Faked A Dark Mafia Romance - Vanessa Waltz Page 0,2

mussed his beautiful hair. I could practically smell her on him.

Vinn peered at me. “You okay?”

“Why does something have to be wrong?”

“Well, you’re not talking my ear off, which is a red flag.”

I wanted to tell him the truth—he meant the world to me, and it killed me that I’d always be his best friend’s baby sister. I understood why we couldn’t be together. Michael and Vinn worked for the Family. The last thing the boss needed was a rift between his captains, and as Michael pointed out, Vinn wasn’t interested in a nineteen-year-old.

I usually grimaced through the pain, but not tonight. I couldn’t talk to him. I flourished the wrapped present—a stupid throwback to our youth—and shoved it onto the bar counter beside his hand.

“Merry Christmas, Vinn.”

Then I grabbed a half-open bottle of Chianti and disappeared into the Employees Only area. I walked through three sets of doors before shutting myself in a closet-sized office. I lifted the wine to my lips as the party raged. Nobody would miss me, and at least I wouldn’t have to float on a wave of sadness when Vinn summoned another girl to keep him company. I was sinking into a stupor when a loud explosion rocked the wall.

Drunken idiots.

Christmas parties frequently spiraled out of control. Everybody overindulged. They sometimes performed ridiculous stunts. Before Michael had kids, he was wild. He’d done the dumbest shit, like drunken races with his cousins with a lit cigarette in his mouth. For a while, they got into firecrackers. Not the cheap, kiddie ones—the sort that blew a hole through your eardrum from the blast. Michael’s Audi used to blaze through the Pike as he threw fireworks at other people’s cars. Explosions seemed par for the course, so I wasn’t alarmed at the noise nor the scandalized shrieking that was probably my aunts yelling at some moron.

I drank, ignoring the commotion, and then alarms shrieked overhead.

Whoa. I should see what’s going on.

I stood.

The world swam as I opened the door and inhaled acrid air. As I headed out, my skull pounded. Everything became a confusing swirl of blackness. The smoke thickened. Where was the exit? The air bit at my nostrils. My eyes stung. I coughed and doubled over, swooning.

“Liana!”

No, not him.

A deep burn scorched my cheeks at the idea of Vinn catching me in a vulnerable state.

He stood near the light, his male figure silhouetted against smoke. His head turned left and right.

“Li, where the fuck are you?”

I raced headlong into the black, toward the heat. Go away, I prayed as he tore through rooms. Leave me alone. My head spun as I slumped down, close to tears, way too drunk.

“Liana!” His heavy footsteps shook the ground. “Jesus Christ, kid. Do you not hear the sirens? What are you doing on the floor?”

Kid.

The swell of pain was beyond tears.

I opened my mouth to tell him to go away and inhaled a lungful of smoke. My consciousness zipped out and snapped back into place.

He’d seized my upper arm and yanked me upright. He propelled me forward, dragging me across the floor and outside, where my exhausted lungs filled with oxygen. His powerful grip spun me around. He shoved me toward an EMT.

A mask smothered me as Vinn stood nearby. He had saved me—after heartbreak had almost killed me. His image melted as my vision misted. Then he patted my head the same way Daniel had.

The ache slammed into my chest.

Damn…I really loved him. But I would never be happy if he lingered in my life.

Vinn was an unhealthy addiction. Interacting with him gave me hits of dopamine. The false high always left me unsatisfied and craving more.

Michael was right.

I’d never have Vinn.

I had to find someone who loved me. I’d learn to exist in a world without him because, if this continued, I wouldn’t live at all.

While his back was turned, I abandoned the sidewalk blinking with red lights.

I didn’t crane my neck to check if he’d followed.

I was done with Vinn.

Two

Liana

two years later

I moved on.

It wasn’t the straightest of lines. Like all addicts, I relapsed, but after Daniel’s murder, I deleted Vinn from my phone and strangled the part of me that loved him. That Vinn was long gone. I shoved him out of my life, but sometimes he dropped into my mind unbidden, like a pleasant summer rain tickling my skin. Then I’d remember my brother’s closed-casket funeral, and heartache fisted my throat.

I didn’t think he’d be here.

My insides froze as my gaze passed over