Page 57 of Anti-Heroes in Love Duet

“I don’t take orders from any man,” she snapped, teeth clicking together with the force of her delivery.

Ah, I’d hit a nerve.

“Ah, but I am not just a man,” I promised her, gentling her the way I would a nervous mare, my thumb stroking down her throat. “I amcapo dei capiof the New York City Camorra. If you do not know how to obey, I will teach you.”

She seemed to have forgotten I was holding her so intimately, but my movement made her swallow hard against my hand. I was close enough to see the way her pupils expanded, shadows eating up the silvered gray.

For one uninhibited second, I thought she might let me kiss that mouth.

And for one vivid breath, I wondered if that might become one of the biggest accomplishments in my already storied life.

And then Marco coughed.

It echoed like a bomb in the silent room and tore Elena from my grip. She stepped back immediately, and then, before I could blink, she struck out with her right hand and slapped me right across the cheek.

Heat blasted over the side of my face, a spike of pain on the side of my cheekbone where one long, red fingernail tore my skin.

We stared at each other for a long interminable moment, her breath a harsh rattle, her eyes wide and pewter, brushed with fear for the first time that night.

Good, the beast inside me growled, loving the sight of vulnerability in her gaze.

Fear me.

I moved closer on one heavy step, and she flinched but otherwise didn’t move even when I leaned close enough to taste her breath on my lips so I could snarl softly, “Next time you hit me,lottatrice, I will hit you back. Only it will be on that sweet little arse I’ve glimpsed behind your tight skirts,capisci?”

“You wouldn’t fucking dare,” she said, but her voice was all breath, her pulse a visible beat in her pale neck.

“Boh,” I said as I ducked my head to speak hotly against her ear just to feel her slight shiver. “Try me.”

The air crackled around us, and our hearts thundered. I’d known she would bring the storm when she heard her marching orders this afternoon from Yara, but this was more than I’d hoped for. This woman who was barely alive made me feel like a live wire, a lit fuse raw with power.

I hadn’t even kissed her, and I felt like roaring, like beating my chest and crowing with glory.

All because the ice queen didn’t realize it yet, but the thaw had started and soon, so fucking soon I could almost taste her—something warm and plummy like wine—on my tongue.

Soon, she’d be mine.

For one kiss, one hour, one night, I didn’t fucking care.

I’d moved her into my home for pragmatic reasons, but in the end, I couldn’t fool myself.

Elena Lombardi was an acquired taste, something to be appreciated by only the most refined palette, the most exquisite mind. As deep and brilliantly complex as expensive Italian wine, and the more I learned about her, the more I wanted to drink her down like a glutton and force her to be mine.

I spent the rest of the night in my room and hated that I felt petulant and childish for doing so. I’d had an idea of who I should be and what I should want all my life, and this mafioso with obsidian eyes and absurdly long lashes, with man-killing hands and an arrogant authoritative manner, made me feel…undone. As if the years of work I’d spent carving my public persona, my refined mannerisms, and thoroughly educated speech were transparent before the eyes of the Don. He seemed to see through my shields, tearing them in his mighty hands as easily as tissue paper. It was more than disconcerting; it was harrowing.

I didn’t want to be seen by anyone, let alone a man likehim.

But his presence had left irreparable cracks in my foundation, just enough space for doubts to grow like weeds.

My sister said she trusted him with her life.

With mine.

I’d tried to call her again to talk about what I’d learned, but she had only texted me back assuring me to keep calm and that she would explain everything next month when she visited. It was poor consolation, but even knowing she was happy now, it made me sick to think of what she had truly gone through for us.

For me.

It only proved to heighten the feeling of obligation that had led me into taking Dante’s case and knowing she loved him at the end of that ordeal, that maybe he had…helpedher cemented my loyalty to his cause if not his person.