Drago (Made Men Book 6) Read online

  Drago walked down the line of the Luciano women who were lined up perfectly in a row. Each one was different to the next, giving him many options, but none of them had sparked an interest in him so far. He reached the last one in the row; she was easily the hottest one in the bunch. The right age, the right face, and the right fucking body. Hell, the bitch was practically asking to get picked the way her red bra and big tits popped out of her shirt, not to mention the way she kept eye fucking him.

  Smiling, he could just imagine how pissed the Lucianos would be to take her ass away from them. This was the day he had been waiting for since the bullets had ripped through his body. Payback’s a bitch. Opening his mouth, he had finally made his decision. “She’ll d—”

  “This is all your women?” Lucca asked from the corner of the room, stopping him from sealing the deal.

  The room went dead silent, till a throat was cleared and a deep voice escaped the oldest Luciano brother. “Yes.”

  “Don’t lie to me, Dominic,” he warned with a deadly whisper as he stepped away from the corner till he stood inches away.

  Squaring his shoulders, the new Luciano boss looked him straight in his eyes. “These are all the Luciano women over the age of eighteen. Just like we promised.”

  “All right.” Lucca raised a brow. “Then you don’t mind if I look around, do you?”

  There was a slight flex in his jaw. “Not at all.”

  As he left the room, Lucca’s shoulder pushed into Dominic’s as he passed by, before he disappeared into the Luciano home.

  Wondering what the fuck his underboss was up to, Drago decided to let it play out, even though his decision was made. His eyes moved over the men in the room while they waited for Lucca’s return. There seemed to be a silent shift, his protective instincts going on high alert. He looked at Dominic first. It was his teeth he ground just a bit too tightly; he was almost undetectable. Then to the middle brother, Matthias, who was the most obvious. His leg bounced up and down harder and harder with every minute that passed while sitting in the chair he was slouched in. The Caruso’s were holding his identical twin, Angel, as collateral for the time being, so he supposed he had more to lose if this deal went bad. The last brother, Cassius, however, was very young and in the early stages of high school. There was something about that kid Drago didn’t like. He reminded him of those kids in the horror movies who were possessed and stared at you a little bit too long. He was a scary little fucker with obscure eyes who definitely had no business being here. Fucking Lucianos.

  A few more minutes passed till they could hear footsteps coming back toward them. Lucca entered the room again, and it wasn’t till he took a step toward the right did he reveal who he found.

  Drago stared at the young woman standing behind him. She was pale with long hair that looked almost blond but wasn’t; it was the lightest shade of pink he’d ever seen. Her eyes, however, were as black as the leather jacket and eye makeup she wore. It all made her look even paler than she probably was.

  “Fuck.” Matthias jumped up from his seat.

  Dominic took a step toward her, trying to grab her. “S-She’s only seventee—”

  A hand came up, silencing him. Turning, Lucca stared the girl down, addressing her. “Is that so?”

  Her black orbs danced between the three Luciano brothers.

  “I’d advise you not to lie or”—his finger came out to touch her chin lightly to make her finally look at him—“your brothers,” he emphasized, letting the room know he knew exactly who she was, “are going to find out the hard way to never fucking lie to me again.”

  You could hear a pin drop in the room from the deafening silence. The only thing that rivaled the quietness was the tension.

  She swallowed hard as the truth came out. “I’m eighteen.”

  Vinny’s voice filled the silence with a hard consigliere tone. “I’d advise you and your men not to lie to the Caruso family, Dominic. I thought by us keeping Angel in our possession, that was understood.”

  Understanding the threat he was just given, he held the bridge of his nose, clearly trying to think of how to get out of this fucking mess. “She’s my—our—only sister, Lucca, and she is only safe here with us. Please, you have a sister. I beg of you to try to understand.”

  Looking at her a moment longer, Lucca dropped his finger. “Get in line,” he hissed fatally at her.

  Drago watched her bravely walk to stand beside the woman he had already chosen.

  “Now, you may choose,” his underboss gave him the order.

  He walked the line once more, this time paying close attention to each prospect, making it all the way down to the woman he was seconds away from choosing. Truthfully, it was his dick that wanted to pick her. The way she eye fucked him now as she licked her lips made the decision even easier. However, there was a desperation in her eyes he had overlooked the first time. She was simply the decoy to keep him distracted; he saw that now. The Lucianos so clearly wanted him to pick her, knew she would be too irresistible not to choose. And I took the bait… Taking a final step, he stood in front of the pretty pink-haired girl… Almost.

  Drago lifted his fingers, and unlike Lucca, he grabbed her chin, holding it tightly between his finger and thumb to force her eyes to his. “What’s your name, sweetheart?”

  “Katarina.” Her voice came out huskier than he would have thought was possible for her age. “Katarina Luciano.”

  He stared down at her. She sure as fuck wasn’t what he wanted. She was far too young for his taste and was definitely not his type, wearing too dark eye makeup and leather. He preferred a more natural look. She not only fit the Luciano esthetic of a rougher vibe, but she looked like a Luciano, not to mention she fucking was one. The worst kind. Three words were whispering through his mind over and over as he continued to stare at her. The devil’s daughter.

  Drago had been close to choosing with his dick, but now something much more satisfying was going to decide who it was he was going to marry, and it was going to taste so sweet. Dropping his hand from the tiny chin, he looked over at his underboss, the slight smile visible to him finally. You really are a sick fuck.

  Unable to stop himself from glancing at her once more, he let himself do so only for a split second before he looked back at Lucca. Quickly, he nodded, giving his final decision to his underboss before he turned to walk out.

  “What does that mean?” Cassius asked, raising his voice louder when the solemn room didn’t answer. “What does that fuckin’ mean?!”

  Matthias was the one to grab his little brother up to keep them from all getting killed.

  Drago didn’t look back. The bullets the Lucianos had driven deep into his heart had killed it. He made his decision the second he saw her devil eyes, and the ruin he was going to cause that fucking family might finally give him a full night’s rest since he’d been at the gates of Hell.

  Payback wasn’t a bitch. It was a fucking monster.

  Four

  …

  If you thought this was going to be a love story where they fall in love the second their eyes met… you were wrong. This isn’t it.

  Five

  Love a Luciano

  “Wouldn’t he like to go out on a date with Katarina or one of the others before he chooses?” Dominic was scrambling.

  “He has made his decision,” Vinny said.

  Katarina stood there, shell-shocked, staring blankly in front of her, where the man she might soon be calling her husband stood. He had only looked at her for mere seconds before he nodded his head, then disappeared from the room. And just like that her whole life was supposed to fucking change.

  “What is the rush? It’s not like they have to get married right this second.”

  “No, but we expect a marriage by the end of the month.”

  END OF THE MONTH??

  “For fuck’s sake.” Dominic watched as Vinny and Lucca walked toward the door. He tried one more time. “Lucca, please.” He grabbed his arm, stopping
the Caruso underboss knowing very well doing so could end his life. Looking into his eyes, he pleaded, “I’m only asking for them to spend one day together. That’s it.”

  Lucca was silent for several moments, as if he was contemplating several different ways to kill him, before he finally answered with a slight tilt to his lips. “One day, Dominic. That’s it.”

  “Thank you.” A huge sigh of relief escaped him as he let him go. “Thank you.”

  The Carusos left with a few final words from Vinny. “We will be in touch.”

  Hearing the door slam should have knocked her out of her shocked trance, but it didn’t. Instead, she kept staring straight forward, replaying the images of him choosing her again and again.

  “He picked Kat, didn’t he?” Cassius asked solemnly.

  Finally letting him go, Matthias confirmed by nodding his head.

  “Get out!” Dominic roared to the women who were in the room before they all quickly scattered out the door.

  The youngest brother vowed, “We can’t let them get away with this.”

  “We’re not.” Dominic came over to Katarina, placing his hands on her shoulders. “You’re not—” He stared down into her black depths. “—I don’t give a fuck what you do on that day you spend with him, but you be the biggest fucking pain in the ass he has ever dealt with. Make him not want to fucking look at you a moment longer, make being around you unbearable. Be the motherfucking biggest bitch there ever was and make him fuckin’ regret wanting to pick you, Kat.”

  Her other two brothers came to stand beside them, both nodding their heads in agreement.

  “You don’t get it,” she whispered as her eyes turned glossy. They didn’t see it, couldn’t see it. “He hated me the second he saw me because he knew exactly who I was. There is nothing I can do that will make him hate me any more than he already does, and nothing is going to change his mind from marrying me because… this is his revenge.”

  It was hard for the last words to come out, but they all knew who Drago was, the man their father had almost killed. Since Drago’s fall and Chloe’s capture, the Lucianos came under new order by her oldest brother, Dominic, after Lucca killed her father, Lucifer. Her marrying a Caruso would insure the Lucianos’ loyalty forever. And not only that, but it would break apart the very family Drago despised with all his being.

  She had seen that look in a man’s eyes before as they’d looked at her, one of pure hatred. It never burned or hurt any less than the hundreds of times before. It was something only one of her brothers understood, and that brother wasn’t here.

  Dropping his hands from her shoulders, he stood up straight, commanding not only her attention but his brothers’ with a tone so fierce it could only be matched by a god. “Katarina, you are a Luciano, and a Luciano never rolls over to die. We fucking fight like hell.”

  Looking out the house window, she saw the big black Cadillac Escalade pull up.

  “It’s time,” Matthias told her with sadness in his voice.

  Taking a deep breath, she headed for the door

  “Kat....”

  Turning, she looked at the half of the twin set who remained in the Luciano household.

  “If you see him, you tell him we haven’t forgotten about him and that here,”—he pointed to the old creaky floor beneath his feet—“this is his home.”

  She nodded her head seeing the toll being separated from his other half had taken on him since Angel had been taken away from them. Matthias and Angel had been inseparable since inception, two perfectly identical twins who even marred their bodies identically. Tattooing images on their bodies from head to toe that were as identical as them. The only difference were the sides they marked, becoming perfect mirror images of each other. However, that was the outside; what they were on the inside couldn’t be more opposite than the sun and the moon.

  As she went out the door, Dominic was waiting on the other side watching a man exit the dark-tinted Escalade and opening the back door for her to enter. She took a step not wanting to drag out the day any longer, but her brother, the new boss of the Luciano family, wouldn’t let her leave without a final request.

  “Give him hell.”

  She felt sorry for him, for Matthias, and for Cassius. They had false hope, hope that would come crashing down on him the day she would have to walk down that aisle.

  Sliding into the car, with it being so dark inside, she had missed him at first. It wasn’t until the door closed and the darkness encapsulated them that she saw him sitting in the seat on the other side.

  “Angel!” She jumped halfway out of her seat to hug the twin brother she hadn’t seen in what seemed like forever. “You have to go inside real quick. Matthias would love—”

  Angel sat there shaking his head while the other Caruso got back into the car.

  “But….” When the driver started the car and began to leave the lot, the confusion quickly went away and pain struck her heart. She supposed he wasn’t allowed that privilege by the Carusos, but that wasn’t what hurt. It was the disappointment that wasn’t there on his face from not being able to go in and see his family. The scary thing was, Angel could see that she knew it too.

  This made the car ride solemnly quiet, especially with the presence of the Caruso men in the car, and it wasn’t until they pulled up to the most beautiful home she had ever seen that the silence disappeared.

  “I need a minute with my sister.”

  Surprised when the men left the car and closed them into privacy, she looked over at her brother.

  “How are you feeling?” he asked with deeply hidden worry in his voice.

  She hadn’t even realized how she had been holding in her breath since they pulled up. Finally, she let the air out. “Like I’m going to throw up.”

  “You’re going to be fine.” He took her shaking hand, griping it hard.

  “Yeah, well, if I throw up, I’ll just aim for him. That’s what Dom says to do, anyway. He wants me to be a pain in his ass.”

  “Kat, I need you to listen to me.”

  Suddenly, the grip on her hand became harder.

  “That’s not going to scare him away from choosing you. That’s only going to solidify his choice.”

  Her head fell. “I know.” She knew Angel would be the only one to understand when someone looked at you with pure hatred, and how that person seeing you in not only sadness but anger gave them exactly what they wanted.

  He squeezed her hand a little tighter, the worry in his voice now turned to deep sadness, “You have to get him to fall in love with you, Katarina.”

  “W-What?” She looked up at her brother seeing the sadness not only in his voice but marred on his face.

  “The only way to scare him into not choosing you is by scaring him into thinking he could love a Luciano.” Angel’s voice descended to almost a whisper. “Trust me, I would know.”

  She had heard the rumors of Angel getting close to a Caruso girl but couldn’t believe it till she could see it with her own eyes, and now… she had. That difference in him she had spotted almost immediately was him changing. Whereas Matthias was falling apart without his twin, Angel was thriving.

  The Carusos were beginning to suit him, literally down to the tailored suit that gripped his body, like the Carusos had a grip on him. She wondered if they weren’t holding him here against his will. Would you even run?

  Letting her hand drop from his, she placed her hand on the door to open it, but she stopped herself from doing so for just a moment. “You know he’s dying without you...” When the quiet car somehow grew quieter even with her voice filling it, she continued. “Matthias isn’t like the rest of us, you know? We’re monsters. And unlike you, he’s the angel.” Throwing open the door, she had to fight back the tear that wanted to fall. “Lucifer just broke his fucking wings.”

  Six

  I’ll Be Damned

  Knock. Knock.

  She felt fire rise in the pit of her belly when Angel knocked on the door they now st
ood in front of, and when the door flew open to a clearly annoyed dragon-eyed man, the fire pit in her stomach blazed brighter.

  Drago simply just stood to the side, going to let her enter without saying a word.

  Swallowing hard, she took a step into the home, passing the tall Caruso bodyguard.

  “Not you, Luciano,” he spat, placing a hand on Angel’s chest, keeping him from entering. “I can take it from here.”

  She turned around quickly to see Angel mouth the words Good luck before the door was closed in his face. That was when she realized maybe she’d judged her brother too quickly, and that he just might run if he had been given a chance.

  Then, just like that, she was alone, with him. An eerie feeling she was clearly going to have to get used to. When he started walking her through the huge foyer that held a wrought iron staircase, her eyebrows drew together. “Is this your home?” she asked. The words just simply fell out. This wasn’t exactly what she’d expected to walk into; this place was gigantic, modern, and breathtaking. Not exactly the bachelor pad she had expected him to have.

  He thankfully didn’t take offence and answered frankly. “No, this is the Caruso family home where my boss and his children live. I have a room here, since I’m here a lot of the time.”

  “Oh.” She wondered how that would work if they did get married, and if so, where she would end up staying. Being a Luciano, her best guess certainly wasn’t fucking here.

  When they walked into the living and kitchen area, she was even more in awe as he continued talking.

  “I have to finish some stuff up here first, but Lucca thought you might be more comfortable here for a bit.”

  “All right.” She supposed, unsure of what to do next in the hell of an awkward situation she was in.

  “Maria? Maria!” A young boy came from the foyer carrying a textbook. “Do you know where Maria is?” he asked Drago when he entered the living space.