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It had to be fucking tough to be him. In one light, he was looking at me like the son I am to him, knowing, as a father, that his sons might be at war amongst themselves.

In another light, he was looking at me the way he would have looked at himself back then.

He wouldn’t have given a fuck, blood or not; he would have gone after the man who had done the same to his wife, the chains of the family rattling with strain as he exploded out of them.

Marciano came in howling at Mac. “No way you could be confused for a coyote,” he was saying.

Mac shook his head.

Rio grinned. “No fucking way.”

Marciano started to hum a song and then sang it. It made sense with the conversation they were having.

If Mac was around, Padrino was close. If Rio was close, so was Matteo. Mac and Rio were their second-in-commands. We moved in prides that way, the wheels of the ancient Fausti family turning as it always had.

In that moment, hundreds of years had passed.

And we still moved in the same way, even if the world looked different around us.

Our core values stayed the same:

Ruthless—whatever the fuck that entailed.

Romantic—whatever the fuck that entailed.

To keep both alive, a heart pumping rich blood.

“Brother.” Marciano squeezed my shoulder. “You’d like that one. It’s—” he yipped “—a country tune. I fucking dig it.” He smiled at me. “Can you dig it?”

Maestro breathed out a laugh.

I narrowed my eyes at Marciano, in no mood to clown around.

He lifted his hands and became quiet. He fucking knew the drill.

Killer fists or not, we’d be in the ring he thrived in so much if he stepped out of line with me.

And if I didn’t fucking keep him in line, it was my ass on the line.

If I stepped into the ring with Matteo because of it, he and I might come close to killing each other.

He had pent up aggression because of what was going on with his wife. So did I.

“This is Italy,” I said to Marciano in Italian, reminding him of what he’d told me in Wyoming.

His face changed—it became more severe. He nodded, just as I had nodded to my father.

My old man looked between us, then looked forward again, like he was trying to see into the future so he could fucking change it with his bare hands.

Matteo and Rocco stepped into the gym, speaking in Italian to each other.

I glanced at them. Did a double take at both men.

My uncle had been looking…harder than normal.

His wife was off the fucking rails, and I’d harden like him too if it were me married to Rosaria Caffi.

I shivered at the thought. Not in the same way I shivered for my wife.

Rosaria Caffi produced a true shiver from me—she was the real fucking creeper, probably the inspiration behind the movie with the same name.

My father huffed next to me, a slight grin coming to his face, then disappearing.

My brother, though. He looked like shit.

It wasn’t his outside appearance, though his hair looked somewhat messed up, which was fucking unlike him, and he had dark circles under his eyes.

Though if it was someone else looking at him, they probably wouldn’t be able to tell.

My family knew each other. My brother wasn’t handling the situation with his wife well.

He was being torn up on the inside, having no way to fix it without ripping his own heart out—his wife’s heart—by telling her no to the decision she had made for them.

She was pregnant.

I would have blamed his wife for the choices she was making that were torturing him, but again, understanding is key. She had her reasons, and I couldn’t fault her for fighting for what she wanted—my brother’s child, his blood—and she was putting her own health on the line for it.

Then again, I was like my old man. There were two different lights that were miles apart—the man in me and the monster. The man could take the reasoning and make sense of it. The monster inside of me only saw one thing— keep my wife safe and next to me; nothing else matters .

Matteo and I locked eyes. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d truly seen him.

It felt like centuries at that point. I nodded at him, and he nodded back.

In that moment, we seemed connected in a way we never had been before.

We were the only two married Fausti sons, and there was something about going through fucking rough situations that seemed to bond us with a look.

Would my brother stand with me over this war?

Looking at him in that moment—my feeling went from fuck no to highly fucking doubtful .

Did he understand my plight? Did I understand his?

Even by a mere look alone, we got each other.

If we took out Lev rallying for Iggy, there was no fucking doubt Matteo would have been with me on this, but it all depended on the direction my grandfather went in.

It became a tricky fucking situation when our word was given.

But fuck the word when Lev’s side had crossed a boundary laced with explosives—Iggy had tripped a fucking line.

My uncles, Dario and Romeo, walked in. Most of their sons were with them. Angelo had gotten permission from my grandfather for a “leave of absence.” Atta was on tour, and my grandfather allowed him the time to be with her.

Guido entered with a few men.

We all loitered around the ring, knowing that, in just a short time, my grandfather would arrive, and we would have to be waiting on him. A woman? He waited on her to show respect. If a man made him wait, the man would have to pay.

The conversation slowed, and Guido made a motion for everyone to file out and start lining up for when Nonno arrived.

Even though my old man should have been first in line, in reference to the hierarchy our family operated by, he was the last to walk out.

My old man was a rebel, and since he had given Padrino his spot in the family, my old man played by his own rules.

Usually, Matteo would have fallen in line, following directly behind my uncle. He kept back with us.

My old man looked us each in the eyes, then nodded toward the door. Before we walked outside, Matteo stopped and pulled me to the side.

“Something I should know before we get started,” he said. He was still stung about me not telling him about our first wedding, too, but again, he had enough shit on his plate. My issues paled in comparison to his, in his opinion.

That made me consider what he was truly going through.

He was facing a life of uncertainty with his wife.

Yeah, all life is uncertain, but when a dark cloud hovers in the distance, and a man can’t move it for his wife, that was an entirely different struggle from mine.

His situation had a built-in struggle that couldn’t be moved unless by God’s hand.

“Yeah,” I said. “I have a situation.” I gave it to him straight, telling him what Iggy had done and how my wife had kept it from me.

He made an agreeable noise, as if this confirmed our bond. Then he stared off in the distance, just as our old man had done. After a few seconds, he nodded, squeezed my shoulder, then walked out the door.

That could mean numerous things for Matteo.

I wasn’t sure if he was just acknowledging this was going to be a battle for me. Even if he sided with the family, he would still respect my stance. Or, it could’ve meant he was going to mull this the fuck over and decide which way to move forward.

I walked out, meeting my old man and brothers. They were waiting for me. We began to walk as a group back toward the villa.

Spring in Tuscany was on the horizon, and the air was chilled but not cold.

Though the lack of sun had brought the temperature down for this time of the year and I could scent a storm in the air, the world was still in motion.

A few early wildflowers had sprouted on the hills, an explosion of colors about to take over. Magpie’s favorite time of the year.

“ Che cazzo vuoi? ” My wife’s voice echoed behind the villa. What the hell do you want?

A male cleared his throat, then answered her in Italian. “To talk.”

“ Hai la faccia come il culo! ” You've got a lot of nerve!

Literally, the words translated to: You have the face like the ass.

A stream of fiery Italian I knew meant she was pissed—more insults, worse than the literal translation of face like the ass —followed.

Pezzo di Merda, for one . Piece of shit, which was a high insult.

My old man looked at me, his eyebrows raising, and in a breath, we all took off. We ran as if we were in a pride.

We all stopped at the same time.

Remo.

He was standing in front of my wife.

Her back was to me, but she was not straight in front of him, her body more to the right, and she was going off on him. Her hands waved. Her mouth shot insults. Her temper was off the fucking rails.

Remo and me, we had unfinished fucking business.

After he was sent packing as my wife’s security in that fucking palazzo of horrors in Venice, Guido sent him with Maestro for a while.

The sight of him brought back all the memories from the sequester that were stuck in my mind like barbed wire.

I’d been fucking murderous when I saw with my own eyes how he was sitting at the table with my wife, making her laugh, too fucking comfortable.

The way he was looking at my wife when she wasn’t looking sat in the fiery pit of my temper, festering.

I knew what he wanted. Mine. He wanted her to look at him the way he was looking at her.

She never did, which was why I knew he had gotten her sister pregnant.

He wanted her fury, any type of reaction from her beside the familial kind.

He had come to break the news. The news I hadn’t told her about yet. Capri was pregnant with Remo’s child.

Mamma was behind the door, looking out.

A few soldiers hovered around the situation.

I handed Marciano my suit jacket and rolled my sleeves up.

Mamma’s eyes widened.

Remo’s eyes narrowed and braced for impact a second before I hit him with force. He made an ung! noise as we hit the ground.