Come a Little Closer (Kadia Club Nights Book 1) Read online

  “Don’t go getting any ideas, Bertinelli,” Marcus growled. “The loyalty in this room is to Drake and Dimitri. Nobody else. If you try to disrupt that, mark my words. I’ll—”

  Erik rose smoothly to his feet and tugged on his suit jacket to straighten it out. It was navy blue with a lustrous quality to it that made the fabric catch the light. Marcus wondered dimly if the damn thing was bulletproof.

  “Nobody is disrupting anything, you ape,” Erik said darkly. “I’m just pointing out the obvious. An unchallenged syndicate? There’s a lot of power in that. Easily accessible power. Are we sure that’s what we want? Adam Cooper is an unpredictable ass to be certain. But he’s also a worthy adversary, and that, in and of itself, keeps others out of our business. They know if they came for the Castalettas and succeeded, one day or another, they’d have to face Cooper. He’s a shield without intention.”

  The room was silent.

  Marcus considered the weight of Erik’s words and was again reminded of how intelligent he was. He saw things from angles Marcus did not. That was why he was in this room tonight. Even though Marcus thought he was an insufferable ass, he had a lot to offer.

  “Not to mention,” Erik continued, “having that much power can warp a man’s mind. Are we sure we can trust Drake with an empire the size of an unchallenged Castaletta Syndicate? Or will he be in over his head?”

  “Careful,” Carrington warned. The old man was learning. He knew who owned him and he knew not to speak ill of his masters.

  Erik rolled his eyes. “This is business, Carrington. Sometimes, the dangerous words are the words that must be spoken.”

  Marcus rubbed his temples. “Are you suggesting Drake might get drunk on the power?”

  “Perhaps,” Erik said.

  “So what?” Thomas chimed in. “More power and wealth for Drake means more power and wealth for all of us. Right?”

  Erik wore a smug smirk as he paced to the liquor cart and fixed himself another drink. “You remember his old Don? Isabella’s father?”

  “Joe, right?” Thomas asked. He’d never met the old Don of the Castaletta syndicate but Marcus imagined Erik’s young right-hand man had heard plenty of stories. Like how Joe had arranged to have his own wife murdered in a dark alley to kick off a whirlwind of events that were intended to lead to his long-term success but ended up leading him to his grave.

  “Joe.” Erik nodded. “He got greedy and then he got dead. I’m not saying Drake is the same man as that, but money and power tend to bring out the worst in a man.”

  “Are you talking from experience?” Carrington asked sharply.

  Erik chuckled and tipped his head back to drain half his drink. “I am.”

  Marcus exchanged a glance with Cole, who remained silent. “None of this matters,” Marcus said confidently. “The decision has already been made. Cole and I are pursuing this first. However shit falls is how it falls. I suggest you prepare yourselves and your men for the unexpected. With Adam Cooper around, everyone should be alert. And Thomas?”

  Thomas looked up from his drink. “What?”

  “Keep an eye on that woman of yours. Cooper has a tendency to strike quick and deep. He knows how hard we fought to keep her safe. And he has a personal score with Carrington. I’d ask her to stay home for now if I were you. Until this is over.”

  Thomas and Carrington looked at each other, and then Thomas nodded. “Consider it done. She’ll understand.”

  Erik polished off the last mouthful of his drink. “Are we done here, then?”

  “For now,” Marcus said.

  Erik flicked his fingers and Thomas stood up and followed Erik to the door. Erik fixed his jacket once more and paused with a hand on the doorknob. “I’ll be in touch. Good evening, gentlemen.”

  “Good evening,” Marcus and Cole said in unison.

  Carrington kept his mouth shut and Erik didn’t miss the slight. He smirked and opened the door. And there, standing on the other side in a glittering body suit of emerald green, was a red-headed viper of a woman. She draped herself up against the doorframe and looked Erik up and down.

  “Hello, handsome,” Keesha purred. “I hope you were coming out to look for me.”

  Erik didn’t so much as blink in her direction. He turned sideways to slip past her, leaving Keesha gaping after him while Carrington got to his feet and thanked Marcus for the drinks. He also took his leave and marched past Keesha, leaving the girl huffing with rage from being ignored by not only one but three men.

  “Keesha,” Marcus said sternly. “Get your ass in here.”

  Cole sidestepped her as she came into the room. He paused in the doorway and Marcus waved him off.

  Once the door was shut and it was just him and Keesha in the room, Marcus rounded on her. “You will not talk to or even look at the company I keep in private like this. Do you understand me?”

  Keesha’s eyes narrowed. “What? Were the five of you sucking each other’s cocks or something? That handsome one in blue your type, Marcus?”

  “Woman,” he growled.

  Keesha got in his face. Her cheeks were red from dancing and her hairline was damp with sweat. She glared up into his face like a fierce cat and jabbed a finger up under his chin. “I don’t know where you get off talking to me like I’m your arm piece, Marcus, but I’ll tell you right fucking now. I’ve had enough of your shit!”

  6

  Keesha

  Marcus grabbed Keesha’s wrist and jerked her in so close she could count the hair follicles on his jaw. He needed to shave. She twisted her arm but he held fast, nostrils flaring, eyes narrowing to slits, and tightened his grip on her.

  “Let me go,” she hissed.

  “You keep thinking you get to call the shots in my fucking club,” he snarled.

  Keesha hardly recognized the man towering over her. He was her Marcus, the Marcus she knew from the hard days back in New Orleans, but he was also someone else. Someone who’d lived through some real shit, seen some bloody nights, and come out the other side physically in one piece but mentally and emotionally fragmented.

  She could practically smell it on him.

  Still, she showed him no mercy. He’d made his choices and therefore made his bed. Just like she had.

  And she wasn’t afraid of him.

  “Take your hand off me,” Keesha said.

  He didn’t. Instead, he dragged her even closer. She could smell his cologne, sharp and masculine and hard to pinpoint.

  “You listen to me, baby girl. This is my club. If I give you an order, what do you do?”

  “Fuck you, Marcus.”

  He shook her roughly. Keesha’s teeth rattled and she pulled away. A desperate whimper fell from her lips but she wasn’t scared.

  God damn him, I’m not scared, she thought to herself.

  But if that was true, why was her stomach turning like this? Why did the feeling of his hand tightening around her wrist have her pulse fluttering at her throat?

  “Kadia is not like other clubs, Keesha.” Marcus released her and shoved her back a step. She massaged her aching wrist and glared at him from beneath her brows as his hand fell to his side. “There are clients no girl in this place has any business talking to let alone looking at. It’s for your own good. And the good of the other girls. Do you really want to get yourself tangled up in a web you can’t escape?”

  Keesha didn’t falter in her defiant resolve. “You just like bossing me around. You always have.”

  “Enough!” His voice shook the room and vibrated against the inside of her skull. She flinched when he rushed forward. “You answer to me. Every man in this room is officially off limits. Do you fucking hear me?”

  Keesha’s mouth tasted foul. Her fury bubbled under the surface and then overflowed. She pushed her hands flat against his chest and shoved him hard. He took an unnecessary step back and she followed, shoving him again, putting all her weight into it. “Fuck you, Marcus! You should have warned me beforehand, not after the fact! I made a
fool out of myself because of you. I’m not a goddamn mind reader!”

  Marcus slapped her hands down and shoved her back. She stumbled but caught herself.

  “Keep your hands off me, woman. I’m your boss. Not your punching bag.”

  Keesha’s hands balled into fists at her sides and she considered showing him just how well she could use him as a punching bag. She’d be able to leave a couple bruises. That was for damn sure. She’d had to fight before.

  But she doubted she’d manage more than that before he put her down on her ass and fired her on the spot.

  That was a risk she couldn’t take.

  So instead, she spat, “That’s rich. Me using you as a punching bag? I think you have your wires crossed, Marcus. You’re spending too much time with these criminal pricks and not enough time around those with IQs high enough to pursue legitimate business means.”

  “Like you?” he asked flatly. “Are you forgetting you take your clothes off for a living?”

  Ouch. Low blow.

  “Some of us are victims of circumstance,” Keesha said defensively. He didn’t know her story. He didn’t know how many bridges she’d crossed and fallen off of and nearly drowned because of. He didn’t know how hard it was to escape a bad past with a baby in tow to start a new life.

  How could he?

  All Marcus had ever known was violence. And money. And power. He had everything he wanted right here under his feet. He’d have given his life for it. She knew that without a doubt.

  “Circumstance,” Marcus scoffed. “Where’s the girl who believed all our choices add up to the ends we deserve?”

  She swallowed a bitter retort. “Things change.”

  He loomed over her and she stood strong in his shadow. “You have no idea.”

  Every muscle and nerve ending in her body ached to step back and create space between them but she didn’t dare yield to Marcus.

  He’d never forget it.

  “I’m sick of you treating me like your play thing,” Keesha said. “You can’t flip flop back and forth between treating me like your employee and then laying hands on me. If you ever touch me like that again, I’ll—”

  “You’ll what?” he challenged as his lips curled in a maddening grin. “Tell me what you’ll do, Keesha. I’m all fucking ears.”

  “I’ll rip you a new asshole big enough to shove your balls into, you brute,” she spat.

  Marcus threw his head back and laughed.

  He actually laughed.

  Bastard!

  Keesha let out a furious yell before marching around him and storming toward the door. She never made it there. Marcus caught her elbow, spun her around, and backed her up with ease until her back hit the door none too gently. She gasped and he leaned in to press one knee between her thighs. He placed one massive hand on her shoulder and let his thumb rest at the base of her neck.

  She stared up at him and her heartrate increased.

  Marcus ran his thumb up her neck and pressed it under her chin, forcing her to tilt her head back. “You forget who you’re dealing with, little girl.”

  Keesha squirmed. Her efforts were futile. Marcus’s strength was and always had been insurmountable. There was nothing she could do against him.

  But that didn’t mean she wasn’t going to put up a fight. He might be able to beat her without lifting a finger when it came to strength but she’d be damned if she let him mentally defeat her. There was still fight burning within her chest.

  As she struggled, it dawned on her that this thing between them wasn’t actually about her. Whatever frustration Marcus was taking out on her had more to do with the four men who’d just left the room than it did with Keesha. Whatever they’d been talking about was weighing heavily on him and she was the only person nearby for him to take his frustration out on.

  She slumped against the door, huffing for breath. “Don’t use to me as a stress ball when this clearly has nothing to do with me, Marcus.”

  He arched an eyebrow and peered down the length of his nose at her. “A stress ball?”

  “Yes. You used to do this shit to me all the time to make yourself feel better. Whenever something was wrong we would fight.”

  “If you want me to use you like a stress ball, I can, baby girl.” Suddenly, his free hand was gripping her breast. He squeezed, released her shoulder, and crushed both breasts together.

  Keesha sucked a sharp breath through her teeth.

  Marcus ran his thumbs along her cleavage. “You’re right. This does make me feel better.”

  She wanted to knee him in the crotch she was so angry. But she also wanted him to rip her sparkly green outfit off and fuck her right there against the door. She’d give him whatever he wanted. He could fuck her throat, her ass, her pussy—she’d give it all up.

  What’s wrong with me?

  She gave her head a shake and ignored how turned on she was, focusing instead on the anger. “You’re an impulsive ass, Marcus.”

  He nipped at her lips. “You used to like my impulsive ass. You used to like it so much you’d make me pull over on the side of the road down the street from your uncle’s so I could fuck you in the back seat. You remember that, baby girl?”

  Yes. I remember all of it. “I grew up.”

  Marcus looked her up and down and licked his lips. “Yes. You most certainly did.”

  “Jackass.”

  “Slut.”

  Keesha brought her hands up and tried to slap him right across the face. But he caught her wrist, threw her arm back down by her side, cupped the back of her neck, and leaned in. His kiss surprised her. She stood stone-still in his grip as his tongue slipped between her teeth, and then she melted against him. He held her face in his hands and kissed her deeply until her knees felt like they were turning to butter and she could feel her pulse in her fingertips.

  No man had ever set her skin on fire like Marcus could.

  Suddenly, Marcus twisted the door handle and threw the door open. He let Keesha go, and without the door at her back, she stumbled back a few steps into the hallway. She could still taste him on her tongue as she looked up at him while he braced himself on the doorframe.

  “I won’t tell you again, Keesha. Stay away from my business clients.”

  “I need the cash, Marcus,” she said, finally getting real with him. That was all this was about for her. She wasn’t trying to piss him off or make him feel like she was disregarding his warnings. But she needed money. And men like the ones who’d been in his office paid well to see her tits and ass. It was worth it.

  Marcus shook his head. “They’ll pay you in blood money, baby. You don’t want that. Trust me.”

  He closed the door, leaving Keesha staring at it on the other side with tingling lips, a racing heart, and a ruined stripping outfit. It was soaking wet in the crotch.

  Damn you, Marcus.

  7

  Marcus

  These women were going to be the death of him.

  Kate and then Keesha?

  What were the chances that on this entire god forsaken planet, he and Keesha happened to run into each other again right here at Kadia?

  “It’s just my fucking luck,” Marcus muttered sourly as he fixed himself another whiskey from the liquor cart in the corner of the private room.

  It was quiet in there, much quieter than every other place in the club—minus his office. Sure, the music still thumped beneath his feet, but this far down, the back hallway on the third floor was removed enough that that was all it was, thumping. A steady beat he might have tapped his foot to if he were in a less provoked mood.

  Fucking Keesha knew how to get under his skin and make him crazy. He’d been foul to her. He knew that. But he also knew a woman like Keesha needed a firm hand—and maybe some sharp words—to keep her safe. She’d never listen to him if he hadn’t tried to frighten her into staying away from men like Cooper or Erik Bertinelli. She would be so out of her depth with men like that.

  He gave his head a shake. Th
at was something he didn’t care to think about.

  Guilt crawled just beneath the surface and he banished it by finishing the entire whiskey in three gulps. There was nothing to feel guilt over. This was his club and Keesha was his dancer to manage. If she didn’t like it, she could leave.

  Simple as that.

  A knock came at the door. Seconds later, Marcus heard it open. He didn’t bother turning around.

  “Boss?”

  Marcus set his empty glass down on the cart. “Come in, Cole.”

  The door closed softly and Marcus listened to Cole’s footfalls across the floor. The leather sofa squeaked softly as the big ex-cop settled into it, and Marcus lifted a fresh glass up over his shoulder.

  “Drink?” he asked.

  “No,” Cole said.

  Marcus finally turned and found Cole watching him. “What do you want?”

  “To discuss how things might go with the NYPD.”

  Marcus nodded.

  They were playing with fire doing this shit, he knew that. Cole was no longer a cop. There were some people in the department who despised him and knew he’d got on with some criminals. But there were others, the less straight and narrow boys in blue, who Cole could still call on for a favor. Said favors always benefitted the cops as well as the Castaletta operation. It was a give and take relationship with the NYPD.

  But asking for their help in dealing with Adam Cooper was a big ask. Marcus knew that even before he and Cole first discussed it in length and brought their proposal to Dimitri, who at first had practically laughed Marcus off the phone.

  The insanity of the proposal was not lost on Marcus.

  However, they’d tried time after time to handle Cooper on their own and they’d come up short. Maybe this time, things would go differently. The police had access to resources even the Castalettas didn’t. And putting Cooper behind bars for the rest of his miserable life?

  Well, that sounded a hell of a lot more satisfying than putting a bullet between his eyes.

  Although Marcus wouldn’t mind that, either.