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"Fuck off," I bite back at the pompous Parisi.
Giulia is gripping my hand behind my back harder than I thought possible, and I block her when she tries to step out and face them with me. I can deal with the fallout of my father's displeasure. She doesn't need to be in the line of fire.
But to my surprise, instead of telling me off here and now, he looks away from me and nods with his chin down the hall. "Come with me.Bothof you. The Five Families are meeting in one of the manor's rooms, and we will deal with this there."
He talks about me, and Giulia's relationship like it's shit that needs to be picked up. I lift my chin, but I don’t argue. I'd wanted to confront the Russos anyway. Better to clear it all up now than to let everything fester—and if Dante Parisi figured out our relationship, he's probably also told her family. There's no hiding it now, and I was sick of hiding it anyway.
Giulia is silent beside me as we leave the alcove and follow my father and the smug motherfucker who led him to us. She keeps trying to slip her hand from mine like she doesn't want anyone to see, but I hold onto her stubbornly, giving her a look.
"They know already," I whisper.
She just chews her lip nervously and looks away.
Finally, we crest a tall, red-carpeted flight of stairs, and my father leads us into a room. It's lit with a large chandelier and looks like it was once a music room of some kind, but the floor has been cleared, and now members from each of the Five Families are standing here.
Dozens of pairs of eyes flick toward us as we walk in. Her parents look immediately thunderous with rage when they see me gripping her hand, and Bruno visibly winces when my father sends him a dark, threatening look. Every person here is in the upper hierarchy of their mafia family. While I'm sure not all of them are armed, it's still a dangerous group that would intimidate me if Giulia and I didn't fit in.
The only non-mafioso present is a sharply-dressed man I recognize from my brother's description as Lawrence Smith—a member of the Illuminati. He tips his head when he sees us walking in but says nothing.
In fact, it seems no one knows what to say for one long second before Giulia's father, Frank Russo, snaps. "Drop my daughter's hand, you son of a bitch."
"Watch your mouth," my own father snarls.
Giulia quickly slips her hand from mine despite my protest and steps forward. I recognize from the determined set of her shoulders and the flash in her eyes that while she might've been flustered earlier, she's back to her no-bullshit firmness.
"Let's skip over the name-calling and dick-measuring and cut to the chase. We're not here to argue, and thisVitalendeal is more important than what any of you think about—" She hesitates for just a moment before glancing at me. "About the two of us."
Several other members of the Five Families present audibly gasp at that. They're as shocked at the idea of a Russo and a Giovanni together as Lawrence Smith, who blinks like someone just slapped him and looks between us with new understanding.
"There is no two of you," her mother scoffs. She must be where Giulia gets her height and looks ready to claw my eyes out. "There is a Russo and a Giovannimurdererwho deserves to pay for breaking the stalemate."
"Oh, please. I didn't fucking touch your nephew," I snap.
"A murderer and a liar—the apple never falls far from the motherfucking tree," Frank Russo snarls.
As if the tension in this room wasn't already reaching simmering, dangerous levels, Dante Parisi steps forward and gives me the evil eye, sneering smugly as he addresses everyone else.
"You should add another moniker to that list, Don, considering how your daughter is pregnant because this Giovanni forced himself on her."
I'm so caught off guard by the revolting accusation that I don’t manage to speak in the shocked silence that follows his lie. Then all hell breaks loose.
Giulia's father leaps towards me with an enraged roar even as everyone else starts shouting over each other, and Bruno rushes to pull Frank Russo back. Giulia's mother grabs at Bruno as someone else tries to pull her away. I try to block Giulia from Dante Parisi as she shouts over the noise at him. She's using some very creative names for him that I'd be impressed by if he didn't right then throw a fist in my direction.
I duck to take it in my shoulder and throw my bodyweight forward, knocking him to the ground. Before I know it, another mafioso I don't recognize is trying to pin me down while my father yells and tackles him, his fists flying for once. It's violent mayhem, and no one in this now-deafening room is being heard over each other as it escalates.
I leap back to my feet in time to catch a right hook in the chin from Dante Parisi. This motherfucker apparently didn't get enough of our last fight. This chaos blending into a mess of fists and shouts all around us is his fault.
Fuck it—if he wants a fight from me, I'll give him one. He doesn't get to just accuse me of forcing myself on Giulia and get away with it.
When he goes to throw another one, I punch him hard in the gut and slam against him. He manages to stay on his feet but shoves me away with an animalistic snarl. Then Dante Parisi takes a step back, which frustrates me because I want to break his nose and twist it until he admits he's lying.
Too late, my focus drops to the pistol he's whipped from his suit.
"No!"
Giulia's shrill scream from directly beside me cuts over everything else an instant before a gunshot splits the air. Everyone else hits the ground on instinct.
Not me. Instead, horror freezes me as time slows and Giulia's body crumples to the floor before me. Splatters of her blood are on me—on the floor, her green dress, pooling on the ground.
