I let my gaze drop to her shadow cast on the marble floor outside my office. I am acutely aware of what I say here—what my nosy sweet girl hears. Though I want no secrets, it is my responsibility to protect her from concern.
Concern is my job.
Hers is to be pretty. Handle my evil. Swell with my children. Remind me that sweet, innocent things can grow around darkness, a flower curling through stone, bringing life and vulnerability to hard, immovable structures like me.
“What I’m building in the District is a real foundation,” I say. “The previous administration failed to do this.” I pause, and let the silence hang for a heartbeat, meaning thread through every lingering moment:Jimmy failed you.
“You sound like a politician.” He laughs as thin as Jimmy Storm’s fucking claim to my city.
“That’s exactly what I was raised to be,” I say, voice steady, jaw tight, eyes on a pretty shadow.
Alceu lowers his voice, a hush more threat than comfort. “You are the Don in the District because you married Jimmy’s daugh?—”
“No.” The word slices through the air. I interrupted Alceu. Have I done that before? Would I have dared?Christ. “IamtheCosa Nostrabecause I am Luca Butcher’s eldest son.” The phone cuts into my grip, betraying my voice that remains smooth and controlled. “Jimmy Storm left no heir, no grandson. I’m tired of trading on his name as if it were my blood. I am a Butcher—of Lucchese blood. My father may have changed his surname, but changing a name does not change what courses through my veins. Perhaps I forgot that.” I click my tongue. “Perhapsyoudid.”
“Careful, my boy.” His tone warns.
“We are past careful.” I say, and the shadow outside hiccups a gasp. “Storm’s legacy in the District is over.”
Cutting ties with Aurora was the final nail.
“You loved Aurora, Se?” His silence is jagged, shaped by static and what remains unsaid: what of my ex-wife?
My fingertips rub against stubble as Luna's demanding meow betrays my little spy. In the doorway, Fawn’s shadow frantically shoos and hushes the cat, unaware of how her silhouette gives her away. I can't help but smile.
“I care deeply for that woman,” I confirm. “She is like a sister to me,Se?I will seek vengeance if anyone were to lay a hand on her. She was given to me as I was given to her, but her father, Jimmy, was always a placeholder, an acting Don until true blood took the seat. I owe no more debts to his name.”
“This girl has changed you,” Alceu says, cold, disappointed, perhaps… nervous? But I am not threatening him; I am educating him.
Fawn’s shadow makes a little waving gesture at Luna, causing the silly fluffy creature to meow with more adamant demand.
Domesticated, indeed.
“This girl…” I drag the word girl, and the pretty little shadow freezes, presuming whom I speak of. “Has shown me who I am,” I finish. “She severed myties to Jimmy Storm’s ghost. Fawn has already given me two sons at only nineteen; my line, my legacy is real. I will have many children. My sons and daughters will be unstoppable. No one will ever question the leadership of theCosa Nostrain the District again.”
He pauses, then says, “We will all be there, my boy.”
“It would be an insult to me”—I declare, reclining to glimpse the tip of pink-painted toes around the doorframe—“and my perfect bride if you did not attend.”
I let the words land, calm, cold, and precise.
Alceu clears his throat. “I agree.”
“I will see you in four months.” I hang up. The quick shuffling away of a nosy little deer and her fluffy white pussy are the only sounds left.
CHAPTER SIX
fawn
It would bean insult to me…
And my perfect bride if you did not attend.
I will see you in four months.
Mulling over Sir’s words, I lay on my back in the huge playpen we have set up in the kids’ activity lounge, with my phone braced in the air, punching a message to Xander. Luca crawls after Luna’s swishing tail beside me, and Ash plays patty-cake on my thighs. The scent of white chocolate and raspberry cupcakes wafts from the kitchen, my newest batch ten minutes from completion.
Fawn: You promise you will be back for the wedding?
