Page 71 of Dance of Thorns

“Aside from being hit by a bus?” I mutter.

He chuckles. “Well, yeah, there's that. But she’s fine.”

I crack my neck to either side, still glowering at him.

“Is she watched?”

Cesare frowns. “Huh?”

“My fiancée,” I growl. “Do you have her shadowed by your men when she’s out.”

His heavy brows shoot up. “She’s family! My guys are on top of these things! You think I don’t look after my own daughter?”

“I think she was just pushed in front of a goddamn bus, and EMT’s got through midtown rush hour traffic and brought her to hospital before any ofyour guyseven fucking knew about it.”

Silence descends over the hallway. Cesare looks at me like I’ve got two heads.

Shitty father or not, thisisstill Don Marchetti, a major player in the city who has the support of some of the biggest families in the Italian Commission.

He's not exactly used to being mouthed off to.

I suppose I could backtrack or make him believe my tone is out of concern for his daughter. Instead, I just bulldoze right ahead. Cesare’s a fucking bully who was given a crown, and there’s only one way to deal with thugs like him.

“I’ll be taking her to my place,” I say evenly. “She’ll live with me from now on.”

Cesare bristles. But not as much as he fucking should.

“You haven’t married her yet, Antonov,” he grunts. I don’t reply, and his brow furrows deeper. “Look, the optics?—”

“Fuckthe optics,” I say coldly. “Someone pushed her in front of a city bus. Obviously your men can’t handle her security.”

I can feel the lethal stares of his men burning into my back. Cesare cocks a brow at me, his teeth grinding.

“This isn’t a negotiation, by the way,” I add, leaning subtly closer to him. “Our marriage is the cement in the deal between our families. Andyour men,” I say, turning to smile coldly at the scowling, pissed-off guards behind me, “don’t seem to be up to the task of keeping one of the parties safe.Iam.”

Cesare glares at me. My expression is icy as I stare right back.

“Fine,” he finally grunts. “She’s with you now. Just…keep it on the down?—”

“Where is she.”

He scowls with all the indignation of a man whose isnotused to being interrupted. But he nods his chin past me to the hospital room door across the hall. “Inside, with her sister.”

Both women gasp when I stride inside the room. Chiara looks surprised, but the expression on my bride-to-be’s face is more…

I frown.

She legit looksafraidof me.

“Chiara,” I growl under my breath, nodding to her.

We have that weird kind of relationship where we don’t really know each other that well, despite having beenaroundeach other at least a few dozen times. Of course, back then, she was a kid when I’d come over to the Marchetti house to see Lark. And I was just the housekeeper's granddaughter’s emo freak boyfriend.

She nods back. “Bane.”

“I need to have a word with my fiancée,” I add.

I know they’re not close, and never really have been. But, bottom line, Chiara is in here with her. Cesare isnot.