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“Bastard: A Deadliest Lies Novel” Copyright © 2021 by Michele Mannon All rights reserved. Visit my website at WWW.MICHELEMANNON.COM Cover Designer: Letitia Hasser www.rbadesigns.com Editor: Eve Arroyo No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. Created with Vellum To the year 2021 May you be extraordinary. I loved you once, nor can this heart be quiet; For it would seem that love still lingers there; But do not you be further troubled by it; I would in no wise hurt you, oh, my dear. I loved you without hope, a mute offender; What jealous pangs, what shy despairs I knew! A love as deep as this, as true, as tender, God grant another may yet offer you. “I Love You” ~ Alexander Pushkin CONTENTS Prologue Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Chapter 22 Chapter 23 Chapter 24 Chapter 25 Chapter 26 Chapter 27 Chapter 28 Chapter 29 Chapter 30 Chapter 31 Chapter 32 Chapter 33 Chapter 34 Chapter 35 Chapter 36 Chapter 37 Chapter 38 Chapter 39 Epilogue Excerpt from Rogue Also by Michele Mannon Acknowledgments About the Author PROLOGUE Rome Four Years After Him N ew Year’s resolutions should be simple. Lose weight. Save money. Connect with your inner muse. Mine is weighty. Born from sorrow and anchored in hurt. A harsh reminder of how love and hate aren’t opposite ends of a spectrum—love and hate are the same thing. It doesn’t help that it’s the same resolution I’ve made the past two years. With one amendment— replace him. Forget him and replace him. Four flutes of Italian prosecco and a night spent dancing with a gorgeous stranger, and my inner muse is telling me I might accomplish my goal before the New Year’s countdown begins. Yes, he’ll do. Midnight-black hair. Naughty, teasing smile. Tall frame and muscular body nicely filling out the expensive suit he wears. He dances like he’s fucking, hips flexing and cock thrusting up against my backside. A tantalizing preview of what’s coming if I let it. Sex. Delicious, mindless, anonymous sex. I lean back into the stranger, mind made up. Not missing a beat, he grinds up against my ass. Hands on my hips, he spins me around then pulls me closer, eyes flashing. Green eyes that steal my breath away yet make me want to both cry and shoot someone. Green eyes that both attract and repel me. I break away with a frustrated curse. “Luciana? Are you okay?” my best friend, Madelyn, calls out from somewhere nearby on the crowded dance floor. If I had to choose one person I can always count on, it’s Madelyn. She’s the sweetest, kindest, most grounded person I know. Who, unlike me, has the keen ability to forgive even the mildest of grievances. Adding Rome to our bucket list was my idea. Because somewhere, deep within my twisted psyche, I thought Italy would bring me closer to him. But that was before that horrible night in Cabo, Mexico. Before an innocent man was killed, my friend targeted, and I was left bearing the scars of a bitter betrayal. We’re survivors, Madelyn and I. Victims of anger, bitterness, sorrow, and strife, yet life still marches on, right? Despite it all, I insisted we ring in the new year together in this city. I should have backed out. Faked a headache or, better yet, a stomachache. Sí. It’s time I move on. My eyes skim over the dance floor until I find Madelyn, who’s watching me closely. Unlikely friends, we are, but dear friends, nevertheless. “I need to use the restroom,” I shout over the noise of the crowd. She looks to the man beside me. “God bless Rome,” she hollers back with an approving wink. Message understood. With a slight nod, I turn and offer my dance partner a quick “follow me” curl of my finger. My breasts sway within the deep V-cut of my black dress as I move across the floor, the clingy material riding up my thighs. Heads turn, they always do. I don’t feel sexy. Or flattered. I feel determined. Hope he’s game for an angry fuck. I don’t glance back to see if he’s following. Not when I break free of the dance floor. Not when I’m striding down the green-carpeted hallway which leads me to a smaller, less busy bathroom I discovered earlier, one that has a door that locks from the inside. Not when I slow my pace, making sure to pause before disappearing inside. I switch on the light and cross the white marble floor to a tall pedestal sink. Its shiny, gold faucet matches the ornate mirror above it. Behind me are two enormous wooden doors, also decorated with gilded handles. To my left and against the far wall is an expensive-looking leather bench. My choices—bathroom stall or the bench? I feel my spine stiffening. Where doesn’t matter. Bench, bathroom stall, public restroom. Anywhere will do, so long as I make good on my New Year’s resolution. I narrow eyes at myself in the mirror. Black hair swept up into a loose updo and held in place by a dozen bobby pins. Thin application of eyeliner curling up at the corners, giving my brown eyes a catlike effect. Long, black eyelashes coated with two applications of mascara. Olive skin. I look different, foreign from the girl I used to be and more adept at masking who I really am. Except who am I? Who exactly have I become? I dip my fingers into the V of my dress, pluck a flat tube of watermelon lip gloss from my bra, then apply a coat to my lips. Looking like a more mature, albeit more jaded, version of myself. The lights go out and the lock of the door clicks into place. I inhale sharply, slightly taken aback by his take-charge manner and by how quietly he’s entered. The scent of his expensive cologne fills the room. A crisp, clean smell with underlying woodsy notes. It’s pleasant yet unexpected. I missed that smell when we were bumping and grinding on the dance floor, my attention absorbed by my own emotional struggles than on him. Maybe he reapplied, before we begin bumping and grinding to a different tune? I vaguely make out his shape in the mirror as he leans against a stall door. Arms crossed. Shoulders broad in his suit jacket. Taller than I thought. He’s ten times more dangerous off the dance floor. I swallow back my doubts. “You found me.” He doesn’t answer but just studies me in the dark. The growing silence making me rethink this bold plan of fucking a stranger in a hotel bathroom. I wish I could see him better. He seemed like your typical playboy hoping to ring in the new near with a bang. What’s the hold up? He would have fucked me like a Roman conquistador out on the dance floor an hour ago. “Don’t play coy now. Come take what you followed me in here for.” He prowls forward like a cat on the hunt. Then, he’s on me, weaving his fingers through my hair and gently pushing my head down so all I see is the lip gloss I must have dropped in the sink and the condom wrapper peeking out of my bra. Es perfecto. Fucking him will be less personal this way. Intimacy isn’t what this is going to be about. How can it be when the goal is to fuck another man out of my system? His lips brush across my exposed neck. Whisper-like. The lightest of caresses over a highly- sensitive part of me. His first touch, and it’s like he knows exactly where my trigger-points are. A shiver runs down my spine. I thrust my ass back into his groin. Teeth graze over my skin in response, lightly then slightly harder. Better. I rise up on my toes and drag my ass across his hardness, and I’m rewarded with his light nip on my neck. Gentle, like a caress. Dios, no. Sweet and intimate isn’t what I need from him. Not anyone. Ever again. I try to raise my head. He pushes it back down. “Fuck me like you dance.” I wiggle against him. “Dirty, capisci?” I demand in Italian. I gasp as the hem of my dress is yanked up and over my hips. And then, with a firm tug, he rips my thong off my body. No translation required. He understands perfectly. He smacks my ass. Once. Twice. Three. Four times. “Harder.” He makes a noise that sounds more annoyed than turned-on, then stops. “I won’t break, if that’s why you’re hesitant.” In my limited experience, most men would be thrilled at having the upper hand in a sexual situation. What’s wrong with this guy? His unpredictability frustrates me. “Make me feel something, even if it’s pain.” Silence. But then I hear him behind me, fumbling with his trousers and lowering his zipper. I cry out in surprise as I’m forced forward with rough hands then repositioned over the sink. I grab hold of either side of it in anticipation of what’s next. He spreads my legs apart with a knee, shoves a hand between my thighs, and ever so slowly, drags his fingers across my folds. Once satisfied I’m wet enough, he brings those same fingers to my mouth. His unspoken command fills the silence. “Clean my fingers off.” Dirty. So dirty. This stranger knows exactly how to turn me on. I suck them clean, tasting the evidence of my excitement.