“It’s not sexual.”
He’s gone serious, and I can feel my lust deflating already. I knew this was coming.
“What is it?” I ask, fully on my guard now.
He kisses my hands again. “I need your help with Juliana.”
It takes a second for my brain to process what he said. “Juliana? What do you mean?”
“I need to talk to her. But the only way I can do that is if we bring her here.”
“How’s that supposed to work?” I frown. “You’re saying you want me to somehow…trick her into coming to the house?”
Armani sighs. “Not exactly. Our best bet is the element of surprise. She can’t know we’re planning to take her away, otherwise Sergio Bruno and the Bratva will have time to form a counterattack. Not to mention, we’d never be able to successfully capture her.”
“Captureher?” I scoff, ripping my hands away from him. “You meankidnap? I don’t think so. You don’t want to talk to her, you want to interrogate her.”
Shaking his head, he says, “What I want is to keep her safe. Whether she’s my sister or not. But I can’t guarantee her safety as long as she’s under the watchful eye of her uncle and his guards—she’s basically their prisoner. We need to help her. Help get her out of there.”
Glaring daggers at him, I say, “Right. So she can becomeyourprisoner. Sounds real safe. My answer is no. Not a chance.”
My stomach turns as the pieces all fall into place. The nursery, the shopping. The sweet words. The snuggling. His truce with Mr. Sprinkles.
“None of this was real, was it?” I say slowly. “You were manipulating me all along.”
18
CANDI
My husband’sface goes stony. “Candi—”
“No. I’m done listening to you, Armani.”
“You’re overreacting. You need to calm down,” he says, which pisses me off even more. “I’m just trying to—”
“Fuck off.”
Getting up off the floor, I grab a bag of knit blankets and toys and dump it over his head. Then I turn my back on him and storm out the door.
I make it about halfway down the hall before Armani grabs my elbow and spins me around. Straightening my spine, I brace myself for a standoff. He’s about to find out that it’s a lot more difficult to intimidate me into doing his bidding when I’m this freaking furious.
“Let’s just sit down for a minute and talk about this like adults,” he says in a soft, hushed tone, leading me into our rooms.
I pull out of his grasp the second the door shuts behind us and then drop onto the sofa in the sitting room, arms already crossed over my chest.
“Howdare youplay on my emotions like this,” I hiss.
“Candi—”
“Whatever you have to say to me right now, I really don’t want to hear it,” I interrupt. “You’re not going to convince me to get on board with your little kidnapping plan.”
More than being angry, I’m humiliated. I should have known better—Ididknow better—but I still let myself believe that we might actually be on our way to becoming a family.
Armani rubs his face as he paces in front of me. “You realize she’s biding her time in a death sentence, don’t you?”
“You’ll say anything to get me to do what you want. But guess what? She’s a lot safer with her guards than in your torture dungeon with no one around to hear her screams.”
Armani tries a new tactic. “You’re my wife. You’re supposed to support me.”
