Page 224 of Modern Romance December 2025 1-4

“I think,” Jovi said, with a mock disapproval, “that we are going to have to decide on the appropriate punishment for such offensive behavior,mia vita.”

My life.

Because that was exactly what she was. And would always be.

He watched her sigh happily as she came to him and arranged herself over his lap, so he could make sure they both enjoyed her punishment to the fullest.

In the life they were making together, all of the punishments were about love. They were made in love and they led to love. And really, they were just a way of playing their favorite games with each other as they wished.

Jovi intended to make certain that they could do this forever, because Rux deserved nothing less.

He had been very clear with his uncle. Should anything happen to him—or, God forbid, to Rux—or should he so much as feel the faintest tickle on the back of his neck to suggest that someone was following him, it would trigger an avalanche.

You think I’m afraid of an avalanche?Antonio had scoffed, malignant and furious in his little throne that day.You ungratefulcazzo.

It will come at you from all directions, Jovi had promised him, and it was not quite that he took pleasure in it, because too much was at stake. But all told, he would admit that it was probably the very best day he’d ever spent in that cursed house.All your secrets, Ziu.Have you forgotten? I know exactly where all the bodies are buried. All this time you thought you owned me. That you made me. That I was your creature. All this time, the creature has owned you.

I should have known that you would turn traitor, the old man had sneered.It’s in the blood.

Your blood is a rotting carcass, Jovi had told him, the way the old women muttered their curses.And soon enough, the crows will come.

Much as Antonio had tried to hide it, Jovi had seen a flicker in his gaze. An acknowledgment all of his relatives liked to make when they were deep in theiramariat the end of a long meal—but did not much care to make at other times, when the inevitable felt closer.

That they would all die the way they lived, hard and mean. That the choices they made assured it. That they were signing their own death warrants in blood and misery.

Antonio had no sweet old age to look forward to and it had been clear he knew it. He’d never taken care of his body, and it had shown. The same way his evil deeds had shown in his eyes and all over his face. If he was lucky, his body would give out. Otherwise, it was as likely to be prison as it was to be an assassination—possibly at the hand of his own son.

They had stared at each other, Jovi and the man who had tried to make him in his twisted image. And he thought they had both seen the same grim future awaiting his uncle.

You know as well as I do that your blood and mine have nothing in common, except what you spilled of it, Jovi had told him quietly. Intently.My father was an honorable man. He wanted better things than this. So do I. The difference is, I will walk away from Il Serpente the way he couldn’t, and you will let me.

Antonio had snarled at him.Carlo will never stop looking for you.

Carlo is a cowardly imbecile, Jovi had retorted.He will never get close to me. If I were you, I would convince him that he’s better off keeping his distance from even the thought of coming after me. Unless, that is, you don’t want your disappointing successor around. Just let me know. I’d be happy to dispose of him, too.

His uncle had growled at him, but he had said nothing.

Damning Carlo with something that hadn’t even risen to the level of faint praise.

Jovi had taken the time to outline all the many ways he could destroy his uncle with a phone call. Not that a phone call was necessary. If certain protocols weren’t followed, by him and by Rux, it would trigger a cascade of consequences that he knew his uncle didn’t want.

The old man listened, a sour look on his face, as Jovi spelled it all out for him. The investigators that would receive charts and dissertations. The journalists who would receive similar packages. The entire web he’d created to expose every single secret he knew about his family.

This is the cost of treating a nephew the way you treated me, Jovi had told him.I learned to stay quiet. You forgot I was there. You have no one to blame but yourself, Uncle. You betrayed yourself. Over and over again.

All of this, the old man had said, shaking his head.All of this for some nameless girl.

I know her name, Jovi had retorted.But if I wereyou, I’d make certain never, ever to learn it.

And he’d walked out the front door of that house they’d dragged him into, battered and bloody and wracked with grief, so many years before.

He took his Rux around the world. He showed her everything she’d ever dreamed of or read about, everything she thought she’d never see. When she woke from dreams that brought her back to old cages, he soothed her. And when his memories came to haunt him, she taught him how to make them stories that she laughed at and cried through, until he learned how to do the same.

They packed these travels into the first six months of their freedom, because afterward, she was too pregnant to travel that easily.

“I didn’t give birth control a second thought,” she said, laughing, the rounder she got.

“I told you I wanted you,” he replied every time. “And I do. I want everything that comes with wanting you. Babies. Old age. All of it.”