On The Ropes Read Online Free PDF

question seemed ripped from Gio’s chest. “You aren’t supposed to be here, and you shouldn’t be wearing—”
    “Are you going to tell him, Carlotta, or shall I?” Marco interrupted smoothly.
    Now I really did have to shut my eyes. Being spread out like this in front of these men hadn’t made my face heat with shame, but imagining the expression on Gio’s face as he found out about my deception did in an instant. “I work here.”
    “You what?” When I didn’t reply to Gio’s thunderous question, a hand came down hard on my ass. It took me a full thirty second to realize it was his.
    And then I began to heat with something else.
    “How could you?” he asked roughly, hauling me to the edge of the table. Against him. “I didn’t want this for you.”
    Blindly, I stared at the wall opposite me, and fought not to offer a million apologies. I didn’t owe him one—or anything else.
    But I wanted to give him what he was pressed against so tightly now, because something was wrong with me. I wanted to revel in the hedonistic desire beginning to spiral through me, tight and full in my lower belly. I didn’t care about those other men. They were there but not. There was only Gio, and me.
    Finally.
    “Oh, she did, and she did it well.” Marco’s smooth voice interrupted the litany in my head as another set of photographs was smacked down on the table beside my shoulder. Even without shifting fully to look at them, I glimpsed my cage—and me inside of it, with my ass in a thong pressed to the thinner-than-normal bars. So someone could touch. Lots of someones, if it came to that.
    It usually didn’t, because I knew how to play the crowd. But it had a few times. And it could any night I didn’t dodge and weave fast enough.
    Like tonight.
    Gio grabbed the stack of photos and sifted through them silently, before slapping them back down again. He said nothing, and didn’t so much as breathe against the back of my neck as he loomed over me. “Why?” he whispered, sounding tortured. “Tell me why.”
    “Ooh, ooh, I’ll take this one.” Z laughed and slouched into the booth, kicking out his long legs. “Because she’s a little cocktease. Isn’t that right, sweetness?”
    “Shut up,” Gio barked.
    “My apologies, amico mio , but he’s correct,” Marco said, and I closed my eyes. If only I could have blocked out his voice too, but that wasn’t possible. “And I have a club full of regulars who can vouch she shakes it twice a week every week, and loves what the men dish out. Just in case you have any plans of crying rape, gattina .” His voice dipped on the Italian phrase and bile rose in my throat. “We also have more pictures. So many pictures…”
    “Stripping doesn’t mean she deserves to be violated,” Gio grated out. “I’ve worked to become part of this family, but if you push me, you’ll force me to do something I might regret.”
    “Threats, Costas?” The man they called Bas shook his head. “A bit beneath you, don’t you think?” He glanced at his associates. “Especially since you’re outnumbered five-to-one.”
    Marco chuckled. “Bas, thank you, but I do believe our Giovanni just needs a bit more light shed on the issue.” He pivoted slightly on his expensive Italian leather loafers, ones I’d admired before. “She’s been flirting with me for weeks. She did it tonight too.” He cupped the back of my head and I fought not to shudder. “In fact, I do believe she’d let me take a turn, if you’re not interested.”
    Gio knocked Marco’s hand off my head. “You’re not to touch her. Understand me?” I sensed he was glancing around at the other men. “You brought her here to me. She’s mine.”
    There was no denying the jolt of excitement that went through me at his rough declaration, but I tamped it down. I still had a strong self-preservation instinct, and I didn’t know how I should react. Or even if I should.
    I wasn’t my sister. I couldn’t fight my way out