Sneak Attack (Tapped Out 2)

Which he then proceeded to suck.

I leaned in close to Gio. “Nice friends.”

He only grinned and slung his arm on the back of our booth. He’d been drinking all night too, but somehow he didn’t seem drunk. Come to think of it, I hadn’t noticed him ordering for a while. My ability to recollect wasn’t too great right now, so I might’ve been wrong.

Goddamn, I was drunk.

It was possible I’d never been more drunk in the whole of my life.

“Big on the coming part, I’d wager,” I said, gesturing with my beer bottle at the tongue-and-tit action across the table.

All three men let out rich, appreciative laughter and I sneaked a glance in the direction of the exit. When it had been just me and Gio, we’d had a surprisingly good time. He wasn’t a complete asshole twenty-four/seven, as I’d understandably assumed. He had a good sense of humor, and he’d been happy to buy a few drinks to start me off.

From the amount of cash he’d flashed when he opened his wallet, I figured he could afford it.

With all of the subtlety of a drunk, I shifted closer to Gio again and made a paltry effort to lower my voice. It still made me wince when it came out, so I had to think I hadn’t succeeded. “They betting on you? Is that why you’re so fuckin’ rich?”

Gio barely blinked an eyelash but Lorenzo removed his lips from his teat and wiped his mouth with his heretofore pristine napkin. “Nothing wrong with a little honest betting on the matches, Fox.” He reached down to undo the button on his jacket, and it fell open to show his matching piece. An accident, I was sure. “No different than betting on the college kids during March Madness.”

“Well, yeah, it is a little different since MMA is still illegal in New York.”

Marco/Matzo/Mateo leaned forward and locked his fingers together around his glass. “Now, Fox, that’s a strange thing to hear from a former fighter.” He glanced at Lorenzo and grinned before looking at me with his weasel eyes. Their smallness didn’t match the rest of his features. “You trade in your dick for a pussy when you swapped out those gloves?”

“Hey, hey guys,” Gio said, laughing as he shot me a measuring stare. I knew he was worried I’d decide to upend the table and start a brawl to show them I could still fight.

Tempting, but I hadn’t been brain-damaged enough in the ring to start shit with two guys wearing Smith and Wessons, no matter how much I wanted to erase their smirks.

Instead I leaned back in the booth and widened my legs, slow and sure, like the smile that spread across my face as easily as butter on toast. “Why don’t you come on over and check for yourself, buddy?”

For an instant silence reigned over the table. That was a misnomer

, because annoying pop music still filtered through unseen speakers and asses still shook on the stage halfway across the room. Laughter and voices still mixed like oil and water, pounding in my temples until I had to rub the spot near my eye—the socket that Gio had busted—that always signaled pressure first.

Giovanni chuckled the loudest, looking uneasily between the other men and me. I didn’t want to test which side he’d be on if violence erupted. Despite the fact we’d come together, I highly doubted Gio would have my back. Hell, maybe he’d even hold me down for his buddies to whale on.

There was a life lesson in this somewhere. Never drink with a man who’d as soon as knife you as pat your arm, as he was doing right now.

“Ah, Fox. He enjoys his drink a little too much,” Giovanni said with false affection, narrowing his gaze at me in warning.

He didn’t need to bother. I wasn’t spoiling for a fight. All I wanted was to go home and sleep it off with my girl curled up beside me.

Or you know, look up and watch her stare down a table of unsmiling men—and a wide-eyed waitress, who still had an exposed breast—with her hands on her waist like an angel of deliverance.

“Who got him drunk?” she asked, throwing her braids back over her shoulders. “I suspected you,” she said to Giovanni, “but I see you brought reinforcements.”

“Who is this?” Marco said under his breath to Lorenzo, who merely shrugged. But I didn’t miss the way his dark eyes lit as they roved over Mia.

I might be a mostly affable drunk, but any jerk who eyefucked my girl in front of me was asking for it. Smith and Wesson aside.

“Gentlemen, this is Mia Anderson,” Giovanni said smoothly.

“The fighter,” Lorenzo said with obvious reverence, and the gleam in his eyes only grew. He displaced the waitress from his lap, sending her off with a flick of his fingers along her bra to adjust her nipple and a pat on the ass. He rounded the table to Mia. “I’m Lorenzo Donato. I’ve heard much about you, Ms. Anderson. It is a pleasure.” He extended a hand and she took it, confusion written all over her face. He lowered his mouth, his intent clearly to kiss her knuckles.

I rose. What the fuck.

But Mia reacted before I could. “Sorry, I’d rather not have the mouth that was just on some babe’s breast on my hand.” She yanked hers back and wiggled her fingers with an artificial smile. “I’m kind of a germaphobe.”

The grin that split my cheeks didn’t help the throb in my skull, but it damn sure dialed back my aggression. Giovanni cleared his throat, but I could tell he was on the verge of a grin too. As was Marco, if that was even his name.