Page 27 of My Solemn Vow

Sean is dead. He was trained by the best of the best. How the hell did this happen?

Mom’s reassurance soothes the worry but sparks my anger. She’s not giving me details, and I don’t know if it’s because she really doesn’t have them yet or she’s keeping them from me. Dad tells her everything, but I get left in the dark when I’m out of range to help. Frustrating. I hate not being there when my girl needs me.

“I didn’t want you to panic and do something ridiculous like fly back home. We’re keeping Kerrianne home for the rest of the week as a precaution. So, there won’t be any more updates on the school trips. She’s a little flustered, and she complained that Captain must be lonely and that Jack doesn’t feed him enough. So now the three of us are at your house. Royal came with. There’s no harm in being at your place, but I wanted you to know. You can check in on the security cameras at any time.”

“I’m coming home.” I bang on the door for the pilot.

“Valor. Go about your work. Kerrianne is currently learningto count cards with Royal,” Mom tells me, knowing that mentioning my brother will calm me some. “Go get your job done and come home.”

The pilot opens the door and looks at me with a raised brow.

“Yes, Ma,” I answer, gritting my teeth while thinking about whatever happened at my daughter’s school.

It was bad enough that her bodyguard is dead but not bad enough that I need to come home. It’s a massive gray area.

Kerrianne is my world, and I’m on the cusp of throwing off the whole mission to run home and be with her. To protect her.

Kerrianne’s safety overrides any logic, but because there isn’t any arguing with my mother, I shake my head at the pilot and deplane again.

Dad may be head of the crime family and the pack, but Mom is head of our house. While we may not live under her roof, my mother’s reach extends to me and Kerrianne anyway. I trust her judgment, and since she does the caring for my little velociraptor while I’m away, I let her make this call.

Royal isn’t the best in close-quarter combat if the house were invaded, but no one, absolutely no one, can outshoot him.

“I agree, keep her home.” Anger fuels me. I was exhausted and sick of being on the road before, but now it’s a rage-fueled rush to the finish line. “I’ve got to get going. The car’s waiting.”

“Go with God,” Mom says and hangs up before I can even tell her I love her too.

Getting the last word in and refusing to say goodbye is how she deals with us doing such dangerous work. Her faith that God wouldn’t let us die if she didn’t get to say goodbye hasn’t done her wrong yet.

I trust that whoever tried to get to Kerrianne will pay with their life. My father won’t make it a swift death.

13

ANTONELLA

THE AFTERMATH

“Antonella!” my uncle yells the minute I walk across the threshold into his home.

He storms toward me, his shoes clicking across the terrazzo floor. His face is red and his eyes are narrowed. I know that look. It’s the one he gets seconds before a rash decision.

Uncle Gregorio grips me by the shoulders and shakes me. “What did you do?”

“You know what I did.” I force myself out of his grasp, knocking his hands away. What I did might have been wrong... in his eyes. But it was right in my soul. “And you know it’s not up to you alone if I live or die. Killing me means they will have the right to destroy you.”

He puts up a hand and works his jaw back and forth. “I always knew you were weak. I thought letting you go to school and then teach would keep you in your place. I gave you what you wanted until I could find someone willing to lower themselves by marrying you. Instead? You pull this bullshit. My brother is rolling in his grave with how ungrateful you are.”

I ignore his jabs and barbs. Before I went to college, UncleGregorio’s tantrums would sting. Anytime he brought up my parents, it would bring me to tears.

Anything Gregorio said, I believed. I was a child and didn’t know better.

While part of me is still a scared little girl, hiding away in the darkest parts of my mind, the rest of me has grown, healed, and accepted that Gregorio is a bully used to getting his way.

Keeping Gregorio honest about my father’s wishes already infuriates him. The audacity of a woman as consigliere and being entitled to my father’s share of the family business stings his sexist ego.

Now, I don’t waste the time or energy answering his brutal attacks, no matter how awful his words are. I never let him see me crack. He doesn’t know what to do with that, and he grapples with my refusal to engage in the volley of violence.

“Well, at least I’ve gotten you married off. You’ll no longer be my problem. This weekend, you’ll marry whomever Ian Cavanagh offers for the truce. I’ve proposed that he offer his own son. It would work out perfectly, seeing as how you’re already willing to throw your life away for Valor’s spawn. Once you’re part of their family, they can do whatever they want with you. Maybe their inquisitor won’t kill you like he did your cousins.” Gregorio steps closer to me. Getting in my face, he lowers his voice and threatens me. “He’s killed six of them personally. This year alone. Maybe he’ll make you lucky number seven.”