Page 158 of Tempting My Mafia Monster

“I’m so worried about leaving her,” Lili said, fighting back a fresh wave of tears as she sank back onto the sofa. “What if Aleksandr demands the wedding is this week?”

“Santino and Alessio will not allow that to happen,” I reassured her as she bit her bottom lip. “And Elle and I will make sure Liv is okay. We are all grieving Gio, but she is our priority now. But I’m worried about you, too.”

“I’ll be okay,” she said, her voice weak and small. My chest tightened. She was a twenty-three-year-old woman who had never been away from her family and had just lost her father. Now she was expected to marry a stranger and move to another country. I hated this for her as much as I had hated it for myself.

“You don’t have to be okay,” I said, ducking my head to make her look at me. “You don’t have to put on a brave face for anyone.”

She huffed and wiped a stray tear from her cheek. “I know. But I’m a Buccini. So I will.”

I smiled. “I admire you, Lili. So fucking much. You are my role model.”

She gave a small laugh at me for using her words against her. Then sighed. “I guess I should show my face to my alpha-hole fiancé.”

We made our way to the meeting room, where Alessio, Santino, Maddox and Aleksandr were already deep in discussion about how to divide Sean’s empire among them.

Maddox had made one thing abundantly clear. He didn’t want any of Sean’s illegal business. All he wanted was what Sean had stolen from his family. The rest would be sold to other allied Irish mafia families or split between the Russians and us.

Maddox didn’t bother pulling out the chair beside him. Instead, he slid his chair back from the table and pulled me onto his lap. I felt the stress and tension in my body melt as he wrapped his arms around me and rested his chin on my shoulder. He was my safe place. My respite.

Across the table, Aleksandr silently stood and pulled out a chair beside him for Lili. She avoided looking at him directly as she dragged it a foot away and sat down. Her hostility towards her soon-to-be husband couldn’t be mistaken for anything else, but not even a flicker of irritation crossed his face. Nothing seemed capable of penetrating that man’s composure. He was the human embodiment of cement.

“Let’s talk finances,” Alessio said, sliding some contacts into the centre of the table. “Max and Fabi have gone through Sean’s assets. Once we’ve cleared the debts, business expenses and outstanding payments, we have forty-three million euros to shift.”

He glanced at Maddox.

“Based on what Sean stole from your family, we’ve estimated that twelve million belonged to the Moriartys, plus your family’s land.”

Maddox turned to stone behind me.

“That goes back to you. The remaining thirty-one million is split four ways between the Barbieris, Buccinis, Rokslovs and Moriarty. That’s seven million, seven hundred and fifty thousand each, with nineteen million, seven hundred and fifty thousand to the Moriarty name.”

He looked around the table. “Everyone in agreement?”

“Agreed,” Santino said, keeping his head bowed and staring at the figures. Grief affected everyone differently. Sani had lost his sparkle. I knew he’d get it back one day, but for now he just seemed… flat.

“Da.”

They all lifted their heads to look at Maddox, even though he hadn’t said anything. I turned in his lap to glance at his face. He’d gone very pale. Of course, we were all used to discussing such huge sums of money; we were raised with it, but Maddox… he hadn’t had a penny to his name since he was twelve years old.

“Maddox?” I whispered, pulling his attention to me. He blinked slowly. “Say you agree.”

He gulped. The word scraped out of his throat. “A-agreed.” I smiled, knowing he planned to share half with his sister. Riley had no idea her life was about to change forever.

“Okay,” Alessio huffed, his eyes narrowing in annoyance at Aleksandr. “Let’s move on to the wedding.”

“I have spoken to the Pakhan,” Aleksandr said, twisting his cufflink in his sleeve with meticulous precision. “We have agreed that the wedding can wait until after the funeral.”

“How very generous of you both,” Sani mumbled under his breath. Aleksandr ignored the remark.

“When is the funeral?”

Alessio replied, “We’ve had the vigil. The funeral is in two days.”

Aleksandr turned his attention to Lili. She very obviously continued looking anywhere but at him.

“And how long do you need to grieve?”

Lili’s eyes widened, giving me a ‘is this man genuinely asking me to schedule my grief?’ look. I bit the inside of my cheek as she plastered on a false smile and turned to him.