Staring at Roman, in the house that abused me, I fist my hands at my side while rage curls into my gut. He was given the rights to a kingdom—money, status, everything. I had a padded cell in the basement, left to rot like garbage. I hate everything he is—what he represents. But I hate that he touched my fiancée more.
Stalking into the foyer, I curl my lip at the ostentatious wealth of the Bruno home. A lush compound built with red brick and white trellises, there are crawling red and pink roses covering the front. In the back is a green hedge maze and a huge five car garage sits to the side.
The focal point is the wrought iron balcony at the front, where serenades and sonnets can be sung off with Shakespearean flair. It’s beautiful, except for the permanent stain of blood from desperate women flinging themselves from the rails.
It’s a better outcome than most.
The white walls of the foyer are perfectly decorated with timeless works of art and a gaudy overhead light. The long staircase, covered in retro pink carpet wraps around to the blackand white tile under my feet. Security stands in the alcoves, hidden.
They’ve learned to double their efforts when I escaped.
Roman rubs a ring on his pinky, a large ruby that signifies his leadership in the family. It’s the ring my father always wore. I have the intense urge to break his finger, take the ring and throw it into the harbor.
Staring at him, I stop a few feet away. Fury rises like a rising flood, ready to consume me whole.
He hurt Collins. He touched what was mine.
“Brother,” he greets and it hits me like a physical blow.
Brother. We look nothing alike. He has our father’s dark eyes, whereas I have my mother’s. He’s pale like his mother and I’m darker like Senior.
We have the same nose and chin. But we couldn’t be any more different.
“I heard you paid my fiancée a visit at work, today.” I knock off the vase, sending it shattering to the floor. The echo of guns clocking is heard overhead but my eyes don’t leave Roman.
“You mean, my wife?” His eyebrow rises.
I bare my teeth. “She’s not yours.”
“Not yet,” he amends. “But, she will be. Ace only has to sign on the line. And we both know how fickle she is in her decisions.”
I want to stab him. Cut out his heart and shove it down his throat.
“She can’t give something away that doesn’t belong to her. Collins is my fiancée—you touch her again, and I’ll break your jaw.”
He stops, looking at me with a bright gaze. It’s the same look Senior gave my mother after he broke her—turned her into a shell of who she used to be. The same calculating glance he gave me when I begged for the men to stop coming into my room.
“I suppose congratulations are in order.” He glides around me, too far to touch. “She wears your mother’s ring.”
"Looks good on her, doesn't it?" I wink though murder still sings in my veins.
“It belongs here. It was our father’s.”
“Yourfather.” I shrug. “Also, if we’re trying to dick around on property rights, my mother was killed with it on her finger. So finder’s keepers, right?”
He clenches his jaw. “Why are you here?”
I kick the foyer table over. It splinters, legs breaking off and the crash vibrates outward. “I thought that was obvious?” I take out my gun, holding it at my side. “We were chatting about your inability to keep your fucking hands to yourself.” I shoot once at the wall beside his head.
He ducks low.Fucking pussy. If I wanted to hit him, I would.
The guns move again, everything clicking. I glance upward, grinning. “Go ahead, Roman. Shoot Ace’s number one. Let’s see how long before she fucking burns your family to the ground.”
“Always hiding behind skirts,” he taunts. A muscle bounces by my ear and I fight the insatiable need to blow another bullet—this time into his head. “Tell me. Does Collins know you take cock? Or are you leaving something for the wedding night?”
I snap. Fury explodes from my gut, long since buried and I surge forward, wrapping my larger hand around his neck. Swinging him into the air, I cut my nails into his flesh and enjoy the fear and pain that fills his beady little eyes.
As a child, I was always the weak one.Not anymore.
