Page 100 of The Beast Who Bought Me
The question now is not whatDamiis willing to do for information, but how far amIwilling to go? I already told him I’d do whatever it took to survive.
Perhaps he plans to test that tonight.
“Well, if this Grisha comes in tonight, send him my way,” Damiano goes on. “I’d like to buy him a drink, maybe throw him a bone, if you catch my drift.”
Jesse laughs as though Damiano has made the funniest joke he’s ever heard. “Oh I will, Mr. Orsini. I will. And if you feel like a little something extra for yourself, I’m sure Mr. King would be pleased to offermyservices to you.”
I’m sitting right at knee level, so I notice when Damiano’s leg twitches. “That’s very generous of him,” he says. “But I don’t want to push the friendship.”
“I’m sure I could persuade him,” Jesse says, and now he takes a step closer to Damiano, his sticky thigh just about brushing mynose. I can’t help myself; I look up and see Jesse Foster sliding his hand up Dami’s bicep.
Damiano glances down at the hand on his arm. At my face beyond. “I’m sure you could,” he tells Jesse with a smile. “Let’s see how things play out tonight.”
Jesse leans into his ear and says something I can’t hear. Damiano chuckles. “Would you like a drink in the meantime?” Jesse asks at normal volume.
“I got someone here to take care of that for me,” Dami says easily. “I’ll send the Clemenza. Let him earn his keep, right?”
Jesse grins. “Yes, sir.” And with that, he sets off to find Grisha—hopefully. He better not be finding Daniel King and begging for permission to fuck Damiano.
“Eyes down,” the man himself tells me.
He’s looking straight ahead. But I’m still glaring up at him. “Have you fucked Jesse Foster?”
He turns his face slowly down to look at me, expressionless. “What does it matter?”
“Just tell me. You said you’d never lie to me, right?”
He snorts. “I’m not stupid enough to stick my dick in a bear trap.”
I quickly look down again. Partly to keep up the charade of submission for our audience. And partly because I don’t want him to see the relief on my face. “Would you like a drink, Mr. Orsini?” I ask the floor politely, but I’m pretty sure Dami hears the acid in my tone.
“Since you mention it, yeah, I would. Go ask the bartender to make my usual. Bar is down at the end, round the corner.” I rise to my feet and he catches me by the arm before I leave. “You go straight there and straight back. You hear me? No wandering off to find a Bratva orgy of your own.”
It’s my turn to snort. And there’s a very tiny smile on Dami’s lips as he lets me go.
The bar is, as Dami said, at the bottom of the L-shaped room, slightly around the corner. I find the bartender and tell him to make Damiano Orsini his usual drink, which apparently is straight bourbon, and half a pint of beer to chase it down.
While I’m waiting, I feel someone slide up behind me. “Hi, Cal,” Jesse says.
I turn to look at him. I don’t say anything.
“I couldn’t say hi before,” he goes on, “since you were there with your owner. It wouldn’t be respectful for me to talk to you without his permission.”
“You don’t have his permission now.”
Jesse giggles. “Sure, but we’re alone now. We can be naughty if we feel like it.”
“You were being plenty naughty before with that group in the corner.”
He gets a dreamy look on his face. “They’re a good time. There’s lots of fun to have here at the Obelisk. You’ll find out yourself, when Damiano shares you with Grisha.”
The bar area is deserted, except for me and Jesse and the bartender. The rest of the patrons of the club are in the long armof the room, and when I glance over my shoulder, none of them who have a view of us are paying attention.
So I grab Jesse Foster by the throat and shove him up against the opposite wall.
“From now on,” I spit, “you keep your hands off Damiano Orsini and your dick out of my face. You wave that thing near my mouth again, I’ll bite it the fuck off.”
I’m not squeezing hard, but Jesse is gasping for air. I let him go and turn back to the bar, where the bartender is staring, mouth open, as though he’s not sure whether to call security.
