Dante’s hand cups my jaw as a slow smile stretches his lips. “Hey,Cattivella.”
“Y-you’re okay?” My voice wobbles.
“Considering he’s wearing a bulletproof vest, he should be,” Lorenzo says over my shoulder.
“It doesn’t take away from the fact that I could have internal bleeding, you asshole,” Dante says as he rolls on the floor in pain.
More tears spring to my eyes. “You’re so fucking reckless!” I scream, and his hand freezes on my cheek, suddenly all that smartass attitude having vanished. “You can’t just do that, not in front of me, not ever. You’re not allowed to leave me too!” I slam my hand on his chest, and the breath whooshes out of him, and I immediately regret it. “I’m sorry,” I apologize on a sob. “I’m sorry. Are you okay?” I put my forehead to his. “I’m sorry. Just please stop being so reckless.”
Logically, I understand he did it to protect his brother. But my heart can’t take losing another person, least of all him.
“He wasn’t being reckless for once,” Lorenzo says as one of the masked men lifts the device off of me. “I told him to wear that so he wouldn’t be.”
“I’m not wearing this all the time.” Dante gasps as he tries to roll himself up to a seated position. “I’m sorry I was late. You should’ve never been tied to that chair in the first place.”
My eyebrows furrow deeper. “Late? I couldn’t give a fuck about that right now because I always knew you were going to come. I just… I just…” Why is it so hard for me to say it? Why is it so hard for me to put the final blade down and admit to him… “I just can’t lose you.”
“Be careful, sweetheart, because it sounds like you’re starting to care,” he says with a half-smile.
My pounding heart combusts into a mix of rage, confusion, and fear. “Of course I care, you fucking idiot. You’re a total pain in my ass, but I fucking love you, and if you put me through this ever again, I’ll throw your shit out onto the street again,” I threaten. His face lights up as he slowly comes to a full sit, his hand still stroking my cheek, wiping away the tears.
“Lucky I’m so good at picking locks.”
“You asshole.”
“Say it again,” he requests, and I can feel the heat spread to my cheeks. Why is it so embarrassing to say it out loud?
“I love you, Dante. But you’re still on my shit list.” I can’t help but reprimand him because this asshole is definitely going to give me a heart attack.
He chuckles as he says, “I wouldn’t have it any other way. I love you too,Cattivella.”
Dante brings his lips to mine and kisses me sweetly. It’s strange; the smell and taste of him are familiar, but now that I understand who and what he means to me, I cling to his touch, savoring it as if it might be my last. The kiss then turns into a sensual claiming. I never want to take him for granted again. I never want to take anyone I love for granted again.
“I don’t want to break up this sweet moment, but we have somewhere to be. Ara’s gone into labor,” Lorenzo says.
“What?” I yank myself back from Dante, and he growls irritably.
“Come on, Lorenzo, read a room. Give me a few more minutes at least,” Dante complains.
“No can do. We’re still on the job,” he says, his fingers threaded through Lily’s. She wears a tender smile, looking down at Dante and me.
I make sure to look at only her and Dante, because I catch glimpses of Shaun's and Fiona’s bodies, and that’s definitely something I don’t want to remember.
The masked men begin to deal with the bodies, and I now understand that this is what Dante’s day-to-day looks like. He’s so desensitized to all of this. And even Lily simply avoids looking at the aftermath, as if it’s the way she’s found to be able to accept this part of Lorenzo for what he truly is.
I stand, trying to help Dante lift his own weight. Once he’s on his feet, he feels like dead weight beside me. I try to take a step, but Lorenzo swoops in on his other side. No words are exchanged; he simply shuffles his younger brother under his shoulder and walks ahead, issuing a few orders to the masked men.
I fall behind to walk alongside Lily, and we share a brief glance.
The Moretti brothers might be very different from each other, and they may struggle to use words at the best of times, but maybe there’s hope that something can come from this. That there's a chance they’ll have a relationship moving forward. Because I think deep down, that’s what they’ve both wanted this entire time.
Lily and Ilean into one another as we wait in one of the drawing rooms in the Armani mansion. We’re exhausted and have beenattended to by Dante. He wasn’t willing to have his own wounds assessed until he knew that we were both unhurt. At one point, I think we both fell asleep after all the commotion.
The gunshot resulted in Dante having three fractured ribs, even with the vest. We were advised he made a narrow escape. Not to anyone's surprise, Dante laughed it off, as if he’d planned for it to happen all along.
Now he lies with his head in my lap as I brush my fingers through his hair, guarding over him as he rests. He's so fucking reckless, he’s going to take years off my life. But I can’t help but watch over him right now as if he were a child.
Dante, for all his flaws, still needs to be nurtured. He never had that growing up. He has a mother he can hardly remember, and a lifetime of feeling like he could only charge through life headfirst. And even when he had the brains and education behind him to be great as a surgeon, he chose this path for himself. Not because anyone else told him this is what he should be, but because he wanted it for himself. It’s not the career choice I would’ve encouraged him to take, but if he hadn’t gone down this path, we would’ve never found one another.
