A chill slid down her spine. Valentino wasn’t saying things to frighten her. Not only was he repeating the old myth, he believed it—and seemed to have reason to.
“The more we’re connected, the better the chances are that you can take me into the shadows with you, but I can’t go in alone. So, if there is danger, you could choose to save me.” He gave her a faint grin. “Worst-case scenario, we have a couple of kids, we’re under attack, we go in together, me holding the children and you holding my hand or however it works, and we escape through the shadows.” He waited a heartbeat. Two. “Most likely scenario, I tell you to get your ass in the shadows with our children while I stay behind and try to kill every fucker who threatened you and our children.”
He would do that, too, she knew it. He hadn’t trapped her so he could be a shadow rider. This wasn’t about that. A tiny bit of relief allowed some of the tension coiled in her stomach to ease. “Naturally, I’d have to fall in love with a badass. Not a smart one, either. A smart one leaves and comes back to fight another day. He doesn’t stay and get riddled with bullets.”
“He does if he’s giving his wife time to get to safety.”
“His wife is safety.” She glared at him. “Valentino, if I do this with you, I’m not going to be like Greta, or Parisi’s wife, or any of the other wives. I’ll be a full partner. I will know your business, whether you like it or not. I’m not a trophy. I’d never be happy in that role. I understand completely that this is a man’s world and they would never accept me. That’s fine. I’ll stay in the shadows when you have your stupid meetings, and I’ll listen and catch all the undertones. I’ll find their weaknesses, just as you did when you were a boy. If you can’t see who I am and what I’ll be in the relationship, then there is no need for us to continue moving forward with these explanations.”
She knew whatever he was going to tell her was bad. It didn’t matter. She couldn’t live with him if he intended to give her just a part of him. “You have to be in all the way with me. One hundred percent or nothing. That’s what you’re asking of me. Maybe that’s the secret of this myth and why you can’t tell another soul even within the family. You have a vow to them. A blood vow. Parisi said never put a woman first. He was adamant that it was wrong. Miceli feels the same way. Anyone dealing in human trafficking feels that way. Giuseppi didn’t feel that way and neither do you. So think about that, Val. You can tell no one, not even to benefit your organization, your famiglia. You have a sworn blood oath to them, and yet you can’t tell anyone in that famiglia, according to the myth. There has to be a reason that loyalty is first.”
Val leaned his head back against the headboard, crossed his arms over his chest and regarded her with his dark green eyes. He could look very ruthless. Unforgiving. Hard. Merciless. Or, like now, soft and tender. He rarely got that look for anyone but her. It melted her every single time, but he couldn’t change what she knew about herself—what she would need to be happy. A lifetime of unhappiness was not something she was willing to settle for.
She waited for that to sink in. Valentino had always been good at reading her body language as well as her facial expressions. He knew she meant what she said. She would never be a pushover. She loved him. She absolutely couldn’t be around him and not want to have sex with him. She’d fall if she was close to him. That was a given. She was too weak. She knew that about herself. But she wouldn’t marry him. Be his wife. Be a part-time partner, a doll for him to come home to and play with at night. That would never be her.
“My world isn’t safe, Emme.”
“Do you think mine is? Do you think my bodyguards go through the shadows with me when I’m sent out on a job? I go alone. When it’s my turn, I take the assignment, go where I’m told and I don’t have any backup. I enter a house, sometimes surrounded by enemies, kill my assigned target and leave the same way I got in. I will continue to take rotations whether or not I’m married to you.”
His eyes went from soft to hard with dark, merciless fire building in the depths. She wouldn’t back down, it was too important, but he had a way of making her heart accelerate too fast when Stefano couldn’t even do that. It wasn’t like she thought he’d ever hurt her, so she wasn’t certain why she got that little thrill of fear chasing through her, but Val could do it.
“When you’re my wife, Emmanuelle, we’ll discuss whether or not you’ll continue to work for your family.” His dark eyes stayed on hers. Steady. No blinking. A predator’s eyes. “You want to be my partner? Full time? How do you think you can do both? Work with me and work for your family? That isn’t feasible, and you know it, especially when we have children. Or do you expect someone else to raise them? Do you want full-time nannies? Others feeding them when they’re babies, or getting up with them at night? What role do you see us playing with our children?”
Her stomach dropped even more. She pressed a hand to it. She knew what he was doing. He knew all about Eloisa. She’d never taken care of her babies. She’d brought them home from the hospital and abandoned them until they were old enough to be trained as riders. That training began at the age of two. Emmanuelle hadn’t told Valentino about shadow riding, but she had told him about her mother’s style of parenting.
“You know I’ll take care of any child I have and will expect you to as well. We had this discussion. We both agreed we wanted to be hands-on parents, no one else raising our children. You don’t have to bring my mother into this, and I won’t bring up the fact that by being with you, there’s constant danger to our children every second of every day.”
“I think you just did bring up that little fact, Princess.”
Now his voice was devoid of emotion and his eyes had gone as cold as ice. A chill crept down her spine. She wrapped her arms around her middle, shivering. She’d rather have a fiery fight, storming at each other in a flash of heat, than the ice he could produce. She wasn’t capable of that cold demeanor—not toward him, not even pretending.
“Babe, put on a robe. Something warm. As much as I detest you covering up your body, I don’t like you cold.”
At least he didn’t realize she was affected by his arctic reaction. She slid off the bed and made her way to the walk-in closet, grateful she could keep her back to him. She needed the respite. Why was it that she was the one so distressed and he seemed so in control? Pulling the longest, thickest robe she owned from its hanger, she slipped into it.
As she came out of the closet and approached the bed, she noticed the wall where the night-light shone. A single shadow danced there. When she looked closer, she realized it was two shadows intertwined. Her shadow. His. The two shadows were bound together by a million threads. Not threads. Veins. Arteries. Something else. She couldn’t quite figure it out. Even so, more ropes seemed to be knotting around both of them, rapidly tying them together.
She stared at the strange phenomenon for some time, long enough that Valentino turned his head to look as well.
“Weird, isn’t it?” she finally said. “People are bound to notice that.”
“It will eventually fade,” he said. “With enough ropes, according to the story, it will fade if we both have an absolute commitment to each other.”