My lips curve upward. “That would be me, I take it.”
“That would be you.” His voice grows quieter. “You’re also the lass who withstood fourteen years of brutality without complaint—”
“As if anyone would have listened.”
“—and managed to pull the wool over every law enforcement official’s eyes when she surgically disposed of her abuser.”
I say automatically, “I didn’t kill my husband.”
Declan smiles. “And is a mighty fine liar, to boot. Why wouldn’t they want you in charge?”
“Oh, I don’t know. My vagina?”
He chuckles at that. “I did tell them I wouldn’t renew the contract with anyone else, so there’s that.”
My feeling of unreality grows bigger. I’m disconnected from my body, as if I’m seeing this all unfold from somewhere overhead. “But I haven’t signed the contract. Gianni did.”
Quinn and Declan just sit there and look at me.
“And you knew when I walked into this room that Gianni was dead. You only gave me the concession about Stavros and told me to send over the other changes because you already knew I’d been named capo. You even knew back at that meeting at the warehouse with Alessandro and the others that they were testing my loyalties. You knew the night we came for supper that the woman who agreed to marry this man next to me was a potential candidate for the most powerful position in the Cosa Nostra. You’ve known an awful lot all along, Mr. O’Donnell.”
He says evenly, “You can’t blame a leopard for its spots, lass.”
“Or a tiger for its stripes.”
Quinn’s tension is rising again. Even without breaking Declan’s gaze, I can feel him growing more agitated, and I know the reason why.
He just realized that if I’m capo, there’s no need for me to legally marry him at all.
We don’t need a marriage license to make the contract valid. If I’m the head of the Caruso crime family now, I’m free to negotiate my own contracts without selling my body as an asset to anyone.
I’m free to walk away from this non-marriage and still get everything I want.
I’m just…free.
I look at Quinn. He looks back at me, all of it written all over his face as plain as day.
In a gruff voice, he says, “I’ll have your things sent anywhere you like.”
He rises from his chair and stiffly walks out of the room.
39
Spider
I stand outside with my face upturned to the sky and my eyes closed, feeling the warmth of the sun on my skin and the freezing coldness inside my heart.
I should have known it was too good to be true.
I should have known.
Footsteps approach. I don’t turn or open my eyes.
I want to remember this moment. I want to brand every thought and feeling into my memory, so if I ever think things might have changed for me, if I ever make the mistake of having hope again, I’ll look back and feel myself burning to the ground and turn away from that hope because it’s a lie.
It’s always been a lie.
There’s no hope for me.
There’s only misery.
Declan says gently, “What are you doing, lad?”
“What does it look like I’m doing?”
“Feeling sorry for yourself.”
“With all due respect, boss, piss off.”
He chuckles and claps a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t tell me you’re falling in love with your wife.”
“Fallen, past tense. It already happened. And she’s not my wife.”
“Everything’s so black and white with you. Try looking at the shades of gray once in a while. It’ll do you a bit of good.”
I open my eyes to glare at him. Standing next to me in the garden, he’s smiling. Looking at me like I didn’t just get kicked off the bliss train I’d been riding since the wedding.
“That’s your advice for me right now? Look at shades of gray?”
“Aye. Also maybe stick around for the end of a conversation before you go storming out in a dramatic teenage huff.”
“I didn’t storm! And I’m not dramatic!”
He takes a moment to let the hair settle back around his face before saying, “Oh no. Not you. You’re as calm as a bloody buddha.”
Muttering, I look away and cross my arms over my chest.
“So what’s your plan, lover boy? Stand out here in the garden glaring at the poor flowers until it gets dark?”
“I don’t have a plan.”
“Then maybe you could come back inside. The girls are having champagne.”
I snap my head around and stare at him. “Champagne?”
He smiles. “Sloane thought a toast was in order. Considering your wife is the first female head of the Cosa Nostra.”
My heart starting to beat faster, I say, “She’s not my wife.”
He shrugs and slides his hands into his pockets. “If you say so.” He turns and strolls back toward the house, whistling “Here Comes the Bride.”
My hands start to shake. I break out in a cold sweat. My heart decides now would be a good time to test its limits to see how fast it can beat in a ten-second span.
Don’t do it. Don’t even think it. Don’t get your hopes up, you bloody wanker.
This is just another setup for fate to laugh its arse off at you.
I stand rooted to the same spot for five minutes, arguing with myself, until Reyna appears in a window.
Dark hair, red lips, olive skin.
A low-cut dress.
Acres of cleavage.
And eyes that glitter silver in the morning sun like the flash of coins at the bottom of a wishing well.
My pounding heart lets out a primal scream.
The first time I saw her in a window, the day I went to meet Lili in New York and sign the contract, Reyna looked at me with those mermaid eyes like she wanted to slit my throat.
Now she’s looking at me like I’m the answer to every question she’s ever asked herself.
She smiles and crooks a finger. Then she turns away, disappearing from sight.
I almost faint.
Instead, I bolt toward the house, pumping my legs as fast as they’ll take me.
40
Rey
I’m sipping from my champagne flute when Quinn crashes through the front door, hollering my name.
Standing in the kitchen with Sloane and me, Declan smiles. “Ah. The groom has arrived.”
Eyes wild, his color high, Quinn skids around the corner and makes a beeline for me.
Sloane says, “Man, he’s intense.”
“You have no idea. Oh, hi, honey.”
Sloane removes the champagne flute from my hand an instant before Quinn grabs me in a bear hug and crushes me against his chest.
His heart pounds against mine. His big arms tighten around my ribs until I can barely breathe.
I laugh, hugging him back. “Long time no see, Dr. Jekyll. Or is it Mr. Hyde? I can never remember.”
Against my neck, he says gruffly, “Viper.”
I whisper, “It’s Antonia Octavia Flavius to you, gladiator.”
A shudder runs through his chest. He hugs me tighter.
Declan clears his throat. “We’ll give you two a minute.”
When Quinn finally releases me from the bear hug, we’re alone in the kitchen. Leaning against him, I smile at the expression of adoration, hope, and dread on his face.