Run Posy Run (Underboss Insurrection, #1)

by Cate C. Wells

I sashayed into this office thinking he loved me, and a quarter hour later, I am staring at a man who seems to be weighing whether or not I’m worth the effort of scrubbing blood stains out of the carpet.

“People don’t make a fool of me and walk away, Posy Santoro.” He says my last name like a curse. “If I see you again, you’re not walking away. Capisce?”

I want her back. I want to break her again and watch her cry. Hear her beg for mercy. I want her terrified and cowering, covered in snot and her own piss.

I’m going to bury him out back under the hostas so I can take a piss on him while standing on the edge of the deck.

That video wasn’t from December. She was telling the truth. The time stamp is a fake. Frankie’s fucking with me. Now why would he do that?

Still, it makes my skin crawl that she’s out there because of my misjudgment. All my efforts for the past eight months blown in minutes. She saw only what she wanted to see, and I had exactly what I wanted. I knocked over my own tower of blocks. How hard will it be to lull her back into her happy fantasy?

When Dario and I first got together, he made me hot just by looking at me. Then I learned he was a taker in bed—like most men—and the novelty wore off.

Besides, I don’t need her pretending she’s a tough cookie when she clearly isn’t. She doesn’t need to be strong. I am strong. I can destroy anything that threatens her—if she just fucking tells me where to come get her.

I know her perfectly. Better than she knows herself. She’s a tangled ball of self-doubt, foolish pride, dumb hope, brilliance, masochism, and blind affection. And I’m obsessed. I need her back.

“I’m going to put a baby here.” He tickles the swell below my belly button.

He wraps his arms tightly around my trembling torso. “Shh,” he whispers in my ear. “You don’t have to fight. I’ll go back to the way I was. You can go back to pretending everything is fine. You liked it like that. It’s over now. You can relax.”

Now, I want. I want Posy to wake up. I want to know what she’s thinking. I want to pick up what I broke and fit the pieces back together until she’s exactly the way she was—but I want her to still see me like she does now. The way I truly am.

I can recognize feelings, but only Posy’s are real. Only Posy’s matter.

Posy Santoro isn’t in my system. She burst into life in my empty shell and made it into something. She is my system. Maybe I didn’t understand that before I lost her. I’m a man. I can be a cliché. Still, it’s true, and I know it now, ever since the moment I caught her. I don’t just get off on what she is—I need it.

“You hurt me.” I didn’t plan on saying it. It seems ridiculous to complain. He nods. “I’ll learn how not to.”

“That was a stupid move with your queen,” I point out although I’m sure he realized it as soon as he did it. “Yes,” he says. “It was.”

“If you run again, when I catch you, I’ll hurt you. Worse than this.”

I only interrupted him a few times before I learned my lesson. Don’t speak to him when he’s working. Or exercising. Or reading. Or listening to music.

It might hurt a little still, but he did me a favor when he kicked me out. He tore off my blinders. I wasn’t in love. I was deluded.

We’ve never done this before. Dario’s pretty much a penis in vagina kind of guy. He’s into all sorts of positions, but he’s not really into appetizers. He goes straight for the main course.

I always thought falling for the wrong man would be my downfall—like it was for my mom. Maybe it’s worse if the wrong man falls for you.

“This is mine.” He squeezes almost to the point of pain, and I rise to my tiptoes, trying to escape the cruel fingers. “You are mine. No one will take you away from me. Not Renelli. Not you. Do you understand?”

His lip quirks. “Yeah. You’re thinking about how you’re going to hock that ring and run.” On instinct, I tuck my hand to my side, curling my fingers into a loose fist. His smile becomes bemused. “It’s yours to keep, Posy, but that’s the wrong choice. If you’re not here, I can’t protect you.”

And what’s wrong with me that I crave consolation and reassurance like an addict, like a love-starved, orphaned child? And I’m asking for it from Dario Volpe? It’s like asking for mouth-to-mouth resuscitation from a fish.

“So I’m a game to you?” It’s not an accusation; it’s a clarification. “No, not a game. You’re the one.” “Which one?” “The only one in the world.” He slips his fingers down my shin and brushes lightly across the top of my foot, the merest dusting of a touch, as if I’m dangerously delicate, liable to crumble with any pressure at all. “Everyone else is a piece. A pawn, a knight, a king. Not you.” I snort softly. “Let me guess. I’m the queen?” “Nope. You’re the one on the other side of the board.”

“We’re going to get married, Posy. You’ll have my babies. You’ll be happy.” He pauses, pensive. “It’s what you wanted. Right?” I don’t say anything. He knows the answer’s yes. Just like he has to know the answer is “no” now. It would be insane to marry a man who hunted you down. Threw you in a trunk. Made you watch him almost beat a man to death. A woman who could do that could have no self-respect, no survival instinct at all.

Maybe that’s why I’ve become fascinated with Posy. She’s an interesting aberration, the one person in the world whose feelings have life to me.

I want her to stay, and so she has to believe she’s safe, and worse, she has to be happy. My nails bite into my palm. I had her exactly where I wanted her, smiling, teasing, willing. I was the center of her world. And then that damn video. Why didn’t I ignore it? Even if she was fucking around, why did I care? If I didn’t like it, I could’ve put Ray on her, found the guy, slit his throat. An easy solution and an effective deterrent.

But I lost my shit, and I needed her to hurt. I know her so well; I knew exactly what words to use. She’s always thought of herself as a whore. All I had to do to break her was confirm her worst suspicions.

And now, I have a new obsession. I can’t make her smile anymore, but I can make her come. It’s not hard. Simple mechanics: rate, pressure, friction. Once she showed me, I could do it without looking.

“What is it, Volpe?” he asks as he adjusts his scarf. “Why Posy Santoro?” I shrug, and I take a shot in the dark. “I don’t know. Why Tomas Sacco?”

“I had a net loss of three million the first month we were together.”

Is it masochism? Whatever, it’s the irony of my life. The only person whose feelings I care about, and she’s the equivalent of an emotional eggshell.

“Why did you let me use you like a whore, Posy?” I give her time to answer, but she can’t seem to find words. “It’s because you figured out a way to get what you wanted. You just want to be loved, and you’ll do anything for it. Does it even matter to you who’s giving you your fix?”

“You played porn star for that loser boyfriend. You played whore for me. Does it matter who’s giving it to you, Posy, as long as you can pretend that you’re in love?”

The burn is spreading to my guts. I need an antacid, and I don’t think Posy’s up for a round of cribbage.

“Don’t worry about it. I pretend, too. And if it makes you happy to believe that I love you, you can.”

It’s so obvious when you think about it. It’s brilliant, really, and so messed up. A man dangles love. The girl leaps. She does what he wants. He castigates her for it. And then he dangles love again. How much higher will she leap? Because she has no other choice, right? If she wants what he’s offering? There are only two choices. Accept being unloved. Or try harder. I’m a scrapper. Of course I wasn’t giving up.

Maybe he’s already having second thoughts. How could I possibly know? I don’t know how lizards think.

I didn’t feel like playing cribbage, and all of a sudden, he decided it’s time to burn the witch.

He was being smug, like he deserved a cookie for finally figuring out how my clit works.

“Dario is the kingmaker. And you’re his woman. Do you know what that makes you?” I shake my head. “Powerful.”

All my delusions have been ripped away, and I know that what he feels for me isn’t love, but it’s real and huge and powerful, all the same.

“Here you have me.” He finally turns to face me again, to skewer me with his cold brown eyes. “I can’t love you, Posy, but I can destroy anyone who threatens you. I can give you anything you want. I can make you feel good.”

He has the swarthy complexion, the hooded eyes, the chiseled bulk and electrifying presence that makes your pussy tingle although you know he’s the definition of unattainable.

I pick wrong, every single time, and I want Dario Volpe. I don’t even want things to go back the way they were. I want him like this—unapologetic and cold and obsessed.

He’s never done this for me before. I thought he was like a lot of the guys in our circle who think oral’s demeaning. He doesn’t seem the least bit reluctant, though. He does seem out of his element.

I’m needy, he’s heartless, and by some magical alchemy, this—this creature we become together—solves us both.

“What are you doing now?” My complaint is muffled by cotton and muscle. “What the fuck does it seem like, Posy?” he says, grouchy as hell. “Cuddling.” He slaps my ass. Hard. “Shut up and take it.”

I’ve been with more than a few of them. Frankie Bianco. Danny Ricci. Hunter Vanzetti. Dario Volpe. I gave pieces of myself to all of them. Tried to make them happy. Tried to make them love me.