Total pages in book: 152
Estimated words: 144979 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 725(@200wpm)___ 580(@250wpm)___ 483(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 144979 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 725(@200wpm)___ 580(@250wpm)___ 483(@300wpm)
The scale of what they’ve accomplished under the watch of the Cosa Nostra and IVI is impressive—I’ll give them that. But it’s also fucking dangerous. In my gut, I already know Mariella is the woman who’s been supplying the poison to the worst cases. I can see it in her eyes as she rips a piece of tape from the roll.
She holds my gaze with more courage than most men can, lifting the tape to her mouth with one final word.
“Omertà.”
She passes the roll to the next in line, and Valentina repeats the performance, ripping off a piece of tape before she glances up at me.
“Omertà.”
And so they continue down the line.
“You think this is fucking cute?” I clip out.
They all stare back at me, unmoving.
“Angelo.” Rafe meets my gaze.
He doesn’t have to tell me it’s been a long fucking night and everyone’s exhausted—or that the wound is too raw for me to deal with anyone right now.
“Take them to Mariella’s wing,” I tell him. “Keep them there until I say otherwise.”
I exit the ballroom and wind my way through the halls of the estate until I’m back in my wing. In the kitchen, I pour myself a glass of whiskey and drain the glass before I enter our suite. Everything is as Abella left it. All her clothes, jewelry, and keepsakes remain untouched.
I can’t bring myself to look at them, so I walk to the window where the sun’s beginning to rise. A suffocating pressure chokes the air from my lungs as I consider how far she might be already. How much distance has she put between us?
In the forest, a flash of movement catches my eye as the black stag emerges from the trees. He stares at me through the window, stomping his hoof as he snorts. It feels like he wants something from me, but I’m also fairly certain that I’m losing my goddamned mind.
With bleary eyes, I watch him walk back into the forest until he vanishes from sight.
50
ANGELO
“Angelo?”
Mariella’s soft knock on my office door pulls me from my thoughts.
It’s been two weeks, and after she refused to say anything else, I haven’t spoken to her. I sent her friends home, and I’ve avoided her and Valentina since.
I’m still so fucking angry I don’t even want to look at her. I’ve been absorbed in trying to track Abella’s movements, and I have half the Cosa Nostra searching for her.
It’s not a matter of if I’ll find her, because I will. But that doesn’t change the fact that she’s gone right now.
“Are you going to stay mad at me forever?” Mariella asks.
“If that’s what it takes to get my point across.”
“You would have done the same for one of your men,” she says. “It’s a promise we made to each other.”
“Yes, and now all the effort you’ve put into Aegis will be dismantled,” I tell her. “Because here’s my promise, Mariella. I will unearth every member if that’s what it takes to find my wife.”
“Why?” she asks.
I stare at her like she’s forgotten who I am.
“Why do you need to find her?” she presses.
“She’s my wife.”
“This isn’t a matter of principle,” she argues. “You could have married anybody. Why did it have to be Abella?”
Irritation seeps under my skin. She shouldn’t be asking me this. Especially not now.
“Can you admit that you love her?”
The answer splinters inside my chest, squeezing my ribs in a vise grip. Mariella knows it, and I glare at her as she smiles. But her amusement fades quickly.
“What do you plan to do if you can’t have a baby together?”
Again, I don’t answer.
“Would you subject her to an affair just so you can meet the requirements of the treaty?”
“No,” I growl.
The finality of that statement settles over the room like a dark cloud. Mariella knows as well as I do what that means. My inability to let go of Abella will impact all of us.
As much as my sister has tried to hide her interactions with Ares Stavros over the years, I know something happened between them. I don’t know what or when, and if I ever uncover the truth, I might murder him for the hell of it and start a war anyway. Because fuck him.
The problem is, she would never forgive me if I killed him.
Mariella leans against the door frame, lost in her own thoughts as she seems to piece something together.
“Did you know Abella’s fertility would be tested before you married?”
“No.” I never would have asked that of her. But it doesn’t surprise me Maurizio ordered the tests. He wanted a fat paycheck for all his daughters.
Mariella frowns as if I just confirmed her thoughts, then nods.
“By the way, you should probably know Genevieve Wilkes has been yapping her mouth and telling everyone you have a list of other prospects to knock up when Abella fails.”