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12
Antonio
The silence in the room is so thick it could choke a horse.
I’m sure Lucas is steaming, although his head is down, but I feel the sear of Cristiano’s eyes on me.
“You have something to say?”
He doesn’t respond.
I very rarely go after a woman, and I havenevertouched a hair on a child’s head, but Daniela has me so out of sorts, so pissed off, that I’m willing to take my revenge wherever I can find it.
“You have something to fucking say?” I bark at Cristiano like an irascible prick.
Without thinking, I slam my fist on the table, sending everything flying, nearly toppling Lucas’s open water bottle onto his keyboard.
I need to calm the fuck down before I do something stupid that can’t be cleaned up with a few paper towels.
I roll back my chair and go to the bank of windows that overlooks the Douro River and the city beyond.
Running the region takes a clear head. Decisions made in anger are often bad decisions. I can’t let her get to me, or everything I care about will end up in rubble.
I rub circles over my eyes before turning to my two friends, the closest thing I have to brothers. “How can we reassure the maid so that there are no problems?”
The cords in Cristiano’s neck soften.
Lucas is dark like me, not just his hair and eyes, but in all ways. Cristiano is blond, with clear blue eyes, and a true sense of humanity. Although when the occasion calls for it, he can be ruthless too.
I’ve seen him plunge a knife into a man’s stomach without batting an eyelash, even knowing it would be a slow, painful death. But unlike me, he carries those sins with him. It’s a luxury I can’t afford.
“We might want to have Daniela call to reassure her that everything is fine,” he replies. “Lucas can put a time delay on this end, and we’ll monitor the call and shut it down if Daniela says too much. But I agree with you. We shouldn’t make the situation with Isabel bigger than it needs to be.”
He agrees with me.I almost laugh.
“I’ll think about it.” She’s going to have to earn a phone call, and right now the only thing she’s earned is my belt on her gorgeous ass. “In the meantime, get Daniela a new phone. Without internet access. We’ll hold on to it until the time is right.”
This is the clusterfuck of all clusterfucks. I’d kill D’Sousa myself if he wasn’t already dead.
Why didn’t I just tell him no,I don’t want to marry your daughter? Why?
Because I wanted those vineyards, and everything they represent, that’s why. And more than that, I owed him. I owed him big.
I turn to Cristiano. “Tell the foreman at the docks I want a meeting tonight.”
“Are you sure you don’t want us to handle it?”
“This is my city. I won’t be sidelined. In case you’ve forgotten, I’m a capable soldier.”
“I haven’t forgotten. But it’s not just that—”
“What is it, then?”
“I’m in no position to give out relationship advice, Antonio.” He shakes his head. “But you have a woman at your house who we lured across the Atlantic under false pretenses. She believes she’s a prisoner, and in many ways, she is. A few times today she appeared to be on the verge of a spectacular meltdown. Tough way to start a marriage.”
Lucas snickers from behind the monitor, but I ignore him.
Cristiano knows a turbulent, drama-filled marriage is the very last thing I want. My days are hell. I don’t want to go home to hell every night too. That’s the reason she’s at the house in the valley, while I’m staying at my place in the city. It’ll be that way until she adjusts to the idea of becoming my wife.
