Ransom: A Bad Boy Mafia Romance (Dark Desires Book 1)

  Ransom: Dark Desires #1

  Amy Starling

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  Alec Ciarello is a ruthless killer – but in his arms, she's never felt so alive...

  Pleasure and business should never mix. I'm a hitman, son of a mob boss, and that's my rule. But some rules, it seems, are made to be broken.

  Ceci's father owes a debt to the family. Until he pays, she is a prisoner in my home. She hates me for kidnapping her. She's afraid that I'll hurt her, maybe even kill her.

  Yet she shivers with need when I bind her wrists. She softly moans when my lips taste hers. Her fear fuels her lust for me, and I've never wanted a woman more.

  She resists, but I will have her – even if that means betraying the family. Taking lives made me into a monster. Ceci shows me there's still a man behind that mask.

  Let a girl like her go? Not a chance in hell.

  This angel belongs to me.

  Chapter 1 - Ceci

  Nothing worth doing comes easy; that's what dad always told me.

  I expected med school to be a struggle. I didn't expect it'd make me go bald in my twenties.

  “Look, there's another one.” I squinted at my reflection and showed my scalp to nurse Emily. “If my hair doesn't stop falling out by the handful, I'll be wearing a wig before I graduate.”

  Emily kicked her feet up on the desk and shrugged. “Well, becoming a doctor is super stressful. All that studying, no social life, mountains of debt... That's why I stuck with nursing instead.”

  Maybe she was right, but I didn't want to be a nurse. I wanted to be a physician with my own practice.

  At least, that's what I thought before I signed up for so many years of this crap. I was fresh out of high school back then, and maybe a bit too starry-eyed and idealistic for my own good.

  Emily slurped her diet soda through a straw. The hallways of the hospital were so quiet and empty that the noise of it echoed off the walls. As I picked up the fast-food wrappers from our dinner, I figured out that I was kind of jealous of her.

  She wasn't saddled with paying back student loans. She could go out and party while I was stuck at home reading textbooks.

  She went on dozens of dates. I hadn't so much as flirted with a man since school began. There was no time for romance – although I was feeling a bit more lonely lately. My biological clock ticking, perhaps?

  “It's totally dead tonight,” she complained, again checking Facebook on her phone for the hundredth time. “Most exciting thing that's happened was having to change Mr. Monroe's bedpan.”

  Okay, maybe I wasn't that jealous.

  “I'd rather work in the maternity ward.” Her frown turned into a wistful smile. “I mean, wouldn't that be great? Everyone's happy there. You have new parents, cute little babies, flowers and balloons all over the place.”

  My shoulders fell. I couldn't bring myself to say it wasn't all sunshine and roses, that not every mother left the ward in good spirits.

  I'd done a stint over there last week. One night, a woman sobbed uncontrollably. She'd decided to give her baby up for adoption but, after seeing the child for the first time, regret and despair crashed over her so powerfully that even I felt her pain.

  But at least that infant survived the birthing process. It was the ones who didn't that hurt me the most.

  “I know it's hard,” a surgeon had told me after a failed birth, when he found me crying in the lobby. “But you've got to put your personal feelings aside in here. You get emotional, you're putting the patient at risk.”

  He was right. I knew that he was.

  But I was a woman, not a robot. One day, when I met the right man, I wanted a baby of my own so badly.

  If that happened to me, if I lost my child...

  “Hey.” Emily nudged me and whispered. “There's Dr. Gray. He's so cute, isn't he?”

  Pete Gray wandered the hallway, shuffling slowly like a zombie as he muttered to himself. He had a clipboard and seemed to be very preoccupied with its contents.

  He was indeed handsome, but there was definitely something weird about the guy. He was the doctor I'd been shadowing the past few weeks. The man had serious OCD and scrubbed his hands with boiling-hot water every ten minutes or so.

  “Wonder what he's doing just wandering around here,” I muttered. “It's after midnight.”

  As he got closer, I could hear him cursing under his breath.

  “Uh... Dr. Gray?”

  He jumped at the sound of my voice. His clipboard fell to the tiled floor with a loud clatter.

  “Oh, um, Ceci!” He fumbled for the dropped materials. “Didn't expect to see you mingling here in the middle of the night.”

  “I'd say the same to you.”

  Emily smiled at him and tried licking her lips seductively, but he didn't appear to notice. Before any of us could say a thing, his phone rang.

  “What? There's been an accident?” His brow furrowed with concern. “But I had a very important meeting... Oh, fine. I'll get to the OR right away.”

  Then he bolted off and vanished into the elevator. A meeting at midnight, he said? Okay, that was weird.

  Emily sighed dramatically. “He's so clueless. Why do the sexy ones have to be so emotionally unavailable?”

  “Maybe he's gay,” I suggested.

  “Well, that would explain a lot.” She snatched the last of my fries and eyed me with suspicion. “Hey, what about you? I never hear you talk about your love life. You got a boyfriend?”

  I gestured to the thinning hair on my head. “I'm already stressed enough by school as it is. Who has time for love?”

  But I was torn. At twenty seven, I wasn't getting any younger. I knew very well that the older you got, the harder it'd be to have kids. Still, my desire for a family didn't mesh well with my career goals.

  And who was I gonna have a family with, anyway? Due to me burying my nose in books instead of going out and partying with other students, it wasn't as though I had a lot of marriage prospects.

  I felt so lost. Hadn't gone on a date in years and had no idea how to play that game.

  Sex? Ha, right. It had been so long, I wasn't sure if I remembered how.

  “You should try online dating,” Emily said. “Friend of mine found a husband this way. See, here's my profile.”

  I studied her phone. “Sexy nurse seeks smoking-hot, wealthy man to show her a good time,” I read. “Broke losers need not apply. Wow, that's... charming.”

  “I've already been on two dates. Why not give it a shot? Even if you don't find a boyfriend, at least you'd get laid.”

  My cheeks burned as I shoved the phone back into her palm. “How do you know I'm not getting laid already?”

  Thankfully, she got a call before I had to suffer her answer.

  “Oh, it's Brad!” She batted her eyelashes at me. “He's my date for tomorrow. I have to take this. You mind watching the desk for me for a bit?”

  “Not like I have anything else to do.”

  She thanked me profusely, then wandered outside where she could flirt with Brad in peace. At last, it was dead quiet in here, with only the hum and whir of machines to keep me company.

  As I gazed down the empty hall, loneliness began to creep into my thoughts. I wasn't the sort of girl who liked to pout and sulk, but all of a sudden it felt like something was missing from my life.

  My dream career was so close to being mine, yet not even that was enough.

  I wanted love, too. Now if only I knew where to find it...

  The sound of heavy, purposeful foot
steps startled me out of my daydreams. They were the steps of a man in charge, who knew what he wanted and was sure that he'd get it.

  Chills ran down my spine. Who could that be, roaming these halls at this hour?

  Then, from around the corner came the sexiest man I had ever seen.

  His dark, piercing eyes were the first thing that drew me to him. Everything about him screamed power, from his broad shoulders to the way he moved, like a beast chasing after its prey.

  As he neared the desk, his gaze met mine. I shivered. I'd never had such a visceral reaction to any man.

  We hadn't exchanged any words yet, but I wanted him so badly that I ached inside.

  I waited eagerly for him to stop and say something to me, but he breezed on by without speaking. Disappointed, I consoled myself by staring longingly at his ass.

  Bet he looked even better without those pants on...

  I was in such a lustful daze that I barely noticed him slip into one of the examination rooms. Hey, what the heck was he doing? Didn't he know he couldn't just wander the hospital aimlessly like that?

  “How rude. Just 'cause you're gorgeous doesn't give you the right to act like a jerk.”

  Okay, now what? Somebody ought to go get him, to tell him that room was off-limits, but the guy unnerved me. That look in his eyes said he wasn't a person to be messed with.

  Before I could even work up the nerve to stand, the exam room door flung open. The man fixed his stare on me and strode straight up without hesitation.

  “Where's Dr. Gray?”

  “I... I, uh...” My heart was beating so fast I thought it'd explode. Even his voice made me squirm. “He's in the operating room right now. Is there something I can help you with?”

  His jaw clenched, and his eyes briefly closed as if in pain. “You a doctor?”

  It was then that I finally noticed the crimson stain on his white shirt. The metallic odor of blood hit my nose.

  The man lifted his hand just long enough for me to see his wound. It looked as if he'd been stabbed just above the abdomen beneath his ribs.

  “Oh my gosh, you're hurt.” I fumbled for the phone. “We need to get you into the OR right away.”

  To my shock, his heavy hand clamped over mine. “No,” he growled. “Can you help me or not?”

  What was his deal? He'd been stabbed.

  “Well, I'm not actually a doctor yet,” I admitted. “I'm a med student.”

  He clutched his side and winced. “All's I need is some stitches and a couple of Percocets. Think you can handle that?”

  Even though he was standing there bleeding all over the floor, I balked at his request.

  “I can't just hand out opiates to random people like they're candy. That's a controlled substance and I could lose my job. Now, if you're willing to check yourself in, I could –”

  He silenced me with a raised hand. “Here's the deal, lady. I just met the business end of a switchblade and if Dr. Gray isn't available, then you're gonna help me.”

  Nobody had ever spoken to me this way. His demand was so ridiculous that I could barely think of a retort to it. Didn't help that his good looks were so distracting.

  Still, I couldn't in good conscience let the guy bleed to death in front of me. If he refused medical care from anyone but me, wasn't I obligated to give it to him?

  “Okay, but I'm no miracle worker. If something goes wrong, I can't guarantee you'd get to the emergency room quick enough.”

  He cringed as he followed me to the exam room. “I'll be fine. Guy didn't hit any organs. I think.”

  A thousand questions came at me while I gathered supplies from the closet. Who had stabbed him and why? How come he refused help from real doctors? And what was so important about Dr. Gray?

  I showed him into the room and locked the door behind us. What would happen if Emily came back inside and found us in here? I had a feeling it wouldn't be pretty.

  The man sat on the table and removed his suit jacket. When I saw what he wore on his hip, I almost dropped the bottle of anesthetic I was holding.

  It was a gun. Holy shit!

  He caught me gaping at it, but didn't seem bothered in the least. While he removed his bloodstained shirt, I filled a syringe with shaking hands.

  Okay, Ceci, play this cool. Piss the guy off bad enough and who knows what he'd to do you?

  I turned to him with the shot and fought this crazy urge to dive into his arms. Clothed he was totally sexy, but shirtless... Those were the muscles of a man who never, ever lost a fight.

  “You gonna help me here, or just stare all day?” The harshness slowly faded from his eyes. “Not that I much mind the attention.”

  Was he actually hitting on me? I was both thrilled and horrified at the same time. My body needed his; my mind told me to flee for my life and not look back.

  “Uh, yeah. Sorry.” I tried to shake off my conflicted feelings. “Can you lie back a little for me?”

  Finally, he cracked a smile as he reclined, giving me a good eyeful of his well-defined six pack.

  “You want me to take off my pants, too, doc?”

  I froze, and for a moment I thought I'd stop breathing from shock. He was hitting on me – despite clearly being in a lot of pain.

  I longed to say yes, take them off and do filthy things to me, but of course I didn't. I couldn't be that unprofessional.

  “What I'd like,” I said instead, “is for you to put that gun someplace else. You can't bring weapons into a hospital.”

  He snorted. “I'm not gonna shoot anybody, if that's what you're worried about. Not unless they give me a good reason to, anyway.”

  “That doesn't make me feel better.” I tore open an alcohol pad and looked over his wound. “At least I don't think this has gone deep. Are you in a lot of pain?”

  “Hurts like a bitch.”

  I gently cleaned the area, like they'd instructed me to do in med school so many times before. Giving stitches was a piece of cake, but I'd never worked on a knife wound before. Here's hoping I didn't mess it up.

  “I'll give you a local anesthetic,” I told him, tapping the syringe to be sure all air bubbles had gone.

  “I hate needles.”

  “Well, too bad. You wanted my help, didn't you?”

  His eyes widened. He probably wasn't used to people talking to him like that. Even as I injected the medicine, he didn't complain.

  “Thanks, doc.” He sighed as the drug began to kick in. “Uh, you got a name?”

  I hesitated, unsure if telling this man what to call me was the smartest thing to do.

  “Ceci,” I said quietly.

  He thought a moment, then nodded. “That's real pretty. I'm Alec.”

  Without meaning to, I stared at his crotch. His erection lifted the fabric of his pants, and from the look of things, he was quite big...

  Wait, was I crazy? How could I even think about sleeping with him? Alec was plainly trouble, and I was a good girl. I should have nothing to do with him.

  But it had been so long since my last time. I'd managed to put it out of my mind completely thanks to the rigors of school, but now I couldn't think of anything else.

  He tensed as I began to suture the wound. To distract him from the procedure, I figured I'd fish for some answers.

  “How did this happen?”

  He laughed dryly. “I'm sure you can imagine. Some asshole didn't like my business proposal, so he decided to let me know it.”

  “Um, I don't think most normal business people go around stabbing each other.”

  “You'd be right about that.”

  I managed to keep my hand steady and do the sutures straight and tight. Luckily the wound wasn't large, so he only needed about ten of them.

  “There's something else I want to know.” I wiped the remaining blood off his stomach. “Why couldn't you go straight to the ER? Why did it have to be Dr. Gray who tended to you?”

  His grin faded. He gestured to his gun. “It's not obvious?”

 
That didn't really answer my question, but I could see he wasn't interested in saying more. Clearly, he was involved in something bad – which meant I should stay far away from him if I had any sense.

  But this chemistry we shared, I'd never felt anything like it. I was drawn to him like a magnet to metal. Did he feel it too?

  “Dr. Gray knows me,” he said at last. “I just... I don't trust anyone else, you know?”

  “Yet you trusted me.”

  He shrugged. “Didn't see that I had much of a choice. I'd expected him to be here when I arrived.”

  “Hope I did a job that's up to your expectations.” I carefully placed a bandage over the cut. “Ah, how exactly do you plan to pay for service? Do you have insurance?”

  For a moment he looked at me like I'd grown a tail. Then he laughed.

  “Insurance? You're adorable.”

  Annoyed though I was, I couldn't help feeling disappointed when he put his shirt back on.

  “What are you laughing at? You don't just march in here and demand treatment for free.”

  He waved me off. “Tell Dr. Gray I was in. He knows to take care of it. Now, how about those painkillers, huh? A prescription for a dozen or so ought to tide me over.”

  “I told you, I can't do that.”

  He slid off the table and came close to me. His body warmed mine, and a hint of exotic cologne was enough to make me tremble with need.

  “Aw, c'mon, doc. You wouldn't seriously let a patient suffer in agony, would you?”

  “You don't seem to be in any agony to me. And if you think I'm that stupid, sorry to disappoint you. We get people pretending to be hurt so they can score drugs all the time.”

  He sighed. “It's a shame you can't be more understanding. Hmm... I know. Maybe this will convince you.”

  I had no time to react when his arms curled around me and his lips found mine. I should have freaked. Should've shoved him away and ordered him to take his hands off me. How dare he grab me, a complete stranger, and kiss me like I belonged to him?

  But I couldn't. It felt so right that I just let it happen.

  This was no sweet, gentle kiss. It was powerful and demanding, rough, violent almost. Much like Alec himself...