141.{GIOVANNI’S POV}**She stops. But she doesn’t turn.Her shoulders are stiff, her breath shallow. I see the way she grips the edge of her sleeve with her fingers pressing hard into the fabric like it’s the only thing keeping her steady.I take a step forward. Not much. Just enough.She doesn’t move.I exhale slowly. "What are you actually doing here, Ingrid?"There's a beat of silence. Then she turns, just slightly, not answering my question still.Well, fine. Fine, yes my name isn't the same anymore. John O’Keefe. It isn't really the name I've known myself to be.This new name, unlike ‘Giovanni D’Avi’ rolls off everyone's tongues too easily now, as if I was born into it, as if it was stitched into my skin rather than forced upon me. The Irish don’t ask questions. They don’t care about what I was before; only what I am now and what I could be for them. And right now, I’m standing in my own goddamn Manor, looking at Ingrid, the one person who shouldn’t be here.She’s too small fo
{INGRID’S POV}**The room they’ve given me is neither lavish nor meager, it's just enough to make me wonder if it was given to me knowingly. The room is not among the soldiers room, not among the servants room. Just a personal space made into a room for Sir John O'Keeffe’s Personal Assistant. The walls are bare except for the deep wood grain of the paneling, the heavy beams above that press shadows into the corners. A desk, a lamp, a bed with stiff sheets are all available. It smells of old books and faint traces of gun oil; perhaps remnants of whoever stayed here before me.I sit at the edge of the bed, pressing my palms against my thighs, trying to anchor myself. It shouldn’t feel like this. I came here for a reason. For one reason.But the weight of the house is different now. Before, it was foreign, a fortress I barely understood. Now, it breathes, it listens, it watches. And I can feel him in its bones.Giovanni.John O’Keefe.Whoever he is now.I exhale slowly, dragging my fi
{INGRID'S POV}**I blink my eyes immediately the word ‘Yes’, giving away my entranced state, roll out my tongue so easily. I was wrong. I shouldn't have concurred. I'm not here to satisfy his urge for pleasure.So, I throw the main question right at him. “My father, where is he?”I study him carefully, watching every flicker of his expression. I won't miss a thing as looks can sure tell. And Mr. Giovanni has always been hard to read, but I should know him well enough by now, right?Like now; the slight narrowing of his eyes, the way his fingers still against the rim of his glass, the tension just barely visible in his jaw… I know he’s thinking of my question. He's Calculating. He's deciding how much to give me, how much to deny. Or, so I think.Then, finally, he speaks. “Your father?” His voice sounds a bit too even. “I don’t know who your father is.”A cold, slow rage unfurls in my chest. Really?He didn't really have to lie right now. I was prepared to hear the truth of what he'
{GIOVANNI’S POV}**She dares speak of Edmondo and not finish the statement. So easily, like she’s throwing it away. Like it means nothing.Then she turns. Walks out. No hesitation, no pause. Not a single glance back.The door swings shut behind her with a dull finality. I stay standing but figured I should take a seat again, and I do. I stare at the empty space she left behind, my hands braced against my knees. If I look at my hands, I’ll see the tension in my fingers; in the way they press too hard, in the way my knuckles stand out white against my skin.I exhale slowly. It should feel like relief. It should feel like control, like everything is in its rightful place and going the way it should, the way Edmondo wanted it. Sadly, it doesn’t.I push myself up, buckle my belt, and straighten my jacket. Automatic movements. Fix the cuffs, check the watch, smooth the creases. Routine.Routine is good. Routine keeps things in place.I tell myself I won. That I got what I wanted. That he
{GIOVANNI'S POV}**"Take the wheel."There, I surprise her. She barely steps into the car before I say it. Before the door even shuts behind her. Ingrid looks at me, unreadable, then at the wheel. "But, you have a driver.""Don’t need him." I lean against the door, watching her. "You know how to drive, don’t you?"Her fingers brush the steering wheel as if she’s testing its texture. "Yes.""Then drive."No hesitation. She adjusts the seat, buckles in, and starts the car with the kind of focus someone has when they’re transporting a bus full of school kids. Perfect posture, both hands on the wheel. No wasted movement. How? How did she know that?Elise slides in beside me in the back seat, shutting the door with just a little more force than necessary. "How responsible," she murmurs, amused. "You must drive your boyfriend around often there in Italy.""I don’t have one." Ingrid's voice is flat, and it's cool.Elise hums, tilting her head. "Then you must have a lot of experience drivi
{INGRID'S POV}**Sitting in this car, driving these crazy old false lovebirds, is a dang smelly drag. If suffocation had a scent, it would be this; the perfume, expensive cologne, and the thick stink of unresolved drama. I swear, I’ll be sick any moment now. Still, I have no choice but to put up with them.Mr. Giovanni, no, JOHN, has labeled me his professional errand girl. Pfft.Learning to drive was quite easy. When you have to do it to survive, when a whip cracks against your back for every mistake, you learn quick. Mr. Paulo made sure of that. I was thirteen when I started driving his truck, a dang truck. And I can still feel the leather burning into my skin from the night I crashed it into a street pole. He whipped me until I blacked out. I woke up on a Friday morning, with my body shaking, my stomach empty, and my eyes swollen shut.That was the last time.After that, I never crashed again.And now? Now I waste these skills driving around these…..Wait, why am I pissed? Why d
{INGRID'S POV}**“.....You could be useful if you have a taste for diamonds.”I scoff. “I do not have my tongue made for engagement rings at such a young age, Ma'am.”Giovanni doesn’t react. He has chosen suddenly not to react. But he gives an order. “You'd get down from the car, Ingrid.”Pfft!I grab my sling purse and step out. The ring store’s sign glows warm in the dimming evening, a respectable little place tucked between high end boutiques. Nothing about it screams it's related to an underground club. But that’s the point I guess.I push through the doors after they do. Inside, glass cases glint under soft lighting, rings and necklaces arranged in perfect, pristine rows. The woman behind the counter barely spares me a glance. She definitely knows why I’m here. To follow the rich ones around like a dog.The couples are lost, picking rich rings. Pathetic. No, I'm just jealous, and it's annoying that I am. I need to get them out of my view.I move past the displays and through
{INGRID'S POV}**“You don’t look like an Irish lady either,” he counters.I arch a brow. “What do I look like?”He tilts his head slightly, studying me. “Like someone who’s waiting for a reason to burn this whole place down.”The air between us tightens. He has a good sense of humour. And he just called me a lady, not some bambina. Wow. It's weird.The white haired man makes a noise; something between a laugh and a knowing hum, but I don’t break eye contact. I don’t let Ronan think he’s got me figured out just because he threw out some poetic bullshit that happened to land close to the truth.Instead, I set my drink down, lace my fingers together, and give him the smallest, sharpest smile I can muster.“Good thing I left my lighter at home.”Ronan holds my gaze. His own mouth twitches like he wants to say something else. But before he can, the white haired man claps his hands together, breaking the tension. “Well,” he says, amused, “This is going exactly how I hoped.”I shoot him a
{GIOVANNI'S POV}**The ring display is full of light; fucking bright diamond reflections sharp like cut glass, bands of gold and platinum polished to a perfect gleam. Elise is to my right, examining a row of engagement rings with the focused eye of a woman who already knows exactly what she wants.I should be doing the same. After all she's my wife-to-be, right?Instead, my gaze drifts, tracking over the cases until it lands on a section that's further down. There's a different style that seems simpler, yet shiny and clear. It's a pretty section. My eyes skim over the sizes without thinking….. until I pause.Nine.It’s becoming a habit; assessing things that might look good on bambina, measuring them without needing to be told. I better not let it stay till it becomes old and hard to die. My fingers twitch, recalling something unbidden: the weight of a hand gripping mine in the dark of the bunker as I pound into her pussy. So small hands but steady and firmly gripping my shoulders
{GIOVANNI'S POV}**She asks for her father. She says she's here only and only to ask me of her father. Does she know that he is a monster? That he and his empire tore the happiness of Trento apart once. Edmondo's people who are also mine.. some bled to death, girls raped, a few murdered in the eyes of their own children and loved ones.I wonder how pretty little girl La Rosa will look when it is revealed to her just how tainted she and her now dead La Rosa empire is. I wonder how her eyes will glisten with tears as she stare up into the malice in mine when I break it to her what Edmondo and I did to them in return.I wonder how much I can make her pussy stretch for me before she screams when I force myself into her again.Shit. That was random. I'm crazy. I'm a crazy old man. Haha.It's funny, looking around me at all the people in this blue hue room. They don't even have the slightest idea of just how evil a monster I am amongst them. So many idiots… living their idiot lives, havi
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