“She’s the mayor’s daughter and, less than a week ago, was engaged to D'Ardenzi. She could be spying for them, using your obsession with her to bring us down. You’re too blind to fucking see it. You can make your own decisions in your personal life, Santino, but when it comes to business, I call the shots. Either she leaves, or we move to your office.”
Alessio’s cold eyes assessed me as he folded his arms across his chest, intimidating as fuck. I knew my place. I knew my rank. But that didn’t mean I’d let him disrespect my wife in my own fucking house.
I stood up slowly, every muscle tensing beneath my skin. “A spy? You come to my house and call my wife a fucking spy?” I bobbed my head and glanced at Elenora, who was giving me ‘shut the fuck up and behave, please’ eyes. “Tell me, Alessio, when you kidnapped my sister and held her hostage in Sicily, fucking her and making her fall in love with you, did you think just as little of her?”
“Watch your fucking mouth, Santino. Sit the fuck down,” Alessio growled, his fists clenched as he stepped towards me.
“Stop! Please.”
I paused as Aria’s terrified voice screeched behind me. Her hands wrapped around my bicep and yanked me back from my brother-in-law. Little did she realise there was too much love between Alessio and me for this to escalate into murder. That didn’t mean we wouldn’t throw a few punches, though.
“He’s right.”
I froze. Turning my head slowly to look down at her at my side, I noticed her eyes widen as she realised what it sounded like.
“I’m not a spy!” she blurted. “But Alessio has every right to think I might be. I am the mayor’s daughter, and I nearly married Callum because I’d been told about all the terrible things you were capable of.”
My jaw tightened, but she lifted her hand and stroked it softly with her fingers until I relaxed. Then she turned to face Alessio, trembling slightly under his gaze.
“But that was before. Before I got to know him. Do I love my father? Yes. Is itkilling me that you’re at war with him? Yes. But last night, I made a choice. I’m choosing Santino. I know who he is and… what he does, and I’m staying by his side, which is breaking my father’s heart, but if I left, it would break mine. You don’t have to trust me, Alessio, but I hope you believe that at least.”
I grabbed her face and kissed her. This woman had just stood up to the Mafia King of Italy, which took balls of steel.
“Aww,” Elle cooed from the sofa behind us as we broke apart and smiled at each other. “Stop scaring her and being a grumpy asshole, Alessio. Give the girl a chance.”
He rolled his eyes at my sister, but I already knew he was softening. “Fine. I believe this is…” He waved his hand in our direction. “…real for both of you. But it just cost me my main fucking port and millions of euros. We are losing respect among other mafia families, and deals are dropping like flies. So, yeah. I’m a grumpy fucking asshole.”
“I can try talking to my father,” Aria offered with a shrug. “I don’t know how much it will help, but I can try to get him to reopen the port.”
I smiled at her attempt to help, then shook my head. “If it were just your father making these decisions, it would probably work, but like I said…” I turned my gaze back to Alessio to remind him of the conversation we’d just had in my office. “Piero’s scared, and not just of us. Last night, I saw more than fear for his daughter. He could see that Aria was perfectly fine. He was afraid for his life. Someone is using him to take us down. And I don’t give a fuck that we didn’t find anything suspicious in his warehouse. I’d still bet my life it’s D'Ardenzi.”
“You think mypapi’s scared of Callum?” Aria whispered beside me, her eyes wide as I nodded. She gulped, then stared straight ahead, her mind whirling.
“I’ll humour you,” Alessio said, flopping back into an armchair. “Say it is D'Ardenzi. What is his motive for blackmailing Piero into bringing us down? And what does a property developer have on the mayor to make him shake in his fucking boots enough to try to get you to sign divorce papers? Why does your marriage to Aria have anything to do with him? It makes no sense.”
“Callum and Santino have been business rivals for years now,” Max added. “Callum is one of the last remaining powerful men in Rome who isn’t in Santino’s pocket, except for the mayor, of course. Maybe Callum’s motive is simply to get rid of Santino so he can swoop in and take all his connections and business. And maybe he’s just fucking sour about the fact that Sani stole his bride.”
“She was never his,” I snapped, wrapping my arm around Aria’s waist and keeping her glued to my side to calm the possessive beast within me.
“Just saying.” Max raised his hands with a smirk. “You made it personal.”
“Callum called me last night before we went to dinner,” Aria mumbled, her voice shaking slightly as all our attention turned to her.
My eyebrows furrowed. “He called you? And you answered?”
She nodded, peering at me from under her lashes as if offering an apology. “I only answered because I thought I owed him an apology about the wedding, but the conversation was… weird.”
“Weird how, sweetie?” Elle asked.
“He said mypapiwas going to offer to drop the investigation if Santino agreed to divorce me. He made it sound like it was both his and mypapi’sidea, because they cared about my safety more than anything else.”
I scoffed, shaking my head as my blood boiled at Callum’s attempt to win Aria’s affection with this fake nice guy act. Manipulative bastard.
“Did he say anything else?”
She gulped, her eyes darting to me and then away too quickly. It made my spine straighten.
“He told me that Santino was using me to control my father and that I shouldn’t believe he cared about me. He said that when I was no longer useful, he’d treat me like shit or… kill me.”
