Shadow Keeper (Shadow #3)

“Giovanni. He’s my friend. I’ve known him a long time, if anyone knows a Ferraro, but he’s a player. Straight up. A good man, but a player. He’s never going to go through with the wedding.”

She continued down the stairs, keeping her eyes on where she was going. He put his hand under her elbow and gripped, as if helping her down. She didn’t like to be touched when she hadn’t invited it, and after that ghastly, very public picture in the tabloids for the world to see, she really didn’t like it. Too many men, as she served them their drinks, had brushed against her body as if they had the right. It wasn’t anything she could call security over, but it made her skin crawl. His friends had been the most disrespectful, and that seemed to be on his behalf.

When she didn’t reply, Aaron continued. “Look, I know you’re going to think I have an agenda, and maybe I do. I noticed you right away and tried to get your attention. I was drunk and went about it wrong, but it was genuine interest. Giovanni knows that. He’s competitive. Do you think this is the first time we’ve competed for a woman?”

She hadn’t paid attention to anything he said until the last. It made sense given what she knew about Giovanni. He was competitive, and he detested the way women threw themselves at his brothers, cousins and especially him. She couldn’t help the sideways glance she gave Aaron. She knew immediately he would take that as a go-ahead to continue.

“End it. Give him the ring back. Tell him you don’t want anything to do with him.”

She didn’t know what to say or how to react. She wasn’t someone who doubted herself. She knew she was good-looking. Okay. More than good-looking. She also knew quite a few men thought she was sexy. She had curves and confidence. She wasn’t a shrinking violet. She liked sex and what’s more, she enjoyed giving her partner pleasure, in particular Giovanni.

“Give me a chance.”

“This competition you and Giovanni are supposed to have. Does it involve money?”

He shot her a quick glance and then shifted his gaze away, nodding. She couldn’t judge his voice by his nod. She had to hear the lie, she couldn’t see it.

“So, you bet whether or not you could lure me away from him?”

“No, God, no. Of course not. I wouldn’t do that.”

“Yet you have money on the table between you. How exactly did the bet go?” She stopped and turned so she was right in front of him, challenging him. She wanted to hear his voice. “And look me right in the eye. If you’re betting on my downfall, the least you can do is look me in the eye when you tell me about it.”

He sighed. “He bet me a thousand he could wrap you up before I did.”

Her churning stomach settled. He was lying. She saw it in his eyes and heard it in his voice. Why he was lying, she didn’t know, but he was definitely trying to break up her and Giovanni.

“We’re done. Please don’t talk to me again,” she said. “And I hope Giovanni realizes you aren’t his friend at all.” Deliberately she turned her back on him and went to the bar to get the drinks for her other tables.





CHAPTER ELEVEN


A half hour later, Sasha finally got a well-deserved break. Nancy was supposed to cover her tables much earlier, but she continued to have headaches and had lain down in the lounge to try to combat the one she had, so Sasha had taken both tiers. The Ferraro family sat in full force at their table, which made it just a little intimidating to approach. Still, the ring on her finger gave her an added boost of confidence.

She went right up to the table, stood across from Giovanni deliberately between Geno and Salvatore, his two cousins who had played their game. She smirked at both of them and then locked eyes with Giovanni. “Would you care to dance with me, Giovanni?” She sent him a sultry smile, her voice pure seduction.

Geno groaned. “I don’t think this is going to be a fair competition.”

“No one had better be competing at all,” Francesca decreed.

Giovanni’s lashes lifted and his dark eyes met Sasha’s. She felt the impact right down to her toes. He couldn’t possibly fake that kind of desire. The sensual lines carved in his face deepened. Lust rose, sharp and terrible to settle wickedly in her deepest core. He could do that to her with one look. He rose immediately without a word.

Sasha dropped a hand on either cousin’s shoulder. “Perhaps there is a lady or two ready and willing to ask you to dance.” Smiling, she took Giovanni’s hand, threading her fingers through his as they walked away together.

“Was that a challenge?”

She laughed. “Of course it was. I know you lost a good deal of money to that awful Geno. He was bragging. We’ll have to see just how many points you earn tonight.”

“It’s late, baby. We’d have to hurry if we were going to win back all our losings.”

They moved down the stairs together. Around them flashes went off as the paparazzi went crazy trying to get photographs of the two of them together. A couple had managed to sneak up to the top tier—although to do that she was fairly certain security had to have cooperated. They managed to take pictures quickly before they were escorted back down the stairs. She’d noted no cameras were taken away from the photographers. In fact, everyone had been polite.

Once on the dance floor, Sasha let him guide her through the mass of writhing bodies to the darker edges where she let the music take her. She’d always loved music and dancing. She found the rhythm in the pounding beat immediately and began to move her body to it. Giovanni came up behind her, his body against hers, following the same beat so that they moved almost as if they were already joined, skin to skin.

His hands came up to her hips, guiding her more intimately into him so that she felt his erection pressed tightly against her buttocks. Every time she moved, she rubbed her body over his. She reached down and brought his hands up to her breasts. The moment his warm palms covered her, her nipples pushed against him, begging for attention.

Her breasts felt swollen and achy, hungry for his touch. Her panties were damp, her body going hot and slick. There was something about the pounding beat of music, the dark, his body, so hard and masculine up against hers, just a thin layer of clothing between them. Heat blossomed in the pit of her stomach and spread like wildfire through her veins.

His thumbs strummed her nipples, rubbed through the thin top until she wanted to scream in an agony of need. Her eyes were closed and she found herself sinking deeper into a haze of desire. She took his hand and slid it along the seam of her blouse. It wouldn’t be easy to slide his hands under the camisole, but she should have known he would be able to figure it out. The zipper whispered and the camisole loosened, allowing his palms to slide up her rib cage to the sides of her breasts.

She sighed and pressed back into him again and again, rocking her hips. He kept one hand around her waist, locking her to him while his other cupped the weight of her right breast, his fingers and thumb busy, stroking and caressing, kneading and tugging. Rolling and pulling. Lightning streaked from her breasts to her clit. Her body pulsed with need. For him. She was wrapped in a web of sheer physical hunger.

His breath was warm against her ear as his teeth tugged at her earlobe. More lightning. More fire. Her sheath spasmed. Clenched. Went hotter and slicker. “Baby, you have to ask me to put my hands on you.”

She wanted that more than anything. Skin to skin contact. Her entire body felt as though she was going up in flames. But … a tiny little part of her hesitated. She could have this moment—this intimacy, locked with him surrounded by a sea of people, but it was only the two of them. If he really was playing her, was this moment going to be enough for her? Would she look back on it with regrets?

“Sasha?” His hands went from moving over her body to swinging her around to face him. His palms framed her face. “Look at me.”