Breathless & Bloodstained (The Chicago War #4) by Bethany-Kris Read Free Book Online Page B

back down the stairs as quietly as
she had walked up them. She shouldn’t have listened for as long as she did.
    Their situation
was difficult. It was one Abriella didn’t understand, and clearly one she
wouldn’t ever be able to sympathize with. Some would call her mother a whore,
and her father a weak man.
    Abriella wouldn’t.
She wouldn’t judge her parents for their errors and poor judgment. She wouldn’t
hurt them for their secrets, or use them for her own gain. They had suffered
enough from their choices and actions toward one another.
    Her mother was
human.
    Her father was
human.
    Humans make
mistakes.
    They forgave.
    They loved.
    Abriella knew she
wasn’t the same as her parents. Her forgiveness was not easily handed out, and
her understanding only went as far as her pain did. Tommas’ name echoed right
along with her punishing thoughts that constantly revolved around a man who
never left the back of her mind.
    Because Tommas was
always there.
    He’d gotten under
her skin long ago.
    Abriella almost
wished she couldhate Tommas enough to stay away.
    But she couldn’t.
    The itch was back
under her skin with a few simple thoughts about Tommas and nothing more. It was
a constant ache Abriella couldn’t get rid of, no matter how hard she tried.
Twice since the Christmas party when she had told Tommas to stay away from her,
Abriella found herself seeking him out to soothe the urge beating in her heart.
    Just to be close
and just to see him. Being close led to a touch, and once he touched her,
Abriella was lost.
    If her father was
strong enough to forgive and trust after all that his wife had done to him, why
wasn’t Abriella strong enough to give her lover the same thing?
    She was going to
fail at staying away from Tommas.
    Again .

 
    CHAPTER THREE

     
    T ommas cleaned his
desk area of paperwork, sliding documents back into their respective files
until he could get back to them another evening. Respirare was the only
one of his clubs that he managed hands-on. His dozen others were looked after
by hired managers who were paid a decent wage to turn their cheek to any
illegal happenings when it went on.
    Respirare ,
however, was Tommas’ safe zone. He could personally control who came in and out
because he worked there every night the club was open. He controlled the
workers and their loose lips when he needed his secrets kept quiet.
    Secrets like
Abriella.
    Lately, there
hadn’t been a reason for his workers to get their extra bonuses on their checks
what with Abriella not coming around like she sometimes did.
    Tommas chanced a
look at the decorative clock hanging on his office wall. At well after two in
the morning, the club was closed. The business’s schedule was tight. Last call
came just before one, and the patrons had to be out of the venue twenty minutes
later at the latest. Cleanup and prep was quickly followed by the staff before
they were out of the joint by two.
    His floor and bar
manager was always the last person to leave. The man let Tommas know when he
was locking up for the night. Tonight had been no exception.
    Leaning back in
his chair and closing his eyes, Tommas pressed the pads of his fingers into his
temples to relieve some of the tension headache that had been plaguing him for
the last week and a half. There wasn’t a pain killer or drink on hand that
would make the damned thing go away.
    “Tired?”
    Tommas
straightened in the chair, his boots snapping on the floor with a crack as his
eyes flew wide. He found where the voice had come from almost instantly. Damian
stood in the doorway with a lit cigarette dangling between two fingers and a
curious glint in his gaze.
    “Someday, you’re
going to get your ass shot for doing nonsense like that,” Tommas warned his
cousin. “You almost gave me a goddamn heart attack, D.”
    Damian smirked.
“That’s kind of hard to do when the whole reason I sneak up on people is
usually to kill them, Tommy.”
    True enough.
    His cousin was the
hit