Drawing a deep breath, I pull the knife from my corset again to complete the image in the reflection. “I look like Satan’s bride,” I say quietly to myself, sounding amused. Sounding deranged.
“No, you are Alessio’s but, yes, you do.” I jump, having already forgotten Armando was even in the room. He smirks at my knife.“Your brother is said to be the best with a blade. I suppose it makes sense he’d give you one.”
I spin toward Armando, not even sure what I mean to do. “It’s mine, my birthday gift.” What if he takes it? It’s my last defender.
He steps closer butcarefully.“I wouldn’t advise knife play this early in the marriage. Not with Alessio.” I gasp as his meaning hits, and something unexpectedly gentle flashes in Armando’s dark brown eyes. “Hey, I was teasing you. I know my friend better than he knows himself sometimes.”
Whatever that’s supposed to mean, I don’t find out because Armando leaves, saying I should shower and rest, that he’ll be guarding my door to keep me safe until Alessio arrives.
I can’t shower. I can’t even easily remove this dress on my own. The adrenaline has bled off by now and a mixture of shock and heavy fatigue sweeps over me. The bed calls to my tired limbs, but I don’t dare lay in it.
Choosing a corner facing the door, I sink down, my full skirt billowing around me. Clutching my knife, I wait for my husband to arrive, remembering the look in his eyes when I stopped him from shooting Nico in the back.‘Blood cries out for blood, one way or another.’Shivering, I curl into a ball but I’m past tears. Bibi warned me not to cry anyway, didn’t she?
The day wears on as I keep my vigil, wondering what’s happening without the strength to seek any answers. The room grows dark, and my eyelids grow heavier. Night is upon us. It would nearly be time for the bedding if the day had gone according to plan.
I’ve nodded off when the sound of a banging door draws a scream from my throat. But it’s not an unknown man with a gun like in the nightmare I was having. It’s my husband, covered in blood and stalking toward me with a twisted grin and fury burning in his eyes.
“Finally time for the bedding,” he drawls.
Terrified, I scramble to my feet and shake my head. A breathy ‘no’ slips past my lips as I point my knife at him, preparing for what will likely be a futile resistance.
“What’s this, my darling? Only a steel kiss to welcome your hero home?” he mocks as he keeps coming ever closer.
11
Alessio
Thirteen dead, twenty-eight wounded. What a fucking nightmare. Rocco was permitted to handle security for the wedding. When I find my cousin, I should cut his worthless balls off.
Our men fought well, but I can see the wounded pride under their fury. “Those Bratva bastards will be bragging about this for decades unless we annihilate them,” Sabatino, our Underboss from Phoenix, growls to a handful of the younger captains present.
“We will make them bleed ten times as much,” I promise them. It’s the words they’d expect me to say, but I receive several approving nods in return. They want their vengeance to soothe the sting of this fiasco.
The hotel venue is swarming with law enforcement by the time I call Armando to make sure he got Caterina safely to the mansion, but I have better things to do than give statements tothe cops on our payroll. We’ll make sure the press says what we want them to say about this mess, too.
“You survived, I see,” Carlo Vicini says, joining me as I slip out the rear exit. The future Don of New York is a year older than me. He has a playboy’s reputation by night and a brutally calculating nature like his father by day.
“Yes, still alive. Sofia finally released you?”
“She was frightened,” he says with a shrug.
No doubt but Sofia had been clinging to him like a barnacle on the dancefloorbeforetrouble showed up uninvited when I had decided to see what was keeping Caterina in the ladies’ room.
If I hadn’t gone after her…
Maybe that would’ve made my father’s revenge plans simpler. I shake my head, not wanting to think about it further. Though I was angry when she stopped me from killing Nico, I couldn’t help admiring her fierceness. My kitten has claws. She even said she can use a pistol. We’ll have to see what other hidden talents she possesses. Hopefully, poisoning husbands isn’t one of them.
“Is this making you reconsider marrying my sister, Vicini?”
“Not at all. Just don’t expect the same level of excitement at our nuptials.”
But, we both know when you’re born into this world death comes calling even more frequently than usual. The hard part is knowing it can come for those we’re meant to protect as well.I might’ve lost her. Why does that thought fester beneath my skin like a splinter I can’t pluck out?
“Oh, your little brother was looking for you.”
With a nod to Carlo, I go search for Valdo, cursing Bibi for not taking him home with her and my father for insisting he remain. He’s nine. What the hell is he supposed to do here? Mop up the blood?
Of course, my own initiation began when I was even younger because I had no mother around to protect me like a lionessfrom the beast lurking in our den. I still recall the humming sound of the generator and the way the metal clamps burned my skin. My father is a sadist in the truest sense of the word. He enjoys passing his madness and cruelty along to his sons the way other fathers might teach their boys about baseball or cars.
