“There you are,” I said, smiling down at him. But then his hand dropped away all at once, and I knew he was gone.
As my brain caught up, making the connection between this huge goon, my brother who had been chained up in the most deplorable conditions conceivable, and my brother who had been driven mad before being gunned down right in front of me, something within me twisted. I peered up at the goon and caught sight of Romeo with a stunned expression standing behind him.
“Vittorio,” Romeo said to the goon. “What have you done?”
But I didn’t care. I roared from some guttural place deep inside of me as I leaped at them both.
I wasn’t being rational. I wasn’t thinking about anything but that I wanted their blood. I knew that it was their fault that I had no parents. I knew it was their fault I’d been trapped in that stupid room for months. I knew it was their fault that I’d lost my eldest brother. The Bonifacio heir was dead, and I couldn’t handle it anymore. I was sick of having no control over my own life, of being nothing but a pawn, an object, an offering. And now, I was going to do something about it.
“I’ll kill you,” I shouted as I jumped on the enormous goon. As he’d been in the middle of reloading his shotgun, I caught him by enough surprise that I managed to knock it from his grip. It landed with a clatter several feet away, and with a ferocity I hadn’t been aware I’d had, I tore into every bit of him I could reach. Scratching, kicking, punching, biting. I was like some ravenous animal, and he was my first free meal of the season.
Still, when it came to brawn, he far outmatched me. Vittorio the goon peeled me off like he might an errant thread, then slammed me full force into the hard rock floor. My vision went from light to dark, dark to light, before flickering like a lightbulb fuse going out.
The last thing I remember is seeing the image of Romeo retrieving his pistol and firing upon his hired goon, then pivoting toward me, his dark Cavetti eyes trained on my face and I knew no more.
12
Romeo
Carrying Lucia away in a fireman’s lift, I didn’t know if I’d ever felt what I was feeling now. I was so irritated at her from trying to escape yet fascinated by her ingenuity at getting as far as she had. I’d had to kill Vittorio, which would no doubt make my father livid, but I’d learned something in my two-week absence. While I did just fine without my spacious quarters, what I had missed during that time was my farfalla.
What I hadn’t known—what I’d only come to understand in that specific moment—was the reason why. Though it pained me to admit it, I’d been wrong about my bride-to-be. I’d always thought of her as this weak yet precious possession of mine, beautiful and delicate. But tonight she’d displayed for me in great detail that while she might be tremendously beautiful, she was not weak. When she’d released that roar of defiance, and attacked an armed man three times her size, the sound had quivered its way down my spine and back up again.
Like me, she would kill for what she cared about, or do as much damage as she could at any rate. Once I’d stripped her down and slipped her into the bath I’d run for her, she’d come to, again muttering, “I’ll kill you.”
Before, her declaring such violence toward me would have made my temper skyrocket, but this time I saw it for what it was. Her standing up for herself. So now, I had to determine one more thing so I could come to my final conclusion.
“Or I could kill you,” I told her, taking a soapy washcloth and wiping her brother’s blood and filth from her complexion.
“Then, do it already,” she told me, her voice not at full capacity yet, but already gaining strength. “If you’re going to torture my brothers and pick off my siblings one by one, then either play fair and give me a chance to take you down or execute me now. I’m so tired of living in this weird limbo in between.”
“You bumped your head. Are you dizzy?”
“Some.”
“Yet, you wish to kill me in your less than healthy state?”
“What I wish is to stop the suffering of my siblings and myself,” she half-shouted, her voice banging off the tile of her bathroom.
“I don’t appreciate your caustic tone towards me,” I informed her, my hand going to her throat. I felt the exasperation she inspired in me, but also something else. The lust, yes, but there was something more there, too. Something I couldn’t quite identify.
“I don’t appreciate you murdering my famiglia,” she volleyed back sharply. I sat back on the side of her tub, removing my hands from her and considering.
“I didn’t kill Antonio.”
“You’re still responsible. Not to mention reprehensible. The Cavettis hate the Bonifacios, and the Bonifacios hate the Cavettis. End of story.”
That brought my hackles up. “I don’t like how tactless you’re suddenly being with me,” I informed her with a tone of steel. She was almost crossing the line into disrespect, and if she slid any closer to it, I would not be able to forgive her.
“You made me make a blood pact to always tell you the truth, and that’s what I just did.”
She stared me down, and I was astonished to register that a change had come over her. Where her brilliant Blue Beauty eyes had once been wide and guileless, now there was a fierceness to them, a power there I hadn’t noticed previously. She’d been angry with me prior to now, but not strong. Now, she was strong, and I felt… proud of that strength. Proud of her.
Ah, my farfalla, aren’t you full of surprises?
“Then based on that same blood pact, I’m going to renegotiate some things.” I required a great deal from her, so perhaps, it would only be fair to make some concessions. “First, I never authorized Vittorio to kill either of your brothers. That was not supposed to happen. I swear to you that from this moment forward your brother Giorgio will no longer be tortured, either. He will be moved to similar accommodations to these and any health needs he might have seen to. You may also visit him and your sisters on occasion, as long as you agree not to attempt any additional escapes. Will that be acceptable?”
Her mouth gaping open a bit, she goggled at me. “You would do that for me?”
“You are to be my wife in six weeks’ time, Lucia. I expect you to stand by my side and promise yourself to me. I’ll pledge my life to you, and you’ll pledge yours to me. Me taking care of you and your famiglia makes sense.”
“I didn’t know the wedding was going forward.”
“My father is organizing it.
She blinked, and for the first time, glanced around at her surroundings. Her lips puckered into a small frown, and my cock began to rise to the occasion. “This isn’t my bathroom.”
“No, it’s not. It’s mine.”
“I’m trying to grasp something, Romeo. What has altered between us? Why are we going ahead with the wedding now? I threatened to kill you earlier.”
“And I have considered killing you. But today, for the first time, I saw some of myself in you. When I saw Vittorio put his hands on you…” I trailed off as fury bolted through me.
“The part with you and Vittorio is kind of fuzzy to me. Did you actually shoot him?”