First Comes Blood by Lilith Vincent

9

Salvatore

“She doesn’t like you one little bit. What on earth did you do to her, Salvatore?”

Ginevra cuts a piece of strawberry tart with her pastry fork, puts it into her mouth and closes her eyes in bliss. My sister always did love cake.

“To Chiara? I didn’t do anything.” I take a swallow of black coffee and gaze around at the other customers outside the French patisserie. It’s been a week since I sent my sister around to see my promised bride, and I’ve only just found the time to catch up with her about it. “She doesn’t need to like me. She just needs to marry me.”

“That’s going to be difficult. She doesn’t trust you, either.”

There’s no difficulty. In fact, it’s very simple. Chiara will do as she’s told or end up like her mother.

Ginevra licks her fork and smiles. “You chose such a wonderful man for me. I want my brother to fall in love, too, and for love, there needs to be trust. Why don’t you try getting closer to her?”

“Should I play footsies under the table like you and Antonio?” I drawl. My sister and her fiancé had instant chemistry, which was easy because she’s beautiful and he’s rich. Antonio is a shrewd and ruthless businessman who understands that his life would be forfeit if he hurt my sister. I’m pleased to hear he’s fooled her into thinking he’s in love with her. Or maybe he is in love. Who fucking knows.

More importantly, who cares. The essential thing is Ginevra has someone strong to protect her if something happens to me.

Ginevra has another mouthful of tart and chews it thoughtfully. “I’m pleased you’re getting married, but why Chiara Romano?”

Chiara Romano. Her face flits across my mind and I recall those big, blue eyes that held mine as she talked back to me at the school gate. How they grew dark and lust-filled as I kissed her. Her curvy body in her school uniform, and then again in that clingy summer dress.

I feel a smile tug the corner of my mouth. “She’s cute.”

Ginevra’s eyebrows shoot up. “I’ve never heard you say that about any woman before. Is my big brother in love?”

I clear my throat impatiently. Why the fuck did I say she was cute? Ginevra reads something into every little thing I say. “If you think I’m in love with some schoolgirl, you’re mistaken. Her father is useful to me.”

But my eyes narrow as I remember Chiara saying she was dumped over dinner. She better have been telling the truth, that it was a girl who had dumped their friendship. No one is going to touch what’s mine.

“How are the wedding plans?” I ask.

My change of subject works and Ginevra begins to recite everything that she has done and still needs to do for her 2.5-million-dollar wedding. The cake alone is costing thirty thousand dollars. I pretended to wince when she came to me with all the bills, but anything for my baby sister. My only baby sister, now. We only have each other, and her special day is going to be lavish.

“I’m finalizing the table settings this weekend. Are your friends really not coming to the wedding?”

“Who?” I ask vaguely.

“Vinicius. Cassius. That other one.” A cloud passes behind her eyes and her smile dims.

“Lorenzo Scava?”

“Yes, that psycho,” she mutters, pushing her tart around her plate.

“You better than anyone knows why Lorenzo is the way he is.”

Ginevra’s eyes drop to her plate and she shrugs. “Maybe I do. Maybe I don’t. We all went through the same thing and none of us turned out like he did. Something’s wrong in his head.”

I sit forward and grasp her wrist. “No. We didn’t all go through what he went through. He had it far fucking worse.”

“I’m sorry, you’re right. Please let go.”

I ease up my grip and sit back, and Ginevra puts her fork down. Our conversation seems to have ruined her appetite.

“Why are you defending him, anyway? I thought you weren’t friends anymore.”

Anger burns through me. I forgot. Again. It’s going to take a long time getting used to this new normal. “Can we please change the subject?”

“I was surprised when you introduced me to Antonio. All these years, I expected you to want me to marry one of them.”

“No!” I sit up so suddenly and shout, that everyone turns around to stare at us. Ginevra stares, too, her mouth open.

“We had a—we were going to… Never fucking mind,” I finish with a growl. Ginevra wouldn’t understand. No one would understand what the four of us wanted to do. We didn’t even know how we were going to make it work. That’s why, four years after we came up with the idea, we never acted on it.

We wanted to, though. We really fucking did.

But we never found the right woman, and now it seems like we never will.

I pinch the bridge of my nose. I think I feel a headache coming on. I get to my feet and throw some bills on the table. “Enjoy your cake.”

I put my sunglasses on and start to walk away. Then I turn back, bend down and kiss her cheek. “I’m happy you’re happy, Gin. That’s all that matters to me.”

She gazes up at me with big, worried eyes. “And you? What about your happiness?”

I push my sunglasses up my nose and give her a thin smile. “I’ll be happy once I have Mayor Romano in the palm of my hand.”

As I walk back to my car, my smile vanishes. Why must women always prod and probe and ask so many fucking questions? How do you feel? What do you want? Why are you so angry all the time, Salvatore? I hope Chiara doesn’t develop this bad habit. I’ll put up with it from my sister, but not from my bride.

Ginevra’s words play on my mind all day. She doesn’t like you one little bit.

Plenty of women in this town would fucking kill to marry me, despite my reputation. Some of them because of my reputation. I remember the two dozen girls standing at the school gate gawking at me, ready to get in my car and hand over their panties if I so much as smiled at them.

And there was Chiara in the middle of them all, reproach and mistrust filling those baby blues. If she hadn’t been so rude to me the night of her birthday I wouldn’t have lost my temper and clamped my hand around her throat. We started so well, too.

That kiss.

That was a really good kiss. I want my wife to want me. When I put my hands on her, she should burn up under my touch.

I pull on a suit jacket and comb my hair. Well, why don’t we start again? Another dinner. Another kiss. I’ll show her more of the life she can expect as the woman on my arm, and just how fucking nice I can be.

It’s nearly seven when I pull up at Mayor Romano’s mansion and knock on the front door. Chiara herself opens it.

She’s wearing a printed playsuit with a halter neck and her feet are bare. All her blonde hair is piled up on top of her head in a haphazard bun, and tendrils have escaped and are framing her face.

Yeah, she’s fucking cute. Cute girls are trouble.

Just the sort of trouble I crave.

As she sees me standing on her front step, her eyes widen. I bare my teeth at her in a smile. “Miss me, baby?”

Her hand slips down the door frame and she stands back. “Are you here to see my father? I’ll go and get him.”

“I’m here to see you.” I step past her into the hall and gaze around. It really is a lovely house. My own is bigger, but it’s missing that woman’s touch.

“What? Why?”

Arguing with me already. I crowd her close to the wall and brace my hands on either side of her head. She smells like vanilla, and those big eyes open wide in surprise as she gazes up at me. Such plush lips she’s got. I bet she could learn to give a killer blowjob.

“Because I haven’t got anything better to do, or because I wanted to see you. Pick one and go upstairs and get dressed. I’m taking you to dinner.”

“I’m not going anywhere with you.”

“My sister will be there and she wants to see you,” I lie. “We’re eating at one of my casinos.”

“I can’t go to a casino. I’m seventeen.”

I lean closer and stroke a finger under her chin. “It’s my casino, baby. Don’t you worry your pretty head about that.”

“Someone might recognize my face and you’ll be reported to the…” She trails off as my smile widens. People can file a thousand reports, charges and complaints about me, but no one will stop me from doing whatever I like.

She’s opening her mouth to protest some more when there’s a deep voice behind us.

“Please go with Salvatore, Chiara, and stop talking back to him. I didn’t raise you to be so disobedient.”

I glance over my shoulder at Mayor Romano. He seems more annoyed with his daughter than the six-foot-three man who has her backed against the wall.

As it should be.

Chiara flushes and looks away. I lean down close and whisper in her ear. “Do as Daddy says, baby.”

The Mayor steps forward. “How are you, Salvatore? All well in the city?”

“All’s well in my part of the city.”

The mayor grins like the Cheshire Cat, but as his gaze lands on his daughter again, the smile is wiped from his face. “What are you still doing here? Go upstairs!”

Chiara ducks out from under my arm.

“Take all the time you need, baby,” I call after her, watching her walk up the stairs in those tiny shorts. Damn, that’s a cute ass she’s got.

I go out into the courtyard and drink a Campari with the mayor while Chiara gets ready. Twenty minutes later, I hear the click of high heels coming toward us, and turn around.

Holy fucking hell.

On her birthday, Chiara looked chaste. In her school uniform she’s deliciously cute. Now, she’s coming toward me in a black satin dress that clings to her breasts and hips and is slit up her thigh, and she has the attitude and lifted chin of a femme fatale. The look is completed with bold red lipstick.

“Holy fuck,” I purr, my teeth sinking into my lower lip. “I could eat you up.”

I reach for her and splay my hand on her lower back, drawing her closer, vaguely aware that Mayor Romano has left us alone together out by the pool.

Chiara gazes up at me through her lashes. “I don’t want to be recognized tonight, so I dressed differently.”

“Sure, baby. Whatever you say.” Even if she didn’t put on this dress for me, I’m the one who gets to look at her all night. I’m the one who gets to touch her, too. I trace the thin strap of her dress with my forefinger, from her shoulder and down over her collarbone.

Chiara breathes in, her eyes landing on my mouth and growing unfocused.

Mayor Romano appears with a necklace laid over his hand. The diamond necklace I gave Chiara for her seventeenth birthday. “This was in the safe. Salvatore would want you to wear it.”

“Allow me.” I reach for it, but Chiara takes it quickly from her father and moves inside to a mirror. “It’s fine. I’ll do it.”

I catch Chiara’s eyes in the mirror as she closes the clasp at the nape of her neck. She doesn’t trust me with my hands anywhere near her throat. I saunter over to her and run a forefinger down the back of her neck.

“If you’re a good girl, then there’s no reason for me not to be nice.”

“I won’t risk it, thank you.” She shakes out her hair and looks at herself in the mirror. Then at me.

“We look good together. Come on,” I say, reaching for her hand and drawing her toward the front door.

“Bring my daughter back by eleven, Fiore. It’s a school night. And keep your hands to yourself.”

“Of course, Mayor. Goodnight.”

A car is waiting by the curb; not my car, but a black Bentley with a driver, and I get into the back seat with Chiara. She adjusts the straps of her satin dress and straightens her skirt, and I gaze at her, drinking her in.

All mine tonight.

Already she’s surprised me with how strong she’s been since her mother’s murder right in front of her eyes. Let’s find out what this girl is made of.

As the car pulls away from the curb, I slide closer and palm her waist. “You look beautiful. Good enough to eat.”

Her eyes flick up to mine. “I’m not on the menu.”

Always reaching for defiance first. Silly girl should know better by now and try to charm me. Or just give in. I trail my forefinger up the middle of her chest, across the diamonds at her throat and down her arm. “Did you like Ginevra’s diamond ring? I’ll be getting you one just like it.”

“No, thank you,” she says, her voice breathy. As my fingers slide up her leg beneath her skirt, she grabs my hand. “Stop that. You heard what my father said.”

“Diamonds look good on you, baby.” I nip her throat with my teeth. “I’ll get you something big and sparkly to wear on your finger when we’re engaged, so that everyone knows your mine.”

Chiara’s breath hitches and her eyes flutter closed. I inhale sharply through my nostrils at the sight. Fuck, she’s so turned on already. Lorenzo said her panties were soaking when he cut them off her.

“I don’t know if I can wait a whole year to get my hands on you. You won’t tell Daddy if I make you come, will you?” I slide my hand from the outside of her thigh to the inside.

Chiara’s eyes fly open. She puts both palms against my chest and shoves. “Don’t even think about it. Keep your hands to yourself.”

I laugh and let her push me back on the leather seat. “It’s you who’s going to be squirming until you get home.”

Her cheeks are stained red and her lips are parted. “I’m not squirming.”

“Do you use your fingers to make yourself come, or have you got a vibe?”

“Is that all you can think about?”

“There are a hundred things on my mind, most of them unpleasant. Some of them downright vicious. When I’m with you, I want to forget about every single one.”

Her lower lip softens as I move closer to claim her mouth. From our first kiss, I could taste something special about this girl. She’ll be downright dirty in bed by the time I get her into mine.

“Tell—tell me about the casino you’re taking me to.”

I pause, my mouth an inch from hers. “You really want to know about my work, or you’re trying to distract me from kissing you?”

Chiara sucks the pillow of her lower lip into her mouth, nibbles it briefly and then releases it. She doesn’t mean it as a come-on. She’s gathering her thoughts, but my balls tighten and I groan deep in my chest. She shouldn’t do that when I’m this close to her, she’s wearing that ridiculously hot dress and her curls are tumbling around her shoulders.

“Yes.”

“Then look out there.” She turns toward the window and I slide my arm around her waist and put my lips close to her ear. “Do you remember which buildings are mine?”

The city lights paint colors on her beautiful face. All the casinos in Coldlake line the north end of the main strip, which is lit up white, yellow, pink and blue with flashing lights, neon playing cards and jets of water from ornate fountains.

“That one,” she says, pointing at a silver and white skyscraper as we glide by, and then turns to look back the way we came at another. “That one.”

The Bentley turns into the Grand Plaza Hotel and sweeps around the circular drive to pull up at the main entrance. The tiles are white marble, and the front entrance is shining glass and gold. All the bellhops wear the same cream and gold livery, and inside, a huge crystal chandelier hangs over the lobby.

“And this one,” Chiara finishes, gazing inside.

“Very good.”

We get out of the Bentley and I hold out my hand. Chiara takes it without thinking as she stares around at all the people in evening dress and the flashing lights and colors. As we stroll through the lobby, I watch people watching us. Most people around here know who I am, and I can tell they’re wondering who this beautiful and vaguely familiar blonde is on my arm. They’ve seen Chiara at events and on TV, but always looking so demure. They don’t recognize this bombshell.

I take Chiara upstairs to the member-only casino where the restaurant overlooks the casino floor.

“We’ll have a bottle of Dom Perignon,” I tell the waiter as we sit down. The table overlooks the private blackjack and craps tables, where men in tuxedos and women in long dresses and dripping with jewels are busy handing over their money to me.

I reach for her hand again. “See how nice I am when you’re good?”

Chiara seems to realize she’s letting me touch her and pulls away. “I’m not being good. I’m trying to prevent my throat from being slit like my mother’s was.”

“And I thought my charm was starting to work on you. What are you hungry for?” I ask flipping the menu open. “Lobster? Salmon? Caviar?”

She eyes the menu in bewilderment. “I don’t know. We never eat at places like these. Dad wants us to be seen at local businesses because it’s good for votes.”

When the waiter comes back and pours the champagne, I order for us. I push the champagne glass closer to her, smiling. “You’re with me. It’s all right.”

Chiara gazes at me, around the restaurant, down at herself, then to my surprise, she reaches for the flute and takes a sip.

My smile widens. So much for the rules when she’s tempted by something she wants. “Does my bride have champagne tastes?”

Chiara swallows, hesitates, and takes another sip. “It’s strange, but I don’t hate it.”

“Like me?” I ask, smiling at her.

She pretends I didn’t say that. “This place seems legitimate. Everyone in this city knows you run casinos. So…”

“So?”

“So, what’s the trick? You make most of your money illegally, don’t you?”

“The trick is…” I lower my voice and lean toward Chiara. She’s so curious that she leans toward me, too. “The trick is I don’t tell anyone how I make my money, and I admit to nothing.”

Chiara sits back and takes another sip of her champagne, watching me with narrowed eyes. Suspicious little cat.

One of the senior casino managers comes to the table and asks to speak to me, and I can tell from his face that it’s not something for Chiara’s ears.

We draw away from the table, and he tells me, “We’ve discovered a pair of card counters in the main casino. They’re from out of town.”

My jaw tightens. Card counting isn’t illegal, but it’s against the unwritten laws of every casino that belongs to me. Counters keep track of the cards that have been dealt in blackjack and bet high when they know a deck is stacked in their favor. Some counters work in pairs or groups to disguise what they’re up to. One person counts, and then another joins a game and receives a signal if they should bet high.

Out of the corner of my eye I see Chiara wave to a waiter and place an order.

If these assholes were from Coldlake, I’d kill them for their sheer fucking stupidity. Out of towners can take a message back to where they came from.

No one steals from me and gets away with it.

“Give them their winnings. Then escort them out back and break their legs.”

“Yes, sir.” He nods and slips away to do what he’s told. Or rather, he’ll find two of the biggest security guards in the place to do it for him.

I walk to the mezzanine rail and gaze around at the players below. The people who come to my casino are welcome to try their luck, but in the end, the house always wins.

When I turn back to Chiara, I see that she’s upending a shot glass into her mouth, and she swallows and makes a disgusted face. A second empty shot glass is at her elbow.

I stride over, snatch the glass from her hand and sniff it. “Tequila?”

Chiara sticks out her tongue and gags. “It’s horrible. I want another one.”

I was gone for two fucking minutes and she’s doing shots? She raises her hand to signal for the waiter but I push it down.

“You’ve had enough. Drink some water.” I take away her champagne flute and set her water glass in front of her.

“But I want tequila.”

“Why do you want tequila?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. The champagne was making my insides feel warm and bubbly and suddenly I wasn’t thinking so much about…about everything.”

I study her face carefully as I sit down. Her cheeks are thinner than they were on her seventeenth birthday and there are dark smudges beneath her eyes.

I pick up my champagne and take a large gulp. “What have you got to worry about?”

“Everything.”

“Don’t be. I worry about things so you don’t have to.”

“But it’s you who worries me.”

As I gaze at her, I see Ophelia in the curve of her cheek. The long line of her throat. Ophelia loved to talk back to me and tease me. She’s the only one who ever dared.

A soft, feminine voice whispers in my ear. Hasn’t she suffered enough?

Chiara leans her chin on her hand and gazes at me, her big blue eyes slightly unfocused. “You’re really cute, you know that?”

“Yes.”

She rolls her eyes. “Of course you do. All your money and looks, and you have to be a criminal. Why?”

Chiara’s other hand is on the table and I reach out and take it. She must be really drunk because she lets me. I hold her slender wrist in my hand and gaze at the delicate traceries of her veins. “Because people are envious and bloodthirsty and they will always try and take what you have.”

“So you take first?”

Always. If my enemy hasn’t protected what’s theirs, then they don’t deserve what they possess.

“You’re wicked, you know that?”

“And you’re beautiful. For a spoiled princess.”

“Maybe in your world I’m spoiled because I was loved and free and told I could be anything I wanted to be. In my world I’m lucky. I was lucky.” Her face falls and I watch despair wash over her. “I promised myself I wouldn’t cry. I just wanted to forget for a while, but I can’t forget her. She loved me. I was loved. You probably don’t know what that feels like.”

Chiara breathes in sharply, and I realize my hand has tightened viciously on her wrist. “Don’t make assumptions about me if you like your blood inside your veins.”

“Ow. Okay, okay.” She stares at her wrist in my grip. Clearly her inhibitions have been lowered because a moment later she asks, “Do you mean your sister loved you? The one who died?”

I’m so shocked that I loosen my grip. For fuck’s sake. I sent Ginevra around to Chiara to soften her up for me, not spill our family secrets.

“There’s no shhhame in it,” Chiara says, slurring slightly. “Maybe I’d like you better iffyou acted human sometimes.”

“How am I meant to take you home in this state?”

“Inwhatssstate? Imfine.”

I should get her into my car and make her drink cokes until she sobers up. I pull her to her feet and walk her across the floor, but her knees keep buckling beneath her, so I scoop her up in my arms and carry her through the casino to the elevator.

“Hey! Put me down. I’m fine.”

Heads turn to stare at the woman who’s yelling at the top of her lungs.

“The mayor’s daughter is drawing so much attention to herself in my casino. I hope this doesn’t get back to her father.”

Chiara claps a hand over her lips, her eyes widening. She whispers around her fingers, “Dad will be angry if he finds out that I’m drunk in a casino.”

“We won’t tell him, baby.”

“But he’ll find out. I don’t know who he is anymore. Since Mom—” She breaks off, her eyes filling with panic and tears. “I’m going to die, aren’t I?”

“Shh,” I say, my lips against her temple. “That’s the tequila talking.”

“Liar,” she whispers, her eyes glistening. “Women who don’t do as they’re told by men like you end up dead.”

I get her out to the Bentley and pour her into the back seat. Well, this is a fucking train wreck. I should have kept a closer eye on her.

“Take us to the Maxim,” I tell the driver. It takes Chiara a moment to raise her head and realize what I’ve said. Tears have spilled down her face and there are black mascara tracks on her cheeks.

“The Maxim Hotel? You’re not taking me home? Don’t try any funny business, mister.” She wags an admonishing finger in my face.

Drunk Chiara seems like she’ll start a fight with her father or fall apart if I deposit her back at home in this state. This is my fault, so she’s mine until she sobers up.

Fifteen minutes later we pull up at the Maxim Grand Hotel at the other end of town. Out front is an enormous white marble fountain. Every fifteen minutes, water shoots out of hundreds of jets, lit up by colored lights.

The perfect drunk-girl distraction.

I help Chiara out of the car and perch her on the edge of the fountain. I stand back and watch her dangling her fingers in the water, gazing at the colors as the lights change. There’s something strange about this tableau that I can’t put my finger on.

Then I realize what it is.

Chiara’s smiling.

I don’t think I’ve seen her smile before.

A moment later, water shoots into the air behind her in a great rush, lit up in yellow, turquoise and pink. There’s a gasp from the crowd, and Chiara lifts her head and laughs. The spray makes rainbows in the air around her and her bare skin is burnished in jewel tones.

A moment later, her gaze shifts to my face, and I feel a lurch as the full force of her smile slams into my chest. I wait for her smile to dim as she remembers who I am, but she merely raises her eyes to the water jets above her head as if inviting me to share in her delight.

Suddenly, I remember why I brought her here, and I can’t fucking breathe. Ophelia. The last time I saw her was sitting right where Chiara is now.

Saw her alive.

I saw her plenty after she was dead.

My fists clench at my sides. Chiara’s smiling and watching the fountain jets, pushing damp strands of her hair back from her face. The image glitches in my mind and becomes blood red. I try to hold back the graphic images from pouring into my brain but it’s like trying to hold back a tsunami with a chain link fence.

The corners of her mouth slit with razor blades in a grotesque smile. Dead, staring eyes. Her nipples slashed. Her stomach cut open and her intestines dragged out in fat, shiny ribbons. The black and bloodied petals of a flower, just glimpsed among the broken teeth in her mouth.

Chiara goes on smiling and reaches out to run her fingers through a jet of water. There were black mascara tracks on Ophelia’s cheeks too, as she grinned the permanent grin that had been cut into her face.

I hear footsteps behind me. Several sets of feet, and deep voices. The voices fall silent and the feet slow to a stop.

Chiara looks past me, and the smile dies on her face.

“You’ve been making her cry, Salvatore.” A deep, sly, familiar voice.

Vinicius.

I turn and see all three of them. My former friends all dressed in suits. I presume that they’ve just come out of the Maxim, which has one of the few casinos in the city that I don’t own. Vinicius will have been needing his fix.

“Tequila has been making her cry. I’ve been kissing it better.”

Chiara grasps the edge of the fountain. Her feet gather beneath her and her shoulders clench. Her breathing comes faster as she looks at Vinicius, Cassius and Lorenzo.

Don’t be afraid, baby. I won’t let them anywhere near you.

“Bambina,” rumbles a deep voice. Cassius is circling around me and watching Chiara like a hawk. He holds out his hand to her. “There’s been a mistake. Come here and we can talk about it.”

She stares at his hand like it’s a snake that’s going to bite her.

I step closer to my promised bride. “Don’t even think about it.”

But Cassius wants to do nothing but think about it. “If he ever scares you or does anything you don’t like, I’m here. I’m nothing like him.” He jerks his chin at me.

Chiara’s gaze flickers among the three men and comes to rest on Lorenzo, the only one who hasn’t spoken. He’s staring at her with naked hunger in his eyes. It’s that dress she’s wearing. That clingy, black satin dress that hugs her hips and her tits like we only dream of doing. Our sweet virgin, looking like sex.

Mysweet virgin.

“Back off,” I say to my former friends. “I won’t tell you again.”

I loop an arm around Chiara’s waist and haul her to her feet. We’re walking toward my car when Lorenzo steps in front of us.

“Has he fucked you yet?”

Chiara stares at him in revulsion. “I’m seventeen, asshole.”

Lorenzo’s eyes open mockingly wide. “Oh, Salvatore wouldn’t want to break the law, would he?”

Vinicius strolls closer to the fountain as if he’s suddenly interested in the water, but his manner is too casual. I feel Cassius pressing in our other side. Three wolves, circling closer.

I try to guide Chiara to my car, but she pulls out of my grasp and rounds on them, brimming with drunk-girl anger. “Why do you guys even care about that?”

Vinicius smiles a pointed smile. “Isn’t it obvious? We want it for ourselves.”

“It? My virginity? Don’t be disgusting. It’s not some trophy you can hang on the wall! It’s my body and…” She trails off, her inebriated mind stumbling onto another possibility. “Actually, yes, Salvatore has screwed me a dozen times. You can all just go home.”

“Beautiful girls shouldn’t tell ugly lies,” Cassius says. He’s close enough to reach out and touch her. I can see his hand lifting toward her cheek.

I pull Chiara closer and wrap an arm around her waist, giving the others a look of gloating.

She’s mine.

So back off.

“Chiara couldn’t wait to dress up for me tonight, could you, baby? Doesn’t she look delicious? Excuse me, I have to take my bride home.”

Cassius’ jaw is tight with fury. Even Vinicius has dropped his perennial smirk as he watches me walk Chiara away from them.

Lorenzo’s eyes are narrowed and his head turns slowly as he watches our progress. “Better keep a close eye on her, Fiore. You don’t want anything to happen to her between now and your wedding.”

“Go fuck yourself, Lorenzo. If you lay a finger on her I’ll cut off your hands.”

I help Chiara into the car, and slam the door closed behind us. As the driver pulls away, Chiara sits rigid on the seat beside me, staring straight ahead. She seems like she’s sobered up at last.

“You all right, baby? There’s no need to be afraid. I would never let them touch you.”

Tears fill her eyes and fall down her face. Tequila tears?

“Seeing them all again reminds me of that night. The moment when—”

No, tears of grief and pain as she remembers her mother’s throat being slit right in front of her. I watch her with teeth gritted, torn between pulling her into my arms and telling her to toughen the fuck up.

In this life we all see things we wish we hadn’t.

I take her inside her house, meaning to see that she gets safely up the stairs and then leave. Chiara turns to me in the hall and stares at me, her eyes huge in the darkness.

“Your three friends. Ex-friends. Do you think they meant what they said?”

“I’ll kill them if they lay one finger on you, that’s a fucking promise.”

Chiara steps closer. “You would kill for me?”

I stare at her, wondering at her sudden change in mood. Mentions of death and violence have always had her shrinking away from me. “Is that what you want, baby? I thought you’d want me to be sweet with you. Treat you gently and make you feel like a princess.”

She shakes her head. “I’ve been treated like a princess all my life, and look where it’s gotten me. I want to know if you’ll kill someone if I ask you.”

Hatred and determination are burning in her eyes.

“Who do you want me to kill, baby?”

Chiara places her hands against my chest. Her beautiful face is raised to mine like she’s begging for a kiss, and the whisper falls from her lips like a word of love.

“Dad.”