“No.”
“I know who your family is,Fausti.Their power is immense and stretches beyond their beloved Italy. The blood in your veins belongs to one of the most powerful families in the world. If your blood would possibly become involved—”
“No,” I cut him off before he could get started.
“I see,” he said. “This changes nothing. I stand with you. I see their light in your eyes. This makes me feel safe enough.” He picked up his wine glass and took another sip, sighing afterward.
“Your wife is right. You should not fear leaving her. He will be sure to provide protection for her. After all, as much as she is his, for business purposes, he belongs to the both of you. I see, ah, that she will not cooperate without your guiding hand. He knows this. He will not jeopardize the fortune he believes he has found in her for anyone. Not evenla famille.”
Scarlett and I had argued. I had told her that I was quitting my job to live full time in Paris. Her argument was that she wanted the house to be ours, not bought by the devil. Whether it was Luca Fausti or Olivier Nemours.
It wasn’t her argument that had won me over. Emory had been right; Nemours wouldn’t jeopardize her safety, and my last name alone enforced the rest. After the attack on Emory and me ordered by Nemours, theFausti Famigliareacted. Not for my sake, but out of honor. No one touched blood that belonged to the family. Lucious had filled me in on this detail and showed me the paper. The men’s hearts had been taken from their chests.Personal.
“I will be here to protect her.” Emory narrowed his eyes in response to my reaction. “Brawn does not always keep someone safe,” he snapped. “You might have the means to physically protect, but I have knowledge. I know the inner workings of Olivier. I will be a double agent.”
He lifted himself up from the chair, pulling out a paper from his back pocket. He slid it across to me.
“That is the layout to Sous Rosa. All of the exit routes are marked. He makes his patrons believe it is in the catacombs, but it is truly not. It is, ah, in a cellar, which he turned into a reality. I can keep her safe. The less you are around to meddle, the less inclined he will be to kill us both.”
“Tell me how this benefits you.”
He smiled and shrugged. “I get access to a family that,perhaps, will not want to maim me all of the time.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Brando
The young Emory’s story about Scarlett’s long-lost family member turned out not to be entirely true. Or so Scarlett thought. We were discussing this en route to her first performance at Sous Rosa since the rat’s meddling.
The truth, the way the story had been told to her, was that the woman and man had been having an affair, and whoever the woman was to Scarlett had been dancing for the man, but the man’s wife had found them, saw her dancing, and snuck up behind her husband and slit his throat.
After the murder, the wife ran off to claim that she saw the mistress tempt him from their bed with her dancing, and as she had hypnotized him thoroughly, the mistress slit his throat. When people arrived to check the truth of the story, they found the mistress with blood on her hands and the man in her arms.
“But who really knows?” Scarlett said, finishing. “It might all be a lie. It was so long ago. And now people like to make sense of situations that had no room for common sense back then. Witches and all that.”
“Is there anyone in your family that isnotassociated with some torrid story?”
She threw back her head and laughed. The first true laugh I had heard from her in a while. “Are you claiming that I come from a bunch of peculiar people, Fausti?”
“Peculiar would be an understatement, Ballerina Girl.”
She hit me with the back of her hand and I grinned.
I lifted a finger. “You have a peculiar sense that seems to thrive on too much empathy. That comes from one side, or so I’ve heard.” I lifted another finger. “Then there’s this supposed witch who can lure men from their beds by dancing. Somehow, some way, both stories have been connected to my wife.”
“I think that’s the longest speech you’ve ever given.”
“The mind boggles.”
“Smart ass,” she grinned at me, but her cheeks flushed.
“Tell me,” I said, knowing she wouldn’t if I didn’t order it. In the bedroom, Scarlett was fierce, uninhibited, like when she danced. Outside of it, her innocence stole my breath. It was such a change, almost two women.
“You have a fineculo,” she muttered. “The finest I’ve ever seen.”
“Yeah, like I said, peculiar.”
She laughed again, and I realized how addicted I was to the sound of it.
