Barresi: Emily Trilogy: A New Orleans Mafia Romance Read online

  Barresi: Emily Trilogy by Lux Miller

  © 2018, 2019 Lux Miller

  All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. For permissions contact:

  [email protected]

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. The medical procedures performed in this book are fictionalized and should not be attempted on any living being. Please note that this book contains situations that may be triggering for some and situations that are not appropriate for readers under eighteen years of age.

  Eyes of Stone by Lux Miller

  © 2018, 2019 Lux Miller

  All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. For permissions contact:

  [email protected]

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. The medical procedures performed in this book are fictionalized and should not be attempted on any living being. Please note that this book contains situations that may be triggering for some and situations that are not appropriate for readers under eighteen years of age.

  ONE

  I close my eyes as I drift nearer to my target. I’ve always found it easier to do my job if I don’t make eye contact with the intended victim. Making eye contact bridges connections. Connections stir up feelings. I don’t have time for feelings of regret or shame.

  My life is what it is. I do what I do. I also do it really well, so if I’m a bit quirky about it, nobody says anything. If they’ve even noticed. My roommates and I aren’t exactly the best of friends. In fact, we hardly know each other.

  I don’t dislike the girls I share a makeshift dormitory with. It’s quite the opposite. I have deep respect for every girl who is on the street with me right now. We’re all fighters with nothing left to lose. It makes us bold. It makes us fearless. It makes us efficient.

  Andre likes efficient. He punishes sloppy. I don’t even see the wrathful side of Andre, but I’ve seen enough of him to know that it’s best to stay off his radar. Perform to his expectations, but don’t be extra. Don’t go out of your way to impress him. I learned that lesson the hard way. The ones who impress him are the ones he watches. Nobody wants to be watched. Not by a man like Andre.

  Don’t get me wrong. Andre isn’t a villain. It’s not that simple. He provides shelter, food, and warmth for myself and a couple dozen other street rats. To everyone else we were trash tossed on the street. Andre pulled us off the street one by one. Naive, tired, and scared, we trusted him.

  He cleaned us up and taught us manners. He provided hot meals. He gave us a place to sleep out of the rain. He clothed us and provided the basic needs of humanity. All he expected for his gracious gift was reimbursement.

  For the girls whose bodies tempted him, he took his payments in the form of sexual favors. For the ones who didn’t match his preference, he sold their services to the clientele of the seedy jazz club he owns.

  For those like me, who were no longer of use in his prostitution ring, he demanded recompense in other forms. Don’t feel sorry for me. The day I aged out of his sick fetish was the day he stopped coming to my bed in the middle of the night for payment.

  Before I turned eighteen, every night he would dress me up in the finest garments his stolen money could buy. He would parade me through the club to entice his clientele, but he never sold me to a client. Despite wads of cash being offered for a night of my company, he kept me for himself.

  The other girls were auctioned off to the highest bidder. Then he would spirit me away to the private bedroom above the club. There, he would ravish me with the kind of attention that made my stomach churn. When he had satisfied his carnal needs, he would take his leave of me. I'd cry myself to sleep in my bed with only my shame as company.

  Once I hit eighteen, he banished me to the dormitory with the other girls. Never once was I treated like an outsider or the discarded favorite. The other girls had never wanted my station with Andre. His penchant for twisted fetishes was no secret among the girls. I wasn’t the only one that had kept his motor running, but I’d been the only one he’d never shared with clients.

  He refused to let another man sully his personal property. I was subjected to one-thousand-two-hundred-and-seventy-five nights of paying my way with my body. He'd seemed to be the only man concerned with saving me from the mean streets of New Orleans, so I didn't argue.

  When I could no longer satisfy his primal urges, he required that I repay his generosity in others ways. Quickly, I learned the art of picking pockets. Pilfered drugs, jewels, and cash became my salary and the career was lucrative. For seven years, I’ve slipped unnoticed through the crowds of tourists. I've delivered thousands of dollars’ worth of stolen goods to Andre nightly.

  By now, my routine is mundane. Andre has me tend the bar. For the first half of the night, the legitimate paying customers came to Piacere for the jazz and booze. Before long, the establishment is rollicking with liquored-up patrons. Andre sends me to loot the pockets of the men who have their pants around their ankles upstairs.

  The stroke of midnight has always been my signal to hit the streets and rob the tourists blind. I’m slight and with my honey-blonde hair tucked away inside my windbreaker, I fade out of sight easily. I’ve been caught before with my hands in someone’s pockets. But I haven’t run afoul of the New Orleans Police Department in years.

  Peering outside through the pane glass windows of the front of Piacere, I smile to myself. It’s beginning to rain and a panic is settling over the crowd outside. Soon enough, they will begin pouring inside the club seeking shelter. There are some who wouldn’t be caught dead in a seedy establishment like Piacere. For them, there will be the protection of the balcony that juts out from the second story dormitories.

  Large groups tucked into small places are my favorite targets to hit. It’s easier to stay hidden inside a crowd. I indiscriminately slip my sticky fingers into pocketbooks and pockets alike. Lifting wallets, watches and jewelry is like child’s play to me. One pass through a good crowd will yield hundreds of dollars worth of stolen goods. I can pass them off to Andre to keep myself off the streets for one more night.

  As I push my way outside and begin to weave through the crowd, lightning cracks across the sky. The sky opens and rain begins falling, splashing off the concrete. As expected, the startled tourists begin to push and shove their way underneath the balcony. They're concerned about the rain and not the thief watching them. They leave themselves unaware and vulnerable to my quick-moving hands.

  Within ten minutes, my pockets are weighed down with baubles. This round of picking has been lucrative. I may be able to call it an early night and retire to the dormitories upstairs before Bourbon Street shuts down. The only thing I love more than clearing pockets during a rainstorm is drifting to sleep to the sounds of the sins of New Orleans.

  Ducking back inside the club, I waltz over to the counter where Andre leans, his elbows resting against the aged wooden surface. If he wasn’t a genuinely despicable human being, he might once have been attractive in a silver fox kind of way.

  Years of shady
dealings with unscrupulous clientele have grayed and thinned his hair. His skin has become oily with the perpetual perspiration that dots his brow. His teeth are yellowed. Where he once stood tall and proud, these days he is stooped from the scurrying he does nightly to squirrel around every bit of money he can manage.

  Rumors are that Andre has contracted the New Orleans mob to keep a watchful eye over the place. There's been threats from local drug cartels and other pleasure establishments. They aren’t happy with the business that Andre is stealing from them. I tried to talk him out of it two years ago when he first agreed to pay for their protection services. So far, the mob has upheld their end of the bargain and Andre has been free of his competition encroaching on his profits.

  Now, instead of petty drug dealers and disgruntled Johns knocking at his door, Andre has the mob breathing down his neck. The kind of protection he contracted doesn’t come cheap and one doesn’t get second chances with the mob. Sure, they won’t burn your place to the ground if you miss a payment or two. But sooner or later, the collector comes to fetch your dues.

  With the combined manpower of myself and a dozen other girls skulking about Bourbon Street, I know that Andre is rolling in dough. That in itself is a problem. The more you make, the more you pay. And I'd be willing to bet that Andre regularly cooks his books. I doubt he’s ever paid the mob a true twenty percent of his earnings and if he has, he certainly hasn’t in a long time.

  I turn out my pockets onto the bar and Andre rifles thorough my offerings. He quickly flicks the various pieces of jewelry and the one watch I collected into a bag and ducks beneath the bar. I hear the telltale sound of the safe’s lock tumbling about. With a grunt, he shoves the bag into the safe and stands back up at me, counting over the cash I’ve manage to get my hands on.

  He tuts to himself, twisting his jaw as he fingers every coin and bill. He announces to me, “It’s not enough. Go back out.”

  I gasp as I shove my hands through my now-damp hair that hangs just below my shoulders. “What? How is it not enough?”

  Andre shrugs and makes a grand sweeping motion with his hand over the small pile of cash. “This is less than two hundred dollars. You know the rules, Emily… five hundred is the cutoff.”

  Grumbling, I cross my arms over my chest. “There was at least a grand in jewels if that watch was real!”

  Andre waves off my tempestuous complaint. His eyes focused on the pane glass door as the chime tinkles to alert us that a patron has entered the building. “Just go. And don’t come back inside anytime soon. I have business to discuss.”

  An ominous feeling settles over me and I turn to see my worst nightmare striding inside the building. Easily six foot three and built like an athlete, the man stalks across the floor like an animal on the prowl. His face is chiseled with dangerous angles, but it’s far from the most dangerous thing about him. My belly tightens as he sets his full lips into a dark, twisted grin.

  His eyes flick to mine momentarily as he appraises me, disgust flashing across his face. I blink in an attempt to break the spell he’s cast over me, but I’m rooted to the spot. The gray in his eyes shifts as turmoil rages like a storm on the sea. He walks past me, but despite my lust-filled stupor, I hear him mutter two words. “Piccola ladra…”

  He narrows those haunting grey eyes at me and rakes his gaze over my body. A shudder creeps through me the moment he turns back to Andre and leans over the bar. He clears his throat as Andre backs away from the mahogany wood, his back pressed against the wall. Andre’s Adam’s apple bobs in his throat as he flicks his gaze to me and utters, “Leave.”

  ***

  It took every ounce of willpower in my short, little body to pry myself off that wall and slip outside into the storm. Not my favorite place to be, but the tension boiling over inside Piacere was too thick. A chainsaw wouldn’t be able to cut through it. I’ve never formally met the guy that just brought scowling darkness inside the club, but we’ve crossed paths before and I know who he is. Trouble.

  Anybody who’s lived in New Orleans for any amount of time knows who he is. Luca Barresi. He’s the Enforcer for the mafia empire run by his father and grandfather. And he didn’t earn the nickname by drawing it out of a hat.

  He’s cold, cruel, and calculating. He is danger personified and the last person in New Orleans I’d ever want to piss off. From the looks of the wild gestures between Andre and Barresi, I’d say Andre is perilously close to doing just that.

  I duck behind one of the columns supporting the balcony overhead and watch with piqued interest. If Andre’s run afoul of the Barresis, I want to know why. The girls and I bring in enough liquid assets each month to fund a casino. There’s no way he’s behind on his payments… unless…

  A sharp squeak slips out of my mouth as I jump back from the column. The sight of an angry Barresi slamming his fists onto the bar startles me. Leaning against the column, I peer around it and see that Andre is sweating. He’s nervous. My guess is that he’s been hiding assets and Barresi isn’t buying his excuses.

  Shuddering at the implications of angering Barresi, I watch as Andre picks up a dishrag from the bar top and blots the evidence of his deceit. As Andre nods fervently, Barresi turns from the bar and nearly catches me staring. I duck out of his view just in time as he storms away from the weasel behind the bar. He pushes the glass door open and turns back to Andre, sneering, “One hour, Norris… you have one hour…”

  Without another word, he steps out onto the patio and flicks open a dinosaur of a phone. Though it’s startling to see such an ancient piece of technology in his hands, the reasoning behind it isn’t lost on me. It’s likely a burner phone, untraceable to anyone. Something he can toss in the event of complications. He’s muttering into it in a language I don’t recognize, but based on his lineage, I assume it's Italian.

  My ears perk up as I try to focus my attention on the darkly handsome man. He is weaving in and out of the foreign language and English. While I can’t translate the Italian, the words he speaks in English make my blood run cold. “Yes, Boss. Understood, Boss. I will take care of it, Boss. Norris won’t get away with this.”

  He snaps the phone closed with a scowl. He drops it into a pocket somewhere inside of the black leather trench coat that swirls about him in the wind. I catch glimpses of a dark blue shirt that peeks out from underneath the trench coat and suit jacket. A slender black tie points down his body to a pair of perfectly tailored pants that fit him like a glove. I blink fervently as I realize I’ve been staring at the man like eye candy. He may be gorgeous, but beneath that pretty exterior is a demon that prowls in the shadows of New Orleans.

  Shaking my head to clear the lingering thoughts, I back away from the column. I slip around the side of the building. As soon as I’m clear of the view from Bourbon Street, I hightail it down the alleyway to the back of the building. I fumble with the key I keep sewn inside my bra. Once I release it from the binding undergarment, I let myself into the rear entrance to Piacere. I lean against the wall there, breathing heavily as a million thoughts race through my mind.

  I don’t know how long I stand there with my heart thundering against my ribcage, but it seems to take forever to calm myself down from the almost-encounter. When I hear the doorknob to the back entrance jiggling, my heart starts racing all over again. “Thank God it locks automatically,” I muse softly to myself. My heart thuds several times before a sharp rapping against the door convinces me to scurry away from it.

  As I round the corner into the kitchen at the back of Piacere, I almost run smack into Andre. His feathers are ruffled and not in a good way. “What the hell, Emily? I told you to leave. I meant it. Get the fuck out of here!”

  I cringe as he raises his voice at me, but I stand my ground as I stare at him defiantly. “Why is Barresi pissed at you?”

  Andre’s voice is tight as he leans down over me, “Quit being defiant and just do what I say.”

  I shy away from him and retort over my shoulder, “Sounds famili
ar. Kinda like how when I was fifteen and I cried for my family. You told me to quit being defiant and just do what you asked like a good little girl.”

  Andre flinches as I throw the past in his face. He gives me a quick once-over with his gaze and shakes his head, “Too bad you don’t do it for me anymore. I could use a fuck right now.”

  I level my gaze at him, my voice hostile as I taunt him. “You’re so old by now, you probably can’t even get it up without a magic blue pill.”

  Andre growls as he steps across the room, pinning me to the wall. I squirm against him, but he’s bigger than me. Though he isn’t much stronger than I am, it’s enough for him to keep me trapped. I'm between the hardness of the wall and the hardness of his crotch that he rubs against me with a sneer. He leans down so that his rancid breath is just inches from my face. “You were saying?”

  I grunt as I twist my face away from his, gulping the fresh air I find once I slip out of his grasp. “Leave me alone, Andre.”

  Andre snags me by the back of my shirt and tugs me against him. “I will never leave you alone, Emily. You belong to me. Whether I’m fucking that sweet little pussy of yours or not, you will always belong to me.”