Thirty or so Messeros sit at one long table, awaiting our arrival in a room where we’ve celebrated countless birthdays, anniversaries, and engagements, and where we’ve grieved more than a few deaths. This was my parents’ house before it was my own, and before that, it was my grandparents’. Our history is in these walls.
The conversations fall silent as people notice our entrance. I wonder if Cleo is attentive enough to notice their poorly concealed sneers. The position of the wife of the don is a coveted one, and Cleo is not the woman they wanted for me. No one would risk openly insulting her in my presence after I made it clear I wouldn’t entertain it, but still, their true feelings about my future wife are obvious on their faces.
I’ll have to fix that. The moment Cleo takes on my last name, she becomes mine, and disrespect against her is disrespect against me.
Nero lifts himself out of his chair and everyone follows his example.
When everyone is on their feet, I glance at Cleo. “I’d like to introduce my betrothed. Cleo Garzolo.”
There’s a murmur of unenthusiastic greetings.
Pink spreads over Cleo’s cheeks, and her expression turns downright hostile.
I should walk her around the table and introduce everyone to her one by one. Instead, I take her straight to our seats. I’m not going to risk someone who’s had a glass too many saying something they shouldn’t. I didn’t clean the blood off my hands only to get them dirty again before the appetizers are served. My relatives will have plenty of time to get to know Cleo once she becomes my wife. They know better than to test my patience by being anything but civil after that.
I lead Cleo to the two chairs at the head of the table and pull one out for her. Her lips are pursed into a tight line as she slides into her seat.
I take the chair beside her and nod at Nero and my mother. Elena and Fabi are sitting to Cleo’s left. My sisters’ expressions are strained as they study her. Both of them seem unsure if they should say something or not.
Maybe it would have been better to just bring her out tomorrow and scrap the whole rehearsal dinner idea, but it’s too late now.
I signal for the staff to start bringing out the food and lean toward Nero. “Anything I should be aware of?”
“Mario and Arturo were running their mouths before you came,” he says, tipping his head in the direction of my uncles. “I put a stop to it. The women are gossiping, but there’s nothing I can do about that.”
Their opinion of Cleo aside, even my harshest critics in the family know this union will make us stronger. If you’re not getting stronger, you’re getting weaker. By joining our family with the Garzolos, we stand to take control over their existing cocaine operation, which would be a new business line for us.
Racketeering and construction are our bread and butter, but adding cocaine, along with the counterfeits deal Garzolo helped arrange with the Casalesi, will put us on par with the Ferraro family. No matter how much their patriarch hated my old man, he’ll quickly see it’s better to have us as friends instead of enemies. There’s no point in letting the fact that my dead father killed one of his uncles over a decade ago destroy the potential of establishing a mutually beneficial relationship.
Still, looking at the disapproving faces of my aunts and uncles, I wonder if I’ve underestimated the blowback I’ll receive for taking Cleo as my wife. But is that blowback going to be enough to stop me?
I take a deep pull from my wine.
Not a chance in hell.
CHAPTER 6
CLEO
I twist the emerald engagement ring on my finger. I wish I could stop fidgeting, but you try sitting still while being scrutinized by thirty-plus fucking people.
Sabina wasn’t exaggerating. Rafaele’s entire family does hate me. They all think I’m a whore who’s unworthy of their precious don.
They can all go to hell. As far as I’m concerned, Rafaele is not worthy of me. At the end of the day, Rafaele must care more about his deal with my father than his family’s opinion, since he’s still marrying me.
Of course, unlike them, he knows I really am a virgin.
I accidentally blabbed the truth to him while I was drunk. He and Nero kidnapped me off the side of the road and stuffed me into their car when we were at Vale’s wedding in Ibiza. I was so angry that I wasn’t thinking straight. Until then, I’d managed to convince everyone who mattered that I was disgraced and unsuitable for a wife, which suited me just fine.
It used to make me mad that Rafaele knew the truth, but if he didn’t, he may have never let Gemma off the hook.
I bet his family wishes Gemma were still the one marrying their don. After all, my sister didn’t spend a lifetime trying to ruin her own reputation in every way possible.
I blow out a breath. I thought I had a chance to break free from all this. How naive of me. Instead, here I am, sitting beside a man who thinks of me as nothing more than a piece of meat.
Goodbye college. Goodbye moving to LA. Goodbye summer internship at a talent agency. See ya never to all my hopes and dreams.
I glance discreetly at Rafaele. I can’t believe this is the man I’m about to tie myself to.
For life.
At least he’s easy to look at. Okay, not just easy to look at. Rafaele is fucking hot. Far better looking than the last guy my father tried to set me up with—Ludovico. He was over forty, balding, and always had bad breath.
Rafaele is twenty-seven. That’s still eight years on me, but it’s the kind of age gap that nobody even blinks at in the mafia. His dark hair is shiny and smooth, longer at the top and shorter on the sides, and he’s got a clean shave. Young made men often grow out their beards to make themselves look older, but not him.
There’s no mistaking that he’s the don of this family, even though he’s far from being the oldest person in the room. He’s got an air about him that practically screams, “Do. Not. Fuck. With. Me.” Maybe it’s because of his serious expression, or the kind of perfect posture I thought wasn’t a thing in the age of smartphones, or those damn eyes of his.
Gemma called him the ice prince because of his cold blue gaze, but I don’t know if that’s accurate. I’ve seen him rage.
I’m not sure what was more traumatizing, Ludovico trying to grind his crotch against me, or having his blood splattered on my shoes when Rafaele just casually murdered him.
The memory sends ice down my veins. Rafaele’s brutality is his brand. His civilized exterior is a mask he puts on to make himself palatable in public, but he can remove it just as easily. And besides an affinity for casual murder, I’m not totally sure what else is hiding beneath.
“I’m very good at intimidation. I’m also quite good at other things.”
What was that?
I thought he’d lecture me on how to behave at this dinner. What I didn’t expect was to be blasted with all that sexual energy and innuendo. I mean, he backed me against a wall with that powerful body and sniffed me for fuck’s sake.