Phantom's Baby: A Mafia Secret Baby Romance (Mob City Book 3) by Holly Hart Page A

envy. A dozen faces sneered my way with the same message: you're not worthy .
    A burning sense of outrage filled me. What makes you any better than me? I wanted to scream. I'm not with him, but why the hell couldn't I be?
    Right then, internally cheered on by a mix of bitter anger and long-unfulfilled desire, I reached a dangerous decision. I was going to show these women what they were missing.
    I came to a halt behind Val's chair, felt him stir with apprehension, and then relax into his chair when he realized who was sneaking up behind him. I eyed a woman in a floor-length red silk dress, no doubt shipped in from Italy, or purchased from New York for more than I paid the whole of last year for food.
    I held her jealous gaze contemptuously, and lowered my head to Val's neck. She couldn't break her eyes away from me, I felt the flicker of heat from the envy burning her up inside though I stood a dozen yards away. I won't lie; I liked the way it felt.
    For the first time in my life, someone was jealous of me, instead of the other way around. Hell, it wasn't even that. I hadn't even had the energy to covet other people's lives, not after working two shifts and then coming home to cook and clean for a man who'd beat me if I didn't do things his way.
    It just felt nice to be desired. I could tell that's all any of these women really wanted, but I was the only one who really had it, and they hated it.
    I ran my hands from the top of Val's muscular neck, separated at the shoulders, then stroked down the side of his torso. I saw his eyelids flicker shut, and a heat began to build inside me. I knew nothing would sate it now, save absolute satisfaction – so no matter how crazy, or how stupid, or how dangerous this was – satisfaction was what I was going to get.
    I lowered my lips to his ear, my voice a soft husky sigh. "How about we skip dessert?"

    * * *
    I never wanted anything as much as I wanted the elevator ride to finish; to finally fall into Val's arms. An old couple, white-haired, in their late sixties and dressed for a night at the theatre joined us for the ride up. The elevator car was mirrored on all three walls, but I held my eyes dead straight ahead. I dared not look at Val, for fear I might be compelled to jump him right then and there, and to hell with the fact that we had an audience.
    The slit between my legs was burning hot, already wet, and desperate for release. Every time my eyelids blinked shut, even for the briefest half-second, my mind filled with the most graphic images of what I wanted Val to do to me, of his naked body, and of the things I needed to do back to him. My legs shook with suppressed tension, which seemed to join with and magnify even the slightest vibrations from the painfully slow elevator, fanning the raging fire at my crotch.
    "I told you," the elderly wife began in a quavering, croaking voice, "to bring your pills. But you never listen, do you, William?"
    The man heaved out a sigh. "Dorothy, believe me, the day my heart finally gives out it'll be your nagging the does it, not forgetting my pills."
    "You know I'm only worried about you, dear…"
    The elevator door pinged open, and the elderly couple stepped out. Val and I glanced at each other, barely-suppressed smiles growing on our lips. Before the doors slid shut, however, a motion dead ahead made me glance forward. The old woman had turned back, and she fixed me with a frank, appraising stare. I felt like a young girl again, about to receive a tongue lashing from my grandmother.
    "You take care of him, you hear, girl?" Dorothy grinned, with unexpected, playful vigor. Her eyes danced up and down Val's chest, and an irrational pang of jealousy lanced through me. Irrational, because she was hardly competition!
    "Um, excuse me?" I murmured.
    She jerked her thumb at her departing husband's back. "Oh, you know what I mean. Make the most of it, because before you know it, you'll be wrinkled like us. Not that it stops us. That's what the heart