Sweet Release (A Bad Boy Mafia Romance) Read Free Page B

all. This is a guy’s place, you know? I was just treating her like one of the guys is all.”
     
    The behemoth in the room took a step forward, and leaned his fists on the table. “That so? In that case, Rex, you want me to jerk you off? Just one of the guys, right?”
     
    Rex recoiled. “I didn’t mean… look, I’ll go, okay? It won’t happen again.”
     
    Mike shook his head slowly. “Nope. Jarome was clear. One strike. This was it. You’re out.”
     
    Rex’s face reddened, and he tensed. “You can’t throw me out, asshole; I pay my dues.”
     
    “Take it up with Jarome, then,” Mike said evenly. “His place, his rules.”
     
    “Shit,” Rex spat. He looked at me, and I held my hands up. No answers here.
     
    Mr. Mike straightened, and folded his massive arms over his massive chest. He looked like he might just tear out of that shirt any second. What was it even made of? Some space-age material you could stretch across a room, I assumed. He waited, patiently. After a moment, he started tapping his foot, staring Rex down.
     
    Rex eventually got the message. With a huff, he got off the table—clutching the sheet to him in his sudden modesty. I wondered if I should leave him to dress—if Mike and I both should—but Mike didn’t move, so I didn’t. We watched as Rex carefully dressed himself.
     
    At the door, the oily prick turned and sneered at both of us. “I’ll have your jobs. Shut this place down. You guys don’t know who I am; my brother works for the city.”
     
    “Gosh,” Mike said, sympathetic, “if he heard what his brother was up to, trying to get a happy ending in a legit venue like this one, that’d be real embarrassing for him, then, wouldn’t it?”
     
    Rex spat something foul, and then stormed off, slamming the door behind him.
     
    I let out a long breath. “Wow. That. Was. Fantastic. I’m Ella, by the way. Robinson. Pleased to meet you. Thanks for that.” I stuck a hand out.
     
    He took it with a hand big enough to nearly swallow mind whole, though in fairness that pretty much describes half the hands on the planet. “Mike Frazetta,” he said. That voice. Oof. Hit me right in the gut. A smooth bass that I felt in the air between us. “Rex was a lost cause anyway,” he went on. “Jarome told him he didn’t have the chops, but the guy can’t take criticism, didn’t believe it.”
     
    “He certainly couldn’t cut it on my table. Good thing they pay in advance.” I smiled. “Well… crisis averted. So… how long have you been working here?” I knew, of course, but I had minutes to kill and would have been happy to listen to Mike talk for hours.
     
    “I got out Saturday,” he said. Then he scratched the back of his head self-consciously. “Out of school, I mean. I’m a trainer.”
     
    “That’s what Jarome said. Welcome on board. I guess I’m no longer the newbie, huh?” I winked at him.
     
    “Didn’t you start last Thursday?” He asked. There was amusement in his big brown eyes, though.
     
    “Two days before you did,” I agreed. “Which gives me seniority, by anyone’s reckoning.”
     
    Mike chuckled, and nodded his head. “Yeah, okay. I’ll buy it.” He looked around the room, and then back at the door. “Well… I should let you get back to work.”
     
    “Yeah, I need to clean this mess up.” I waited for him to leave, or say good bye, but when he didn’t do either of those things right away I snatched what I thought was a tiny loose thread of opportunity. You don’t play, you don’t win. “I’ve got a lunch break at one,” I said. “Don’t really have any friends in this town yet, so… care to grab something cheap with me?”
     
    I didn’t know why I even asked him. I hadn’t been out with a guy once since my divorce. And I wasn’t sure a guy like Mike was the right type for me. Maybe I should settle down with an artist type. But then again, I’d gone for the straight-laced, suburban dad type once before, and it