Mafia Queen (The Manning Sisters #1) by Christina Escue Read Free Book Online Page B

those twelve, I was in a relationship for a year or more with eight of them. I was seventeen the first time and I had been dating the girl for a year and a half. I never once spent the night with any of them because it wasn’t my thing. Even when I was in a relationship I liked sleeping in my own bed, alone.”
    Lis looked at him for a moment before she dropped her head and looked at the blanket still covering them. “I’m sorry. I should never have assumed.”
    “Lis, look at me,” Dakota said gently. When she looked up he caressed her cheek and smiled. “I wanted people to think that. I wanted to hide my feelings for you by letting people believe I was screwing around with every woman I was seen with. I wanted you to believe that so you wouldn’t pick up on my true feelings. You have no reason to apologize for believing exactly what I wanted you to believe.”
    “I always thought you were a player,” Lis confessed and looked at the blanket again. “I was always jealous of those women. I wanted to be those women. When I turned nineteen, just after Jonah was killed in that car accident, I snuck out one night and went to your house. You weren’t home so I waited in the bushes beside the front porch. When you finally showed up you weren’t alone. You had a tall, slender blonde with you. I watched you kiss her on the front porch and I heard you two after you went inside. I listened as you had sex with her against the wall by the door. In that moment I decided that I would never be what you wanted. I was totally opposite of that woman and I knew I could never compare. For the next two years I focused on school and tried to forget you.”
    “Lis, I dated women who looked like that because they were total opposites of you. Your petite, compact body and long, dark hair have always drawn me in. They never held a candle to you, in looks or personality.”
    “When Mike first asked me out I turned him down. Then you were assigned to my security and I knew I couldn’t see you every day, feeling the way I did, and not act on it so when he asked me out again I accepted. He’d been a strong shoulder of support after Jonah’s accident and I cared about him. When he proposed to me I accepted for two reasons. First, was because I knew my parents approved of him and second was because I know he was nothing like you. I’d hoped that being with him would stop the thoughts and feelings I had always had for you. It didn’t.”
    Dakota sat there and listened to her talk. When she stopped, he reached out a hand and gently laid it on her shoulder. “Come here,” he said softly and gathered her into his arms. When he laid back her head was on his chest and he started stroking her hair gently. “I am so sorry you had to go through all that. I need to tell you something that may change how you feel about everything. Including me.”
    “Nothing could change how I feel about you,” she whispered softly as she snuggled down into his arms.
    “This could,” he told her and took a deep breath. “I don’t think Jonah’s death was an accident. I have always had my suspicions that Jonah was killed by Morrison.”
    Lis stiffened in his arms as her world flipped upside down. His words confirmed what she had been thinking since that day she’d spoken to her mother in the garden. Her mother had hinted at it, but she didn’t give any indication that it was true. “What makes you think that?” She asked softly and his hand stroked down her hair once more.
    “Right after I joined the organization I overheard a conversation between your father and Morrison. They were working out a deal that would benefit both families. Your father promised you to Michael if Morrison agreed to let the Manning’s hold fifty-one percent of the territory.”
    “Mom mentioned something the last time she and I talked about dad always wanting me and Mike to be together. Now I see that she meant dad was using me as a pawn to control more territory. I wonder if