Page 54 of Bad Blood

Assuming he means Reece, I’m dragging my guilt behind me as I enter the apartment. He’s been good to me over the years, and I’ve gone and thrown it in his face. My father won’t be happy either, so that’ll necessitate a dreaded phone call to deflectthatbullet. I’m going to need to do some serious groveling to make this right.

My bare feet sound like sighs on the mahogany floorboards. I’m right outside the living room when a familiar rich scent wraps itself around my throat, making me stop dead—my heart exploding in my chest.

It can’t be...

And then I watch in horror as his presence fills the doorway—a man far taller and broader than Reece Costello, with a firestorm raging in his brooding black eyes, and his expression as dark as the shadows stretching out behind him.

Age hasn’t softened him. If anything, it’s made him sharper, harder... Deadlier.

The only man in the world who scares me more than Santi Carrera.

The shoes in my hand clatter to the floor.

“Hello,papá,” I whisper.

Chapter Seventeen

Thalia

There’s that silence again…That long, painful precursor to hell.

It takes me back to a snowy night ten years ago, sitting in a stolen car outside an abandoned church, waiting for something to happen and knowing I wouldn’t like it when it did. That was the night I first heard the name “Carrera”—the night I first learned anything about this war.

Who double-crossed who first doesn’t matter anymore. All I know is a tentative truce became a bloodbath, and it hasn’t stopped splashing over the sides ever since.

Through the years, there have been more bullets fired, deals undercut, lives lost… Like my knight in the snow predicted, it passed down to the next generation, and now I’ve been forced to marry into it and face the consequences.

My father doesn’t comment on my appearance at first, but the downturn of his mouth does all the talking for him.

“Thalia,” he greets, in that drawling, mocking intonation of his that delivers kill orders in the same way he used to tell me bedtime stories. “Nice of you to join us.”

“I can explain...”

“I can’t wait to hear it.”

“About the dress...”

“No need to start there,mija,” he says, lifting his eyebrows at me. ‘Clearly, Santi Carrera isn’t picky about what the fuck his vengeance looks like.”

And so it begins...

“Don’t. Just don’t.” Brushing past him, I flop down on the nearest couch and pull a cushion to my stomach for protection.

“Don’t, what?”

“Don’t…this.” I gesture at his casually deceptive stance. He’s leaning against the doorframe with his arms folded, but I’m not fooled for a second. He’s so unapologetic about everything. It’s his way, or he’s blowing up the highway. There’s a good reason why I never went to him about Bardi’s footage in the first instance. The situation needed tact, and he only knows how to stomp.

“You mean I’m not allowed to congratulate my youngest daughter on her wedding?”

His tone could flay skin… Which is something he’d know all about.

“Next, you’ll be telling me you’re in love with him.”

“Iamin love with him,” I lie. “It’s been a perfect day.

“I see.”

“Shamemamácouldn’t say the same about her own wedding day.”