“Flirting. And your efforts are wasted on me.” She nodded behind me. “Try your moves on my sister. You will not have to break a sweat. Or mess your impeccable hair. You know where she lives. Which balcony is hers. Thedoorwill be perpetually open to you.”
“You think my hair is impeccable?” My eyebrows shot up for dramatic effect.
Her nose scrunched and she made claws out of her hands. Lifting them toward me, she bared her teeth at me in almost a snarl.
I laughed until a sigh hit my lips. “Ahh.” My breath washed over her skin. “I don’t shy away from hard work or a challenge. It fucking thrills me to know I’m putting in hard work for something that’s worth it. That’sallfucking mine. Something I’ll carry the scar for until my body is no longer here.” Without breaking the moment, I reached up and removed the clip from her hair. Then I reached over and grabbed another one from her desk and held it out to her.
Her hair fell to her waist. It was thick, slightly wavy, and smelled like apples and roses. There was a citrusy twist in there somewhere. She had a center part, and it only took her a second to wrangle the strands back into place. Like they were trained to fall a certain way. The teeth of the clip held her hair in a tight twist, and that told me the smaller pieces snuck out of the hold on their own.
Rebellious.
I shivered and made the noise to go with. I fucking liked it.
“You are…” She growled low in her throat. “Insufferable! Cheeky! Pompous! What do you plan to do withmyclip?” She went to snatch it back, but I pulled it out of her reach too fast.
“I’m going into battle soon. I’m going to keep it close. For good luck.”
“How manyclips—” she made air quotes around the word “—do you keep with you during your battles?”
“Up until this moment.” I made a show of staring at the ceiling, like I was thinking. Then I stood to my full height and had to look down at her. The height difference between us was sizable. Our eyes connected before I leaned down and whispered in her ear. “Zero. You’re my first.”
She stared after me as I left, her hands on her hips, but her mouth was slightly open. I laughed, and evenZioRomeo grinned and shook his head as he looked between us.
Out in the cold, I lifted her clip, fighting the urge to sniff the thing like a fucking creep. It had a red silk rose on it. I clipped it to my coat, smelling her scent in the chilled air, and stood taller as we navigated the streets of Venice, on our way to meet my family so we could question a wannabe pirate about the status of my brother’s heart.
The status of mine suddenly?
Lost.
So fucking lost.
Or maybe it wasn’t lost at all.
Maybe it had been in a jewelry store in the middle of Venice all along.
Chapter 3
Mariano
The last time we were in Sub Rosa, the underground club in Paris where Olivier Nemours forced my mamma to dance against her will, we were looking for a man my brother was going to kill for assaulting Chloe, a girl we knew from the small town in Louisiana where mamma and papà had roots and a house. Matteo ended up finding the love of his life dancing on the stage of the underground club, or tomb, as the underground scene was nothing but catacombs.
Stella was the newer version of Scarlett that the Nemours had caged and forced to dance.
That night—was it in November or early December?—led us back to Sub Rosa.
We were on the hunt for the Nemours and the Russians they were working with. We’d learned from the wannabe pirate, one Bertrand Moro, that the Nemours wanted to keep Stella for her monetary worth, while the Russians wanted to get rid of her because of the trouble my family was causing to get her home.
By all accounts, neither family was good to her. The Nemours had taken Stella in when she was just a kid and put her straight to work. They dressed her up as a star, sold her to crowdsof highest bidders as an otherworldly being, and forced her to dance for her life in the circus that had become her life.
Saverio had reason to believe the Nemours and the Russians were hiding Stella in the catacombs. We were on a recon mission to find her. We’d separated into groups—leaders and soldiers—to search the vast bowels of the Paris underground. I couldn’t fathom where they would hide her, unless they carved out a spot for her.
It was colder than a witch’s tit, and the sewer-sized rats were running the fucking show. Some of them darted out of fear, but most of them made eye contact, as if to say,come and get me, you fuckin’ punk.
ZioRomeo and I were leading two sets of soldiers. We were making our way in deeper together. We’d separate when we came to a cross in the road, so to speak. It was safer to travel in heartier groups, though the men who made our teams were competent enough. Most, if not all, of my team were trained by Saverio. The men in Romeo’s team were trained by Guido.
My uncle had a fierce look on his face. He was quiet, and I wondered if it had to do with his hair again. He was truly fucking struggling with the silver hair. I wasn’t sure if he was connecting the end of his youth to it or what. He was angrier than usual.
Romeo was always the uncle cracking jokes or getting a laugh or a slap because of his obsession with his hair. Over the years, it had become athingfor him.
