Antonio steps closer, dropping his voice.
"You can. We have it all planned. The next major event youattend together. We will make it look like you were kidnapped by another gang out here. We'll be back in Italy before your cartel prince even realizes you're gone."
"I don’t know…," I whisper, unease filling me.
‘Why am I suddenly hesitant to leave?’
Antonio's eyes harden.
"You don’t actually love him, do you? You belong with your family, Liana. His family is…"
"Our family isn't exactly innocent, Antonio,” I say, cutting him off.
"We are different. We protect our own. These people?" He gestures to the house behind me. "They'll use you until you're broken, then discard you. They will play with you until they’re bored. Is that what you want?"
I think of the warehouse. Of Rio's sister and her casual cruelty and how easily Rio stood there and watched. But then I think of Rio and how good he’s treated me now. The way he looks at me when he thinks I don't notice. Rio wouldn’t play with me like that, would he?
"I…I don’t know," I say finally. “I don’t want to go home and be forced into another marriage alliance. I’ll be trading one cage for another.”
Antonio's face softens, and he reaches out to touch my cheek.
"You don't belong here and you never did. Alessio is dead. This marriage was a mistake and you won’t be forced into another one."
For a moment, I let myself imagine walking away from all of this. I could go back to Italy, back to the safety of what I know, but this time with freedom.
The memory of Rio's words echo in my mind.
"You're mine, Datura. Mind, body and soul. And one day, you're going to realize I'm yours too."
"I need time to think," I say, stepping back from Antonio's touch.
The sound of leaves crunching has us both on alert and I look at my cousin with wide eyes. He grabs my face and kisses my forehead before leaning in and speaking low.
“We’ll come for you, cousin. Be ready.”
I open my mouth to respond, but he’s gone before words can leave my mouth. I don’t know what I would say anyway. My freedom is right there, within my grasp after all this time.
‘So why does my heart feel like it could shatter at any moment?’
Because the truth is, somewhere between the lies and the nights in Rio's arms, I've started to feel something for him. Not just the something I felt for him when I knew him as Frankie. No, this is something different. It’s something that terrifies me more than all his violence ever could and I don't know if I'm strong enough to walk away.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Rio
The security feed flickers on my phone screen and my blood turns to ice. A shadow moves through the garden, too large and deliberate to be an animal but also, far too confident to be a random intruder. I lean forward in my office chair, abandoning the shipping manifests I was reviewing, and zoom in on the figure. The figure is broad, tall and has dark hair. My best guest is male. He moves like he owns the place, like he knows exactly where to go which pisses me off more.
My hand hovers over the button that would send a dozen armed men flooding into the garden within seconds. One press and this fucker would be bleeding out on my manicured lawn before he could take another step, but something stops me. Curiosity, maybe?
I switch cameras, tracking him as he slips behind the olive trees near the east side of my yard. If I was home right now, I would already be outside beating this fucker to a pulp. Unfortunately, I had a few meetings to attend and now I’m regrettingmy decision to leave this morning. Motion detects another figure and I switch over to see Liana, barely dressed, racing across the patio like she's being chased by a lion. My jaw clenches so hard I taste blood. Does she know this man? Did she invite him?
I pull up the audio feed and the sound crackles to life just as the man steps out of the shadows and I finally see his face.
Antonio Manitellie. Her cousin.
"Took you long enough, little L," his voice comes through the speakers.
I watch as he embraces her tightly and something dark and ugly coils in my chest. Jealousy. Pure, irrational jealousy that makes me want to find him and rip him apart with my bare hands. Cousin or not, no man should be holding my wife like that.
