Page 36

Sistine

W arm water slid down my face and dripped into the sink. I refused to splash it with cold. Cold water would only bring forward details of that night that I might have forgotten. It would dig up ones that would never go away.

The uncontrolled fear. The pent-up fury.

The feeling of spinning helplessness that almost made my mind numb, as numb and chapped as my ass had been from peeing myself, along with the burning cold.

I looked into my eyes, searching for any signs that I was not feeling as strong as I usually did.

Reliving that night made me feel breathless.

I lifted my hands. Trembling. I set them underneath the warm flow and closed my eyes, taking a deep breath, refusing to look myself in the mirror.

Refusing to allow the memories to lodge inside of my eyes.

I knew what was going to happen if Mariano found out, and Scarlett’s words, or a sum of them, floated through my mind like a melody.

No matter what you both do, root it in love.

Atta was right. Rattler and his brothers were not worth the stain on Mariano’s soul. I had to protect him from this.

He and Angelo would eventually find out about the money, how deeply in debt the ranch was, and how horrible the men were who wanted to steal it from the Watt family, but what happened to us that night would stay buried.

I tried to take a deep breath, and the air whistled through my nose. I had not been crying, but my nose was blocked as if I was.

Sighing, I fixed my hair before I opened the bathroom door, running right into a hard wall when I stepped out.

“Oof !” My hands automatically slammed into a chest.

My eyes rose to meet Mariano’s. They were almost frantic. He was standing guard outside of the door.

I smiled to hide the nightmare night that I was burying even deeper. I rubbed my foot against his leg. “I did not let the sock elf get me, Casanova. All good here.”

He searched my face, as if he was searching for a lie, or some minuscule sign that my allergies were getting worse.

I sneezed and his eyes narrowed, then he picked me up and carried me into the room with the television.

He sat me down on the sofa, covered me with a blanket, and after sitting beside me, pulled me in so close, it was as if he was trying to weld me to his side.

A trembling breath left my mouth at the feel of his warmth. His protective nature. I curled up even closer to him, even tucking my hands against his side. He kissed my forehead, and I looked up, meeting his eyes. I expected them to be softened, warm, even hot, but they were sharp, digging.

I turned my face forward and cleared my throat. “The movie?” I said to no one in particular. My voice came out shredded, but it was easily blamed on my allergies and what they were doing to my upper respiratory system.

Angelo had the remote and played the first movie. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade . Urban Cowboy after. At first, the men seemed to be feeding off our tension, Mariano looking at me constantly, willing me to meet his eyes so he could find something. He was close. So close.

We all seemed to relax when Angelo gave us his Papà’s version of, “Do not ride that bu llll , Sissy!”

Atta and I were hysterical with laughter, and this seemed to soothe Mariano and Angelo, at least for a time. My pick played next. Mufasa: The Lion King . It was hard not to think about the conversation Atta and I had in the kitchen. The words Scarlett had spoken to me about love.

Atta’s need to protect Angelo from that night—I completely understood it. It reinforced what Scarlett had said to me.

As a woman, we have a need to protect our men as well. From damage to the soul. And the instincts in the men next to us were so ingrained in them to protect our flesh and bones.

For instance, Mariano was looking to kill the common cold inside of me. He considered it an enemy.

The lion was not only a symbol to the Fausti family, but it was their spirit animal. I had never met a Fausti who did not embody some aspect of the wild animal. This was why Hannah either referred to the ones on the ranch as lions or hunters.

“Get me the lion with the…” Insert description here of that particular lion she was referring to.

When she wanted Mariano, who she seemed to love as much as Angelo and Marciano, she would say, get me the lion with the spirit of a wild stallion .

The day she had taught me how to preserve the fruit we had brought her, I had asked her why she had described Mariano in this way.

“Doesn’t it seem to fit?” She quirked an eyebrow up at me.

She was one of the most stunning women I had ever seen.

She aged so gracefully. Perhaps because she accepted time and the lines they caused.

She had said lines meant she had weathered the storms of her life.

Nature’s way of marking the passage of time.

“Not exactly,” I had said, preparing the cherries.

She had wiped her hands on a kitchen towel. “Two separate parts of the human spirit can exist at once, just as two separate colors can, even if they belong to two wildly different spectrums of it.”

“Even predator and prey?”

“Your hunter has learned not to kill one important side to himself.” She looked over the counter. “Bring me more jars. This is a lot of fruit.”

This conversation still lingered in my mind, branching off into different directions.

It was true that the Fausti family embodied the spirit of a lion, years ago making it more than a symbol of who they were.

For some of them, it was nothing more than the family name.

A man who walked this earth, giving and receiving orders, only feeling inside of the scope of who the family name dictates they are at the table.

I had always applauded Luca’s line. How they all seemed to be different, but their lion hearts rooted them to the family name.

I had always compared it to living to eat and eating to live .

Even when I considered Mariano and his moniker, the Casanova Prince , I could understand how easily Mariano could have disappeared in Matteo’s shadow.

I had met his older brother before, and Matteo reminded me so much of Luca.

He embodied his role in the family. Leader.

However, setting Mariano next to Matteo was setting two similar colors next to each other, but they were still distinguishable. Navy blue next to teal.

Mariano’s parents must have seen to that.

Perhaps they did not want Mariano to covet the name “Matteo.” However, just because Mariano was different in his own ways, he still had Fausti blood running through his veins.

So did Angelo. The situation made me uneasy.

Rattler and his ass-faced brothers were not worth even getting rags ruined by their blood, much less the precious soul.

“Annie,” Mariano called.

Mariano Leone, the spare to the Fausti heir, but the only king of my heart.

My eyes slowly lifted to meet his. I had gotten too comfortable in his arms, my eyes almost closed, and I was melting, though staying put inside of his firm hold. It was a protective hold. His body around mine, a shield.

One of his thick eyebrows quirked up. “King of your heart, ah?”

“ Sì ,” I breathed out, my nose whistling. I had not even realized I said that aloud. I felt drunk off his…essence. His scent was intoxicating. His heat addicting. “You are.”

He moved the hair from my forehead, and I wrapped my hand around his wrist. “I do not have fever, Casanova.”

“Call me something else.”

“Something that is only mine?”

He nodded.

“It will have to come to me.”

He nodded again.

The way he was looking at me, as if he was already inside of me… that made me feel feverish, and I shivered. He wrapped me up even tighter, my head pressed to his chest, the sound of his heartbeats against my ear so soothing.

However, I was hot. Hot enough that it was making me uncomfortable, and my hand seemed to develop a will of its own. I pressed my palm against his chest and moved it up to his throat, exploring his skin.

He was all smooth lines, but with a ruggedness that pulled me in and held me captive. He was visually stunning. A piece of art. And as an artist myself, I marveled at the hand skilled enough to design such a being.

“Annie,” he almost growled out.

The sound thrilled me, and my eyes shot up to his, determined to meet his intense stare and keep it until we both had to be naked from the extreme heat, the only relief each other.

He hauled me up, sitting me on top of him, and my eyes flew to where Angelo and Atta had been. They were gone.

He growled low in his throat again, but it was different. Threatening. “No man sees you this way but me,” he said in Italian, wrapping his powerful hands around my wrists, directing them over his beating heart. “No man hears what is mine in this way. Or their hearts are mine.”

My breath left my mouth in a slow push, and when he pulled my head close, his mouth close to mine, I turned away. “I do not want to give you my allergies,” I said.

“Fuck the allergies. Your sickness is mine. Your enemies are mine. I take care of you. You. All. Of. You. Mine. ” He punched his chest, then turned my head in a rush and pressed his mouth to mine, damn whatever I had.

His tongue searched my mouth, and when I moaned, he groaned, and the vibrations of our want came together to cause a wildfire between us—the gasoline and the lighter.

My hips started to move as my hand did, without thought, and I rode his cock through layers of clothes between us. It would have been embarrassing, the noises I made, if he had not been looking at me as if he had never seen someone, anything, as beautiful as me in this moment.

I needed more. Not wanted. Needed. My hips seemed to agree, as they started to move up and down, around, needing the friction to keep the addicting fire burning between us. I could not stop.

If anyone tried to invade on this moment, I would kill them.