Page 143 of Sins of the Orchid

“I don’t need protection,” I muttered. “And from whom exactly are you protecting me?”

Maybe this would make Dad come clean. He didn’t know I’d seen the message. I haven’t told anyone except for DeAngelo.

“You never know what can happen,” Dad reasoned with me. I wasn’t surprised he refused to tell me anything. Disappointed, yes, but not surprised.

“But—”

“There is no but, Amore.” Dad stopped me. “This has been arranged and breaking it would cause a war, a wedge between our families.”

My heart sank. I didn’t want to cause a wedge between our families. But marrying the brother of the man I loved was wrong too. On so many levels, especially since I slept with him.

I glanced back at my best friend. I loved him like my own brother, but I didn’t want to marry him. Would I lose him if I said that out loud?

I had never thought my father would arrange a marriage for me. I heard it was how it was done in Cosa Nostra, but I wasn’t actually fully integrated into that life. I’d told him on numerous occasions I wouldn’t marry like that. Stuck in between my grandmother and dad, it had never occurred to me that I’d fall under the same rule as other women of Dad’s world.

“What about Grandma?” I breathed out, grasping for straws.

“I’m your father,” he bit out, his eyes a dark storm. I flinched at his harsh tone since he never used it on me. My grandmother was a sore subject. “I make decisions for you.”

I swallowed hard and a cold sensation crawled down my spine while my lungs constricted. I wasn’t willing to just accept my fate. Maybe if I grew up under my father’s rule, I would have accepted his word and gone along with it. But I’ve spent too much time outside his world to agree and go along with it.

“I’m not underage,” I replied, straightening my shoulders. “Grandma might not agree for my inheritance to be tied to the Cosa Nostra. Frankly, neither am I.”

A spark flickered through Dad’s eyes and his lip tugged up. I held my breath, unsure whether he was reacting positively or negatively to my comeback.

The phone felt slick with sweat in my palm, my grip hard.

“I’m glad you said that,” Dad’s reply was light. “Because Adriano won’t be tied to the Cosa Nostra.”

My head whipped to Adriano, our eyes meeting. He liked doing work for the Cosa Nostra and his brother. In fact, he hated leaving it to visit me in Italy. He lived and breathed the whole criminal world.

Usually, the two of us were always in sync, but right now it was hard for me to read him. I wasn’t ready to accept my defeat though. If I married Adriano and he found out I slept with his brother, he’d never forgive me. Besides, Adriano slept around like it was a damn exercise.

“Has anyone asked if that is what Adriano wants?” I was running out of excuses to use.

“He’s in agreement.” Both Dad and Santi answered at the same time. I avoided Santi’s gaze, but I felt his eyes on me the entire time. Adriano kept his gaze on me too. I felt stuck between two brothers, who I loved in very different ways.

Adriano’s golden-brown eyes stared at me, and my heart sank recognizing the expression in them. Each spoken word by me pushed my best friend further away.

I shook my head. Maybe I was never meant to have a family, and this was the best way to break ties with the Cosa Nostra. It was a foolish, childish dream to have it all anyhow.

“I’m sorry,” I finally said in a firm tone. “I won’t do it.”

I started for the door when my father’s voice had me pausing. “Are you prepared to see men die for your refusal?”

He had cornered me. After all, it was what made him a don.

CHAPTER53

Santino

Adriano and Amore left Bennetti’s office without a backward glance, seemingly accepting their fate. It left me alone with Luigi and Savio. The former was worried I’d shoot his father. Not a bad assumption.

My blood ran hot at seeing Amore standing in front of me, that smell of strawberries invading my nostrils in the best possible way. Or the worst, depending how you thought of it. Every time I’d seen her this week, she’d shone, and I had to fight the urge not to beat down or kill any man she talked to. She saw me but avoided me like her life depended on it. She watched me with detest in her eyes.

Frustration clawed at my chest and my heart because she’d become everything to me. I wanted to drown in her, age with her, bask in her light and her smiles. I wanted to be the one to give her everything, to make her happy. I wanted her to run to me for comfort and happiness; just like the way she had in the past. In Italy.

Yet, that woman seemed to be gone.