Basili rubs a hand across his face but doesn’t interrupt.
“He has other legitimate children — Shufen and Shuren, his sons. They’re perfect. Everything I was never able to be. Everything I’m incapable of being.” The words began to pour out, unstoppable. An emotional dam broken. “I lived in that house for sixteen years. Spent sixteen years being told I was worthless. Abused daily for being too American, for not being a perfect doll. Not being —”
I can’t finish. Can’t put all the ways he broke me into words, too embarrassed to speak of it.
“That’s why you ran,” Basili says quietly.
“I escaped. With help from Shufen — she risked everything to get me out.” I think back on that night, Shufen’s whispered instructions ringing in my ears once more, the money she’d pressed into my hands to start a new life. “I ended up at Jay’s orphanage. Started over. Changed everything about myself to make sure he’d never find me.”
“Do you think he got a good look at you tonight? That he recognized you?”
“I don’t think so. But that’s why I panicked when I saw him tonight. If he recognizes me, if he realizes his daughter is living in your house —” I wrap my arms around myself, instinctively retracting into myself. “I don’t know what he’ll do. Try to use me as leverage against you, probably. Or kill me outright for the embarrassment I’ve caused him.”
“He won’t be taking you anywhere, Chloe.” The words are hard and absolute.
“You don’t understand, Basili. When he sets his mind to something, nothing can stop him.”
“I don’t care what he wants.” Basili reaches for me, his hands framing my face, forcing me to look at him. “Listen to mecarefully, Chloe. That man orchestrated my son’s kidnapping. He used Emmanuel to create leverage to coerce me into marrying your sister. He caused you to live in fear that he’d find you this whole time. That he’d kill you if he found you.”
“You didn’t know?—”
“I should have known. Should have put the pieces together.” His thumb strokes my cheek. “But now I do. And I’m telling you right now, I’m not marrying Shufen. I’m not allying with the Triad. I’m going to burn Delan’s entire empire to the ground for the trauma he caused to my son. To you.”
“Basili, you can’t,” I whisper.
“I think you underestimate me, Chloe. I can and I will.” He leans closer, his forehead resting against mine. “I am the Don of this family. I make the rules. You and Emmanuel are mine to protect. And no one — not your father, not the Russians, no one — gets to hurt either of you again. Capisce?”
“I understand,” I breathe.
“In Italian, tesoro.” He smiles then, making me smile too.
“Capisco.”
“Rava ragazza,” he says with a nod.
“What does that mean?” I ask.
“Good girl.” And then he’s kissing me.
Not gentle like in my room just days ago. Not tender like before. This is true. Possessive. His tongue sweeps into my mouth like he owns it, like he owns me, and God help me, I want him too.
I kiss him back with everything I have, my hands fisting in his jacket, pulling him closer.
We’re in the back of a car in his garage, and I don’t care. Don’t care about anything except the way he tastes, the way he feels against me, the way he’s kissing me like I’m the only thing that matters.
His hands slide down my waist as he moves over me, laying me down so my back is against the seat, and he’s on top of me. Knee between my legs, my skirt pushed up.
“Basili,” I gasp against his mouth.
“Tell me you want me, Chloe.” His hands work their way beneath my skirt and onto my thighs, pushing the velvet up inch by inch.
“I want you,” I tell him. “I want this, us, all of it.”
Something fierce flashes in his eyes. “Color?”
The question throws me. “What?”
“If we’re going to do this, I need you to pick a safe word. Colors are easy to remember at the moment,” he explains.
