I was successful.
Then came remorse, a feeling I’ve never experienced before.
Damn confounding woman is crawling beneath my skin.
And I can’t let that happen.
I have to be deliberate and thoughtful.
I’m wielding her as my weapon.
Still, Matteo’s voice echoes in my head.“Have you lost your fucking mind?”Nico and Dante’s doubts ricochet.
My actions could be disastrous for our family.
I can’t deny tomorrow has risks for me, my brother, and my family.And yet every decision was the right one, the only one.
Revenge for my father, peace for our families.Still, what she does to me, the way I react… It’s not normal.
I down another sip, the alcohol doing little to dull the ache.
And even though I shouldn’t, I pull open my phone and scroll to the security app.I ensure that the privacy screen is in place so no one but me can see her.
She’s pacing the room, her hair in wild disarray around her shoulders.
The belt is tight around her waist.
Suddenly she stops and slowly turns to look up at the camera’s blinking eye, as if she knows I’m watching.
Her nostrils flare, just a little.
Then she abruptly pivots and strides to the bathroom.
Privacy be damned.Tomorrow I’m fucking having a camera installed in there.There will be no place on this planet that she can hide from me.
“We’re a pair, Moretti.”
Yeah.
I close the app and drop my phone back into my pocket.
After eating dinner, we talk for hours, sharing war stories without details, two men haunted by what we can’t control.And through it all, regrets and recriminations stab me more powerfully than any wound I’ve ever sustained.
I am an absolute bastard, as she’s repeatedly insisted.
But that realization doesn’t stop me from checking in on her again and again.
Sometime after midnight, I leave the club.
As I enter the house, there’s only one thought clawing at me.
How the hell am I supposed to slide in bed next to her without fucking her?
ChapterFifteen
Valentina
“The next time I see you, you will be my wife.”
