Dirty Secrets: O'Donnell Crime Family, #3

By Paula Cox

Dirty Secrets is book 3 and finale of the O'Donnell Crime Family trilogy!

I’m her worst sinful nightmare
She’s the kind of girl who has no business around a brute like me.
Nineteen. Beautiful. So fragile she could break from a hard stare.
She’s running from something—or someone.
I saved her, but now I’ll own her.

I’m a mob enforcer—I hurt people for a living, not go around saving girls.
But Emily was something else.

She was so young. So innocent.
The way her eyes would pull away when you look hard enough
--like she’s afraid she’ll break.

I had no business being around her, no business kissing her.
But once I had a taste, I couldn’t stop myself.

I’ll own her sweet curves.
Use her for my pleasure .
And leave her ruined for anyone else.

• Language: English
• Publisher: eBook Publishing World
• Release date: Nov 14, 2017
• ISBN: 9781386547792

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DIRTY SECRETS: O'Donnell Crime Family (BOOK 3)

By Paula Cox

I’m her worst sinful nightmare.

SHE’S THE KIND OF GIRL who has no business around a brute like me.

Nineteen. Beautiful. So fragile she could break from a hard stare.

She’s running from something—or someone.

I saved her, but now I’ll own her.

I’m a mob enforcer—I hurt people for a living, not go around saving girls.

But Emily was something else.

She was so young. So innocent.

The way her eyes would pull away when you look hard enough

—like she’s afraid she’ll break.

I had no business being around her, no business kissing her.

But once I had a taste, I couldn’t stop myself.

I’ll own her sweet curves.

Use her for my pleasure .

And leave her ruined for anyone else.

Chapter 1

Jude

When we get back to the bar, the only thing on my mind—except for Emily, who is always on my mind, even if every so often she’s a background track—is cleaning myself off. I make toward the bathroom as the other guys go to the bar for a drink. I’m about to enter it when Mickey’s voice cuts through the bar. He speaks quietly, but it’s the quietness of a feared king, the quietness of a man who knows he never has to raise his voice to be heard.

Jude, my office.

I go into the backroom, past containers of whisky and potato chips, and into the small office hidden in the back. I walk in and Mickey gestures at the seat opposite his. A man like Mickey, you’d expect him to have a grand, kingly office, but this room is bare and plain, the chairs simple wooden stools, the desk devoid of any personal indulgences. It’s a Spartan office.

I sit down. If Mickey has any problem with me smearing blood all over the chair, he shows no sign. He doesn’t seem to notice the blood at all. But then, he’s Mickey, the leader of this crime family. His entire life has been spent in the presence of blood.

Heard you gave the man a Judas Kiss, Mickey comments, with the shadow of a smile.

How does this man know everything?

He reads my expression, and then says: Tool texted me. In code, of course.

I just did my job, I mutter. Too much is made of this Judas Kiss business. It’s almost as though a man can’t just go about his work without people twisting his bloody tasks into some kind of heroic gesture. Judas Kiss, is, really, only, a punch, and yet people treat it like some emblem of the life.

Mickey grins openly now. Yes, yes, I know. We don’t have to indulge in all that nonsense, do we? That’s why I called you in here, actually. I’ve got your pay.

Already? You go freelance, you get paid when you work; you sign up with a family, you wait for the cuts to be spread out.

And a bonus, Mickey goes on. He reaches into his pocket and takes out a huge roll of twenty-dollar bills. At a glance, I’d guess there was around twenty thousand dollars there. He casually counts out ten thousand dollars and slides it across the table. Then he counts out another three and drops it on the pile. I take the money, roll it up, and stuff it in my pocket.

Thanks, boss, I say.

Mickey waves a hand. You’ve earned it. That asshole didn’t deserve to live. That’s the truth about some men, Jude. They don’t deserve to breathe. How much do you know about natural selection?

I blink at him, dumbfounded. Mickey is like a pinball sometimes. One second he’s beating the blood out of some unlucky gentleman, the next he’s philosophizing.

Nothing, I admit. I think it was that Darvin guy, wasn’t it?

Mickey’s grin is positively beaming now, like a little kid on Christmas morning. Darwin, but close enough.

Okay...

I want to go back to the apartment, take a shower, see Emily. I know Moira’s there, but it’s almost three o’clock in the afternoon and I want to see how the ladies are getting along. I decide I won’t bother washing up in the bathroom. I’ll just get home as quickly as I can. But of course I have to let Mickey finish. If there’s one thing you never do in this life, it’s interrupt the man in charge.

Survival of the fittest, Mickey says.

I’ve heard of that phrase, I offer.

It’s commonly misunderstood, he lectures. That’s what he sounds like: a professor giving a lecture. People misinterpret it to mean survival of the strongest, but that’s not what it means at all. Fit, in the biological sense, means a collection of genes and traits which are suitably adapted to their surroundings. For example, a chameleon, whose entire life is based around hiding, is fit. That’s interesting, I think.

Yes, sir. When he starts talking, he can really get going, can’t he?

"You are suitably adapted to your surroundings, Jude. You’ve lived it. You’ve breathed it. You are the fittest, and that’s why you’ve got a bonus. Barry and his friends, they are not adapted, which is why they have to go. He rubs his eyes. I’m rambling, Jude. Forgive me. I’ve just been thinking a lot lately about the life, the nature of what we do. He shakes his head. Anyway, what I mean to say is, we’re suited to this. We’ve been doing it a long time. We know how the game is played. Barry didn’t. His friend, Patrick, doesn’t. My hope is that Patrick and his buddies take Barry’s death as exactly what it is: a proclamation that they are not, nor ever will be, the fittest. We are. Failing that, it will at the very least send a different message: we’re coming for you, so don’t get too comfortable."

The blood has dried and stuck to my body now. I feel it peeling away from my skin.

Mickey rolls his eyes. You can go, Jude, he says.

Thank you, sir.

I go into the bar and make for the door. Tool touches my arm.

Yeah? I ask.

Did he give you the survival of the fittest speech?

I laugh. He’s given you the same one?

Tool nods. He bought a book about evolution a few weeks ago. How survival of the fittest applies to business management. He told me he regrets not reading more when he was younger.

I leave the bar, chuckling to myself. You can be in this life for a year or a decade and it’ll never fail to surprise you. People think of us as monsters, but the truth is we’re just men like anybody else.

I