Page 134 of Unlock My Heart

A frown tugs my lips. “Neither will I, and that’s where we’re stuck.”

“I’m not stuck; you’re just stubborn as hell.”

Arms crossed, I inform him, “You knew that going in.”

“My balls and I did,” he agrees.

Despite myself, I smile.

“Stop hating me, just for tonight.” He cups my cheek, and out of complete lack of self-preservation, I find myself leaning into his touch.

“Boss,” someone calls, breaking the spell.

“Be back in a little while.” He winks, hustling across the courtyard.

“Take your time,” I call after him, needing to get back into the proper headspace of hating my husband. My first stop is the bar, shielding myself with a cocktail that I always hide behind at family gatherings.

It’s different now, that little voice argues, but as the party begins, I watch over the rim of my cocktail glass as everyone licks my husband’s boots.

Maybe not so different after all.

“Sienna!” The same capo’s wife from Michele’s birthday party waves me down. “Wow, married to the boss. You certainly moved up, and Michele’s body wasn’t even cold.” She giggles.

“And you, still pregnant with twins! Due any day now, right?”

“Still one baby,” she says through her teeth. “And I’m five months pregnant.”

“Ohhhh, my mistake. If you’ll excuse me.”

The chef rolls out the wedding cake, and I hurry to intercept him, but pause, reminding myself that I no longer have to babysit Michele and his tantrums. “Let’s set up the cake across from the fountain,” I decide.

“Yes, Mrs. Calvani.”

The party gets into full swing, with the boss being pulled this way and that. We both have what we’ve always wanted. Fabien is the boss, and I have my own design studio. And yet it all feels hollow, because…

Lest I screw up my mascara, that train of thought is stopped in its tracks.

Angelo appears with Maks trailing behind him like a menacing shadow.

They both are on the receiving end of death glares from me. Unfortunately, neither gets the hint. Angelo strides toward me, with Maks a few feet behind his boss.

“Sienna. A funeral and a wedding. You move quickly,” Angelo muses.

Oh, how I’ve looked forward to this day. “Since you’re no longer the boss, Angelo, I refuse to hold my tongue⁠—”

“You held your tongue before?” he says without inflection.

“Your holier-than-thou attitude is beyond trite,” I inform him. “As the boss of this family, you could have ended my suffering at the hands of Michele with the flick of your wrist. You chose not to involve yourself because you didn’t see me as human, but as a whore. Someone beneath you.”

A Calvani family trait, one that Angelo doesn’t deny.

Now that I’m good and fired up, I continue, “And because you didn’t see me as human, you had no problem ordering me drugged and kidnapped.”

Angelo holds up his hands. “You were caught in a family squabble. For that, I apologize.”

Bitterness coats my words. “A family squabble? That’s what you call drugging me in the bathroom of school and dragging my body out the window?” While I don’t remember most of it, that’s how it must’ve happened; otherwise, my guard would’ve interceded.

Angelo’s voice remains inflectionless. “What is it you want from me, Sienna?”