Chapter 3

A week?!

It feels like all of the air has been knocked out of my lungs.  Had I not been sitting, I think I would likely have fallen down.  It sounds like the words of the conversation around me are being spoken through water and it takes me several seconds to process them.

“A w-w-week,” my brother sputters.  “Why so soon?”

“We will have all of the technology, domains, and legalities taken care of by then.  Then we can start rolling out the second phase of the project, which is where Rothschild's Reads will come into play.  We will need your help with identifying and signing authors, as well as editing services for those that we do sign and all of the copyrighting that goes with it,” Don Luciano answers my brother, his tone clipped.  “I should think that you would want to get some cash flow into your company as soon as possible.”

Through it all, my father just stands there.  He doesn’t say anything.  Just looks at the floor and waits for the conversation to be over.

There’s a knock at the door, which Dante answers.  He’s handed a bag of ice and he walks over to me.  He stoops so that he’s eye level with me and takes my hand in his.  More tenderly than I would have thought him capable of, he places the ice on my skin.  Instead of just leaving me with the ice, he stays there in front of me, holding the ice in place.

I might have mistaken it for something sweet, an olive branch of sorts for us to try to get along in this shit situation that we’ve found ourselves in, but he still doesn’t look at me.  

Instead, he turns towards his father.  “Perhaps it would be a good idea for me to speak with my fiancé alone.  So that we can settle into roles a little easier.”

Don Luciano sends a warning glare to his son.  “Make sure that you are both aware of the roles that you are supposed to play, figlio (son).”

“Sì, padre. (Yes, Father),” Dante says, bowing his head slightly towards his father.

The Don leaves the room, followed quickly by my father.  Stefan stands there, torn between his loyalty to me as my brother, and his loyalty to the business.

“Stefan!” my father calls.

My brother sends me an apologetic wince and follows my father and the head of the biggest crime family in the city out of the door.  Leaving me to my fate.

The second that the door is closed, Dante lets go of my hand as if I’ve scalded him.

I just manage to grab the ice before it falls to the ground and look up to see the hot glare of hatred that is pouring from his eyes.

It makes me pull back as if I’ve been hit, his hatred is that tangible.

“Let’s get one thing straight before we start our marriage,” he says, venom dripping from his voice.  “I don’t want this marriage.  I won’t be the doting, loving husband that you’ve probably always dreamed of.  I will only ever touch you in public and during the time that you ovulate until we can give the old man an heir and a spare.  We will have to live in the same house because that is expected, but I will continue to live my life the way that I see fit.”

I may have recoiled from his hatred at first because it was so out of the blue.  But now that I’ve recovered from the initial shock, I allow my disgust for the man before me to shine through.  “Do you really think that I want to marry you?  A trumped up crook who fucks anything with a twat and a nice rack?”

I seemed to have surprised him, if his wide-eyed stare is anything to go by.  But I don’t let him recover.

Standing, I throw the bag of ice that he had just moments before put so tenderly on my skin to the floor.  “Don’t do me any favors, Mr. Luciano.  I want nothing to do with you and I’d be happy to never see your face again.  However, it appears that my father has already sold me to the devil and my job is just to survive you.”

I move to walk around him in an attempt to get to the door, but he grabs me by the wrist.  It’s the opposite one from the wrist that my father had grabbed, the one that has already started to bruise, despite the ice that was on it before.

The next thing I know, my back is against the wall and Dante has crowded into my personal space.  It’s hard, this close, not to see how gorgeous the man is.  I can feel the muscles beneath his shirt with the hand that I brought up to keep space between us.  His coffee brown eyes are blazing.  There’s definitely hatred there, but there also seems to be a hint of challenge and amusement.  As if what I just said to him has intrigued him.

Dante’s eyes roam all over my face, his body crowding closer to mine.  His hand is still holding mine, raising it above my head and keeping it pinned to the wall.  The other hand finds its way to my waist.

If I didn’t already have my opinion of the man in front of me shaped by years of hearing the things that his family has done and the last two hours in his presence, this position would have been a lot more enjoyable.  As it is, my body still reacts, my nipples beading into nubs and my panties starting to feel wetter.

He smirks as if he knows the effect that he’s having on me.  “Well, aren’t you a bit of a firecracker?  I think that I might have liked you if I wasn’t stuck with you.”  He pushes away from me and the smirk is gone, replaced again by the blank face he wore in front of my family.  He takes off his tuxedo coat and holds it out to me.  “Cover up that bruise.  Can’t have people thinking that I did that to you.  Won’t help the optics at the start of this relationship.”

The second I take his coat, he leaves me alone without a second look.