Read Keep: The Wedding: Romanian Mob Chronicles for Free Online Page A

had been before, but even Denys seemed to be figuring out the error he’d just made.
    “I didn’t mean anything by it. There’s just talk,” he said quickly.
    “‘Talk’? Tell me what this ‘talk’ is about,” I said.
    “Nothing, it’s just, you know, you have a kid, a woman that nobody knows—”
    I moved swiftly, the small table falling aside as I wrapped my hand around Denys’s throat. Markov scurried out of the way and I squeezed tighter, digging my fingers into Denys’s neck. I stayed crouched low, my eyes on his as I banged his head against the wall, the sound a low thud that soon was even more muted by the wet splat of his blood as it coated the wall behind him.
    He went limp, so I let go and watched as he slumped against the booth. He’d live, probably, but I’d made my point.
    “Markov, you should teach your men manners,” I said.
    He lifted his hands. “No disrespect intended, Vasile. Denys is stupid and becomes even stupider when he drinks,” he said.
    I ignored him and left, feeling all eyes on me as I moved, though each gaze slid away before I could meet it.
    “Drive,” I said when I got into the car.
    I’d brought a driver along tonight, which was a good thing. The energy coursed through me, and I wanted to go back and kick Denys to death. So there was talk about them, whispers of the sort that hadn’t yet reached my ears. I’d known there would be. I was convinced the men spent more than half their time gossiping like old women, but this was the first someone had dared speak such things about Fawn to me.
    I hated it, hated the thought of Fawn and Maria even being known to them.
    I hated the thought of my world touching them at all. But it would, it couldn’t not, not when I was around.
    Which meant I’d have to work harder, keep them more insulated. Because no matter what, I wouldn’t let my world touch them, taint them, destroy them.
----

    V asile
----
    F awn wasn’t in the living room when I got home. The house was dark, quiet, and my chest pulled tight at the emptiness.
    That emptiness had been my life for as long as I could remember, but now I hated it, and the urge, no, the need to see her, hear her voice, propelled me up the stairs.
    Fawn was lying in bed, and she sat up when I entered, the covers falling down around her waist. My heart clenched again, but this time with the love this woman made me feel.
    “Hi,” she said. “I missed you.”
    I closed the door behind me and moved to her, not stopping until I wrapped my arms around her body. Then I leaned down and kissed her, her soft lips under mine, and for those seconds, I felt completely content, at peace.
    At home.
    Yet again, I was reminded that I could not live without this woman. She brought light to my life, brought meaning, and I would never be without her.
    I kissed her, touched her, her skin under my hands both grounding me and sending me to the highest heights. So rarely in my life had anything touched me. But Fawn did. She broke down my walls without trying, loved me for who I was and yet made me want to be better, made me want to be worthy of her and her love.
    Like always, she melted into my touch and parted her lips, accepting my tongue into her mouth. I kissed her with all I had, the all-encompassing desire I felt for her in no way fading even though I’d had her so many times before. But I would never have enough of her, never have my fill, and I prayed she felt the same.
    I pulled her closer, rocking my hips so that my hardening cock nudged the softness of her stomach. That was me and Fawn, hardness to soft, darkness to light, death to life.
    When I broke the kiss, I moved my lips down her neck and over her collarbones, intent on going lower, the scent and taste of her skin driving my already raging passion higher.
    Fawn yielded to me, her hands wrapped tight around my arms as she held me. I broke away long enough to strip her and then myself naked before resuming my path, kissing down her