Caterina’s gaze is level. ‘Yes. But I was also the only one who survived.’
Chapter Nine
Caterina
HE’S LOUNGING INthe chair opposite, his long, muscled body relaxed. Like a panther. He’s in black suit trousers and a black shirt with the first couple of buttons undone. He wears no jewellery except the heavy gold signet ring that he took off to give to me so I had a ring to put on his finger.
He’s almost monklike in the severity of his clothes, yet no monk looks like he does. The candlelight loves his high carved cheek bones, the straight length of his nose, and that mouth of his that seemed so cruel before, isn’t now. No, now it’s beautiful.He’s beautiful, with his silver-grey eyes and his intense stare.
My heart is beating so damn fast and it won’t slow down. I hadn’t meant to tell him about my relationship with my father or to fling that confession like a vase at his head. I didn’t want him to know how upset I was, but when he reminded me that his deadline for my father’s loyalty is sundown tonight, I couldn’t seem to find my nice, polite, well-bred Salvatore mask.
Because that sun is going down and if my father hasn’t given the Wolf his loyalty by now, he’s not going to give it. Which is only confirmation—as if my whole damn life wasn’t confirmation enough—that my father doesn’t care about me. Not one single iota.
I should have expected it, but expectations and reality seldom meet, and so my own reaction caught me by surprise. The tears mainly, because I didn’t want to feel sad about it. I wanted to be angry, since anger is so much more powerful. Dad never had any patience with my anger, said it wasn’t becoming in a woman, yet anger is what I cling to, because he can go to hell.
Vincenzo Argenti can go to hell too, though I have to admit, he doesn’t seem to have an issue with my fury. No, he’s staring back at me as if I’ve fascinated him in some way.
You like it.
A part of me does. A part of me finds that very powerful.
‘He wasn’t pleased you survived?’ the Wolf asks, his voice cool and detached sounding.
It’s wrong to talk to him about my family and our relationships with each other, since technically he’s the enemy. But over the years my family loyalty has been steadily worn away by my father’s contempt, and besides, this man is my husband now. I’m going to give him my family history whether he wants it or not.
‘No,’ I say bluntly. ‘He wanted my mother and brother to be the ones who lived. My brother, because Alessio was his heir, and my mother because she could make more heirs. I was an afterthought child. A daughter as a sop to my mother.’
‘Sounds familiar,’ the Wolf murmurs, though he doesn’t elaborate on what exactly sounds familiar. ‘He didn’t think to make you his heir?’
‘Of course not. I’m a woman. My only use was in making alliances.’
Out beyond the terrace, on the horizon, the sun flares as it readies itself to disappear into the sea. My father won’t pledge his loyalty to the Wolf. His dream of vengeance against the Argenti threat is more important to him than the life of his one remaining child, and despite myself and my fury, the little girl I used to be feels as if a knife has been plunged into her chest. My mother loved me and so did my brother, and when they died, I lost the only two people who thought I was important. The only people to whom I mattered. And it makes me feel the ache of their loss all over again.
It’s his fault. His family’s fault.
It would be easy to blame him and the Argentis. That’s what my father did. But my father was also the one who ordered the killing of this man’s mother for some petty slight lost in the mists of time, so can the fault really lie with the Argentis?
I don’t know anymore, but perhaps there’s something to the Wolf’s aim of stopping the inter-family killings.
He’s studying me intently, something in his eyes I can’t name. Has my story affected him? It’s intrigued him, that’s for sure.
‘Well,’ he murmurs at last, a dark and heated note in his voice that makes me want to shiver. ‘Your father’s a fool then.’
Surprise ripples through me. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘Because he missed an opportunity. You have a lot of courage,gattina, not to mention determination and spirit, and those are valuable qualities to have in the head of a family, regardless of gender.’
Praise from the Wolf shouldn’t make a wave of warmth roll through me, yet it does. I haven’t been called anything but disobedient, wilful and a damn nuisance for years, and so a part of me laps up his words like a flower starved of sunlight.
There’s a lump in my throat and I don’t want him to see how he’s touched me, so I reach for my glass and take a healthy sip of champagne instead. The liquid is yeasty and cold, and delicious, so I take another, even though I shouldn’t drink it too fast. Getting tipsy here in this literal wolf’s den would not be a good idea.
‘My father would disagree.’ I make myself put down the champagne glass. ‘Clearly he’s not going to give you his loyalty tonight. Which puts you in the difficult position of having to kill your new wife.’ I lift my gaze to his and hold it. ‘Good thing we didn’t have a proper wedding.’
His handsome features are enigmatic, his gaze glittering. I can’t tell what he’s thinking. He’s been saying he wouldn’t kill me all this time, and so far, he hasn’t. Perhaps he won’t. Still, I can’t take his word for anything, can I? He’s not only the enemy, he’s been my personal nightmare ever since I was a child, and regardless that his bullets didn’t kill my mother and brother, he was still sent to our family’s door to kill us. Also, he did say to me up in his bedroom that he was a killer.
Fear is a cold snake in my gut, but I don’t let it out. I pile anger on instead. Anger is strong and powerful.Let him try and do it,I think.I’ll go down fighting him every step of the way.
‘Gattina,’ he murmurs eventually, putting down his wine glass. ‘How many times must I tell you? I am not going to hurt you. I didn’t save you only to kill you twenty years later. What would be the point in that?’
