Page 119 of Scarlet Vows

“I-is this about me not answering your calls yesterday? Because there’s a good reason for that. Nothing bad, I promise. Please… talk to me… Let me know what’s wrong.”

He looks at me then, really looks at me, and his savage expression melts into softness and warmth for me. “You’ve got something on your cheek.”

He puts the bottle back and crosses to me to wipe it away.

“Flour.” Ilya takes my hand. “And it’s nothing you did,malyshka. You are amazing as always. It’s just been a fucking shit of a day right after a shit of a night.”

“What happened?” I ask softly.

He lets go of my hand and rubs the heel of his palm against his eyes. “I fucked up. Trusted Santo and he double-crossed me. Got his men and mine killed. It was a bloodbath.”

With mounting horror, I listen to the events of last night, and the shouting and noise suddenly fall into place. Nausea rocks my stomach.

“And now I have work to do, a lot of work, to fix this mess.”

He offers me a small smile and kisses my cheek before stalking out and up the stairs. The door to his office slams.

Part of the pain of this horrible betrayal is having to call Pavel. Demyan probably knows, and Ilya thought my brotherwould look upon him as incompetent, unable to run his own bratva. And with all the deaths…

That part’s weighing down on him.

And Santo?—

I stop. Slowly, I walk out of the room and across the foyer to the stairs, staring up.

Santo may be a lot of things…but getting his own men killed to prove a point? To get revenge for… what? Maybe if he was Demyan, but even then, Santo doesn’t strike me as stupid. Going against Demyan is stupid. Starting a war with Ilya is stupid.

That look on his face when Ilya and I pretended to be engaged… He went from taunting to generally impressed and interested. And… almost excited.

It wasn’t malicious. Greed? Yes, but malice? No.

I don’t like the man, and I don’t trust him, but when you grow up in a bratva family as the so-called precious daughter, one who just may be bartered or sold off in marriage, one who’s vulnerable because of who and what she is, you learn to read people.

And Santo… I think the line he won’t cross is muddy and out there, but he also has his own code of honor. When he said what he said at dinner here, he was taunting Ilya, not me. He sees me as off the table as long as I wear Ilya’s ring.

Beyond his own dubious code, he also strikes me as the type to own up to his moves.

If he crossed Ilya, set him up, he’d let Ilya know. He’d get something for it. And I don’t think he’d throw his men to the slaughter.

He’d crow about it, not deny it.

With that in my head, I march upstairs, knock on Ilya’s door, then open it.

“I’ve been thinking about the situation,” I say, not giving him a chance to speak.

His smile is bemused.

“Santo’s not the type to deny something he did. He’d consider this a triumph. And I assume his beef with this other guy is real. I mean, he sacrificed his men. And you two shook hands. He’s head of a mafia family that has a brutal reputation, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard of them being talked about as double-crossers. Not that Demyan ever works with them…”

“And you’re an expert?”

“Women talk.” I shrug. “I know some Italian and Russian princesses, and they gossip about the bad ones, the good ones, the hot ones, and the hung ones. The ones good in bed and who to keep away from.”

His smile grows. “Is that so?”

I nod. “And with it comes the rest. You learn to piece it together. I haven’t heard a thing about him, which is why it took me a minute to realize who he was when we met. So either he doesn’t mess up in bed, doesn’t sleep with the princess pool, or he’s mediocre. But the thing you always hear is when a high-up or an entire house is bad news.”

“Really. And me?”