The Carrero Contract - Selling Your Soul (Mafia Romance) novel Chapter 68

The fact is that I am pining, stupid and emotional, and all I keep replaying in my head is him and his parting words. Crushing my soul and tormenting myself, even though it’s stupid.

He wants me gone and I want to be free of him. There is no reason to feel distraught and set adrift because I am getting just that. I skim my phone for the millionth time and hover over his number. Somehow knowing these are the last hours of any connection to him is making me erratic and stupid, and I have to keep chastising myself for letting him get in my head in this way. All I can think about is how he was that night, in bed alone with me after he made love to me, and that’s what it felt like. I know I am obsessing, but … It wasn’t sex, not in Alexi’s typical dominant and aggressive style. It was something else, something more. Something that got to me in ways that cannot be undone. It was seeing another side to him, one capable of softness and gentle caresses.

In the darkness when my senses were on high alert because I could not see him, I was more aware of how he touched me, how he felt, and Alexi made me feel like he loved me for one single night. It changed everything.

It’s in my head, stuck on the fact that in all the months I was in his domain, I never once did anything to warrant how he treats me. I never lied, I never played him or did anything deceitful or broke his trust. I never even had sex with another man besides him. I played by his rules even if my mouth was my biggest flaw. I behaved, stayed in line for the most part and brought his club to where he wanted it. I put my sweat, heart and soul into polishing it to perfection, and getting it running so smoothly the dollars were practically raining on him from above.

I do not deserve what he is doing now. I never failed to meet the standard he set in our agreement. No other men and make my club work. That was it—that was what was required of me and that was what I did.

Fuck you Alexi, you constantly moved the bloody goalposts and made life impossible. So why do I care so much that I am walking away?

That’s my problem right there, this inability to just let it go. Alexi showed me what it could be like to live a life where you don’t run or use sex for a living. He gave me another purpose and some self-respect, something to be proud of. A hint of what it could feel like if he ever fell for me and I want more.

I want my club. I want him and what it felt like that night! Safe, cherished and loved. Like it was only him and me in a safe bubble, where my past, or who I was didn’t matter at all, and Alexi didn’t make me feel owned or afraid for one night, despite what I had witnessed him do.

Ironically, I saw the monster he can be, and then he showed me the part of him that wiped it all away straight after. It was the first time I saw more in him than what he shows the world. It was the first second of my life that I was just allowed to feel and linger in the moment without always being aware of danger or consequences. For the first time in my life, someone made me feel like it was not just sex, control, or fulfilling a need for themselves. He made me feel that I mattered to someone, even briefly.

He took his time and made me finish long before he did, kissed me softly, passionately, caressed me and held me close even long after we were done. Every single second of that night was a huge contrast to what I had known from him before and it’s in my brain like an obsessive-compulsive need.

I keep replaying it over and over and I cannot believe that in those moments he felt nothing at all for me. It has plagued me every second since, and it’s why I cannot just let him go. He did that to make me feel better. No matter what other reasons he said it was for. I refuse to believe it was to keep me quiet, he has better ways to do that.

He killed someone to protect me. He then came and consoled me and stayed with me until I fell asleep in his arms. I felt something and I didn’t imagine it. And then I woke up alone and it’s like he had cut all ties from me as though I didn’t matter at all.

That thought has the power to make me doubt all of it and send me spiralling in anger. Rationally, what he said after makes sense. Making sure I kept quiet and calmed down after witnessing a cold-blooded murder. Keeping me sweet so I wouldn’t run and tell, yet if all that were true then why isn’t he still pandering to me and keeping me close? He is acting like it doesn’t matter at all and letting me loose despite what I witnessed doesn’t make any sense.

On some level, I guess it shows Alexi trusts me enough to know that I won’t ever betray him, or tell the authorities what happened, or maybe he just knows that I have no doubts where I would end up if I did. Swimming with the fish in a pair of concrete boots.

My head is going around in circles, over and over. I know that what he did is probably nothing to him. I don’t doubt he has killed that way before and I can see that it’s part of the reason he is the way he is. I have known cruel and sadistic men and I have known gangsters and murderers. Alexi is the first one I’ve met who could kill with his bare hands and not react in any way whatsoever. It’s terrifying, yet at the same time strangely reassuring.

He’s not a psychopath who got off on it or went bloodlust crazy. He did what he needed to do to protect me and then he cleaned up his mess and acted like it was nothing at all. The sane behaviours of a killer because this is a path he was set upon, and he has become numb to the things he has to do in order to fulfil a role. It’s not the same as being a killer who revels in his bloodlust.

Alexi has a moral code, it’s just more of a soldier doing his duty than of a gangster killing for power. Like me normalising my abuse and trauma over the years and turning sex into a tool, Alexi has normalised what he must do to stay head of his family and uses his ‘’skills’’ as effectively as I did. We are more alike than I realised. We just have different tools in our arsenal and handle the after-effects in the same way, with disinterest and a non-emotional response. Completely unhealthy and inhumane, but somehow, it’s how we survive.

Well, how I handled things before him. He has broken me when it comes to the after reactions. Since Alexi, I have met a barrage of feelings I long ago buried, and even allowing myself to form a friendship of sorts with Mico is proof that he has changed me in subtle ways. I care about Mico and I obviously care about Alexi. I would even go as far as saying I care about my staff at the club, and the club itself gave me a sense of pride and achievement.

He trusted me to run something important to him and it gave me a sense of purpose and something to feel a little good over. Not selling my body, drugs or girls in the conventional way I had.

Instead, a real place where the women had a choice, and he protected them within his walls. He protected me, even when I told myself he was controlling and possessive—not once did I ever feel like he would allow anyone in that place to use me for their own ends. As much as I hated it when he said I was his and acted like he owned me, I secretly loved that I was somehow branded as his and fell under his care and protection.

He never called any of the other girls his, well not that I ever heard, but then I guess Joanne wouldn’t act like the smug bitch she is if he didn’t. Maybe he just keeps it between him and his playthings.

I can’t stop my head going round in circles of hate, adoration, misery, and love. He has royally screwed my brain up for the worst and now I am thinking about him and her, that skanky whore Joanne, and how she probably allows him to tie her up and do kinky things to her every chance she gets. Things I could never allow him to do, even if he wanted me to.

I could never fulfil that side of his desires, so it’s pointless even thinking of it. I need to quiet my brain, or I am going to turn myself inside out with insanity. I need to switch all this off.

I wander to the mini bar in frustrated desperation and browse his vast array of booze. One thing the man likes is quality booze and a good variety of it.

I pull out the gin and pour myself a sizeable glass and dunk in a few ice cubes for good measure. I was never one to run to alcohol to deal with a heavy heart and messy head but now seems like as good a time as any to drown my sorrows. I have nowhere else to be tonight and no one to care if I get smashed and pass out on top of my vibrator. I need to let off steam and get my shit under control. I need to stop thinking.

‘‘Bottoms up Lisa … a new day and all that shite! Forget about him and walk away.’’ I raise my glass half-heartedly, yet I cannot shift the lump of ache growing in my chest and stomach. Downing it in one and gagging on the strength of the alcohol, I pour a second quickly.

I am always pretty controlled when it comes to booze and drugs, partaking but never overdoing it as I like to stay in control. Playing the part of intoxicated but really keeping myself sober, so I am on full alert. I don’t need that right now and I want to forget. I want to drown out the overwhelming pain in my heart that’s pulsing like a heavy drum through my body. I want to stop crying silent tears as though water pouring down my face is the new norm, and I want to hate him and move on.

I open the lower cupboard and locate his array of crazily expensive bottles. I can tell by the fact some are still boxed he reserves these for special occasions, and in my current ‘‘Screw you Alexi’’ frame of mind, I pull out the bottles and line them up ready for my pity party for one.