"Yes, Bruno." I meet his glare without flinching. "I do. Would you like to hear them, or should I just leave and let you all decide my life without me? Again?"
"Let her speak." Lorenzo's voice is soft but firm.
I take a breath. "I want to meet any candidate myself. Dinner, public setting, my choice of location. I want veto power—if I sayno, it's no. And I want a minimum three-month engagement before any wedding. Non-negotiable."
Mamma clutches her pearls like I've suggested we start worshipping Satan. "Threemonths? Vittoria, that's?—"
"Reasonable," Pietro interrupts. His dark eyes study me. "Fine. You'll meet them both."
Both.
My stomach drops. "Both?"
"James Rogers approached us first." Pietro slides a folder across the table. "His family deals in luxury automobiles. Fifteen dealerships across the country. They're not in the life, but they want the protection our name provides."
I flip open the folder. James Rogers stares up at me from a glossy photo—blonde, clean-cut, the kind of handsome that looks manufactured. I first met him at a charity gala three years ago. We had dinner once. He spent the entire meal talking about his car collection.
"And the second?"
Pietro's jaw tightens almost imperceptibly. "The Baganovs made an offer yesterday."
The coffee turns to acid in my throat.
Dmitri.
"Absolutely not." Bruno's wheelchair scrapes against the marble as he shifts forward. "He'sRussian, Pietro. It's not done."
"Times change," Pietro says evenly.
"Tradition exists for a reason." Bruno's knuckles go white on his armrests. "Our grandfather would be spinning in his grave. The Bratva are animals. They don't operate by our rules, our code?—"
"Their distribution network covers the entire Midwest," Nico cuts in, not looking up from his tablet. "And their political connections run deeper than ours. Strategically, it's sound."
"I don't give a damn aboutstrategy." Bruno's voice rises. "This is our sister. Ourblood. And you want to hand her to some Russian thug who probably keeps a torture chamber in his basement?"
Actually, I'm pretty sure it's a private room above a nightclub, but semantics.
"Dmitri Baganov is heir to the Chicago Bratva," Pietro says. "He's educated, connected, and his father is dying. In six months, maybe less, he'll be pakhan. That kind of alliance?—"
"Is an insult to everything our family stands for."
The brothers stare at each other. Two years ago, Bruno would have been sitting where Pietro sits. He would have been making these decisions. Now he's stuck at the end of the table, fighting for relevance in a world that moved on without him.
I almost feel sorry for him.
Almost.
"What does Vittoria think?" Lorenzo asks quietly.
Every head turns toward me.
I think about how he orchestrated everything to get close to me. How he's been watching me. How he probably knew about this marriage conversation before I did.
Manipulative bastard.
Devastatingly attractive manipulative bastard.
"I'll meet them both," I say carefully. "Starting with Rogers."
