“He has ten seconds to leave.” Brando rolled his shoulders, still staring at Ace. “If not, I will hurt him.”
He had spoken the words as though he were commenting on the weather, but as I had, Mitch caught the wailing of sirens in the distance.
“Yeah,” Mitch said, shaking his head. “He’s gone, Fausti. No problem.”
Mitch nodded toward the door. “Best get going, Holden. This is a private matter.”
Holden sidestepped Brando without a second glance, and I almost expected him to breathe a sigh of relief when Brando didn’t snatch him before he made it out the door.
A few minutes passed as Mitch walked Ace Holden out, and Brando and I stared at each other in the silence. Not before he looked me over, though, from head to toes, as slowly as if he were taking me in for the first time.
“We have to talk, Fausti,” Mitch said, coming back into the kitchen.
“Tell me about that—how you tried to set my wife up with another man.”
“Bullshit,” Mitch spat out.
Mitch spoke to him, but his eyes were still on me.
“Your friend is a liar then. He told my wife that you mentioned us being separated.”
“Last I checked, Fausti, you left her. Holden just wanted to—”
Before I could react, or Mitch knew what had hit him, Brando had him by the shirt and pinned against the wall.
“Holden just wanted to fuckmy wife,” he said. His voice was still so calm, but his eyes…my palms started to sweat from the sheer fear of what he was capable of in the state of mind he was in.
Brando always had his rage in check—he could control it. Right then? I wasn’t so sure. What had happened to me broke him, and the trip to Italy had done nothing to repair the damage.
That would take time andus.
He went there to find relief, but I got the feeling he had only claimed more despair. What he needed was here, with me.
Glancing over at Guido, I noticed him watching the scene with narrowed eyes. Maybe he would intervene, but not something I’d bet my life on.
“You think I’d let him—”
“Yeah,” Brando said. “I do. You have an issue with me.” He shrugged. “Fine. We’re both men. Let’s deal with it. You bring my wife into it, we have trouble, Lewis. Your friend, Ace, came close to losing. You should know by now. I don’t allow anyone to come close to what’s mine. Never have. Never will.”
“Let me go, Fausti,” Mick snapped.
Brando released him, and he went down before he came back up, pulling his shirt down.
“Is this what friends do, Fausti?”
“You tell me, Lewis.”
“I’ve been like your fucking brother since we were kids.”
“True, and more of a reason you should know better.”
“Your way of thinking sucks, Fausti. Ever since Italy, you’re totally screwed up. Can’t stand for another man to even talk to Scarlett.Your wife.You should know by now that she’s a good woman. Even if Holden wanted to talk, that’s as far as it’d go.”
“Not the fucking point.”
Brando wanted to say more, to say that she’s peculiar, there’s something about her that attracts the wrong kind of man, but he didn’t. Knowing that Mitch had the history already.
If Mitch chose to ignore it, that wasn’t Brando’s issue, but he’d make his point that he didn’t want any man trying to get close to me.
