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That last one jabs at me, because I thought I could never have a family before my Lucy came along. Even now, amidst all this business, I ache for the closeness of her.
“You’re a man I could do business with.”
“You know what you’re suggesting.” He sighs darkly. “War.”
“We’re already at war. This is just evening the odds.”
He stares at me, his eyes flickering between dozens of different emotions. Joining me and fighting against Franco will mean severing all his ties to his old family. It will mean starting his own after Franco is dead or in handcuffs.
“Can I have time to think about it?”
“Sure.” I glance at my silver watch. “Let’s head inside and have some coffee. You’ve got an hour to let me know if you’re going to help me… or if I’m going to toss you in the ocean.”
I stride toward the warehouse, leaving him to wonder if I’m serious as I pace away coldly.
It’s revenge or death as far as he’s concerned.
But Ottavio is old school.
Some of those bastards will take the bullet rather than betray their family.
I know how that feels, a deep pulsing in my gut. It’s my will to always protect Lucy and the joy and love we will bring into this world, protect it from the grime and the underworld and the violence and the pain.
I’ll protect her from everything, and definitely from the fucking Rosso Family.
I’ll turn feral if I have to, for my woman.
Chapter Eight
Lucy
I’ve just had a shower and gotten changed, and now I sit on the bed with my hands in my lap. I stare around the opulence of the room, taking in the wall-hangings and the classic art and the tall marble columns in each corner. Everything is sleek with fur rugs draped over the floor.
It’s like being inside a palace.
When Luca left me – swirling in an emotional storm of confusion and need – I thought about going to find some breakfast. But the thought of stumbling around his palace, getting lost, running into one of his men…
That last one sends a shiver through me.
What if this is all a game and Luca is sending me out there to get hurt?
My body rebels at the notion, my feisty womb screaming at me that he’d never do something like that. I try to tell my sizzling desire that I don’t know him, but my feelings don’t care. They twist and coil around me until I’m trapped.
I don’t know him… but it feels like I’ve known him forever.
He’s a stranger… but my body aches to bring his children into the world.
Love, at first sight, doesn’t exist… but something is aching deep inside of me, an inexplicable pulse that glows and glitters and explodes like love. And that makes no freaking sense, none at all, because I can’t love this man. I shouldn’t even be able to like this man.
But it doesn’t matter.
He made me feel more in thirty minutes than anybody has in my entire life.
I flinch at the knocking coming from the door.
Is it one of his men?
I need to calm down.
But panic rules me.
“Excuse me, Lucy?” It’s a woman’s voice, high-pitched and friendly. “I’m Maria Lioni, Luca’s aunt. He’s kindly letting me stay here and asked if I’d have breakfast with you. And I’m dying to meet you. I’ve never seen Luca so besotted before.”
Besotted?
My heart pumps rapidly at the thought I could invoke such strong emotion in Luca Lioni, but my anxiety tells me it’s a trick, a clever cruel lie to reel me in.
“Really?” I say, somehow forcing my voice steady.
“Yes. I’m sorry I couldn’t check in on you sooner. I’ve only just arrived, you see. May I come in, dear?”
“Sure,” I call across the room, even as instincts scream at me to say no. “It’s unlocked.”
The door opens and Maria Lioni steps in.
She’s tall and elegant, with pearls at her neck and her ears. She’s probably around sixty, but she holds herself with a grace and elegance that makes her seem younger.
She struts across the room in emerald-colored block heels, standing at the edge of the bed.
“So you’re the famous Lucy.”
I laugh, smiling up at her. She’s so forward, making it easy for me to go along for the ride. I hope I don’t have to think of something to say. I’m terrible with meeting new people.
But still, this is something normal buried among all the craziness. I’m meeting my—my what? Am I meeting my boyfriend’s aunt, or is that taking things way too fast?
“Well?” she goes on. “Don’t just giggle up at me, dear.”
“Yes,” I say. “But I don’t feel very famous.”
She leans down and hooks her arm through mine, pulling me to my feet and basically dragging me toward the door. I giggle again at her forwardness, glad I changed into jeans, flats, and a sort-of stylish T-shirt. The clothes were already in the drawers, waiting for me.
