Chapter One
Giuliana Moretti paced back and forth in Kalinda’s living room. Everything inside her was tensed, pulled so tight her bones ached with the strain. It didn’t help her Alpha had clipped a leash on his anger only enough to keep the mages in the room from wailing in agony. She was ready to beg on the floor for him to let up the pressure from his power, but pride kept her from saying a thing.
Sometimes it really sucked being an Enforcer—a job she always thought she wanted until she got it.
Hindsight, they say, is twenty-twenty.
“On the other side of my gun …” Dominic repeated the part from Heath’s text to Lorenzo for the umpteenth time.
It didn’t fail to make her wolf want to blast through her skin this time, as if she’d only heard it once. To threaten one of their people would normally be a death sentence.
But Heath …
The Lombardi Pack had adopted Lorenzo and Heath, along with Lorenzo’s girlfriend Cin, when Dominic mated Zoey. The young teens may not have been a part of the underworld side of things, but they were family. Heath had always been with Cin, and when Lorenzo joined the group, they’d been inseparable.
Sure, things had been a bit weird lately—understatement of the world—but all the changes around them would be hard for anyone. Maybe Heath had gotten himself into some trouble and that’s why he’d sent that text. She didn’t want to believe he was just another blow to them in the short time they’d been a pack.
Giuliana clenched her fists. “Alpha, he is young—”
Dominic whirled to face her, his teeth bared as his deep growl filled the room. “He threatened one of mine.”
The worst thing anyone could do was to go against an Alpha like Dominic. He was a monster when it came to care for his pack, even when he’d only been Capo under Arturo in the Moretti Pack. Taking over the former Bianchi Pack and making it his own had only made him worse.
Not that Giuliana couldn’t appreciate him for it. But still … “Heath is one of ours.”
Silence filled the room as Giuliana stood her ground. Alpha or not, she’d spent more of her life standing toe-to-toe with men like Dominic, and she wasn’t going to stop now. He might knock her on her ass, but she’d make sure he’d feel it in the morning.
She’d always been one of them, yet different. The protected princess. The crazy one who snuck out at any time of night and wrecked fucking shop. Teetering between the two sides was enough to give her whiplash.
“Careful, Giuliana.”
“You be careful. You don’t keep me beside you because I kiss your ass.”
No, he probably was keeping an eye out for her so she didn’t get a hangnail. That’s the only reason she’d been able to guess why Arturo had let Dominic take her into his pack in the first place.
Arturo Moretti, the Alpha of the Moretti Pack, didn’t give up control lightly. She figured it had a lot more to do with her being a thorn in his side and wanting to pass it to Dominic than thinking it was because he saw her value.
Not that he didn’t love her, but an Alpha male’s love was … stifling. Giuliana didn’t know how Zoey dealt with Dominic regularly, and Kalinda … well, she was lucky her mate wasn’t an Alpha. But Romano was Dominic’s number two, and if anyone could run the Lombardi Pack when he wasn’t there, it was him.
Assholes. She could manage too, if they’d let her.
Dominic glared at Giuliana. “And I’m supposed to … what, ask him nicely why he said what he said?”
“Dom, you know these kids.” Lorenzo’s face twisted, and Giuliana rolled her eyes. “These men. They’ve been right by our sides and helping out through the Lombardi Community Center. They kept things looking pretty normal while we were all twisted up with Kalinda and the Trinity Council.”
“And that’s supposed to make me feel differently?”
“No, Alpha, it’s supposed to make you think. What could send Heath running off like this?”
Instead of answering her, Dominic looked to Romano. “You have to stay at Kalinda’s side. Her position as ruler of the Trinity Council is solidified, but she’s got to have a chance to make the changes for Encantado. Zoey has a complication, so I’m here. I don’t want to risk the baby letting her use her map magic.”
Ohhhhh. You want my foot so far up your ass you won’t be able to sit until the second coming.
Giuliana hated to be ignored.
Romano—mate to the newly appointed National Council member Kalinda—smiled. Of course, it wasn’t a nice smile. Like, at all. Giuliana was certain Lorenzo was going to puke at the sight of it. Maybe he should, and Giuliana would make sure it landed squarely on said wolf’s pretty little shoes.
The young man hunched in his seat and grew pale. “Are you … are you going to kill him?”
