Page 40

Mariano

F irelight lit her in red and gold hues, making her seem like a creature not of this world.

Cappuccino-colored hair cascaded over her slim shoulders in waves, my bandana still wrapped around her head. The roaring bonfire made it look like a halo.

Small tendrils of her hair waved in the subtle wind, highlighted by the heat. The fire teased out the red and gold in her mane, making the strands spark. Her face was touched by the sun, such a beautiful light olive, and her hazel eyes glistened.

The gold in them was prevalent, and the fire was playing on that too, making it melt around her irises like oozing honey.

Waves of heat surrounded her, made her seem almost like a mirage, but there was nothing truer, more real, than this:

The fucking fire was inside of her.

It almost seemed as if she had manifested it, and it existed outside of her body for me to see and feel. Something deep inside of her that I could touch. If she ever tried to leave me, to say goodbye, even turn away from me, she could turn me to ash.

Together, we created a perfectly warm atmosphere that I could exist in for the rest of my life.

The it between us. That thing .

The connection .

This was what it felt like to my soul. A glow I could never have imagined was real or meant for me.

Heaven.

The only heaven a sinner like me could call mine .

My heart recorded as I watched her smile, laugh, fix her hair.

Exist.

She pulled her— my —worn-in flannel a little tighter over her chest. She had switched her shorts to jeans.

Jeans that hugged every curve and flared at the bottom.

She was slim with curves I wanted to trace with my hands.

Sink my fingertips and mouth into. She laughed.

The melody of it seemed to slow dance toward me.

She talked to Atta’s friends, who had arrived for the wedding and were here for the party to mark the change of seasons.

Her scent was carried by a gust of wind that made the bonfire waver.

Crisp and sweet, like a juicy apple with a smoky tinge from the burning wood.

Sistine Evita was that religious experience I’d always have. The one I’d had the moment my eyes found her in that jewelry shop in Venice. She was my reminder that heaven existed, and wherever she went, I would be there.

My heart raced straight to hers.

It felt weightless. Bottomless. Like it was flying on air. It was like the lion inside of it had hit a dip in the road, and its stomach never recovered. It made the need to be close to her, protect her at all costs, an obsession.

My eyes refused to leave her.

Her eyes were on me.

It felt like the space between us was a breath, a breath I had to catch, or I would die.

It would be that way per sempre .

Thoughts from the night before invaded my mind. How she felt. How she tasted. The scent of her. The noises she made. It was as if I was watching a creature that was made for me, mine , for the first time. Exploring every inch of her as if she were a map, a map straight to the core of who she was.

That one small word made the difference.

Mine.

My name needed to be next to hers.

Sistine Evita Fausti.

My children needed to mark her skin—somehow, some way.

Irrevocably mixing her blood with mine for centuries to come.

I needed to live with her, then lay next to her forever, a grave somewhere on the hillside, the dash between when we were born and when we left this world the same length.

The exact same length.

I couldn’t live a second without her.

I refused to.

In that moment, my heart and soul came together, handing my mind the vow, making it jot it down.

I lifted my hand, pounded a fist over my heart, like the vow was sealed in the span of the beat it took to make it, then I ran a hand over the aching thing.

Watching her, my eyes barely able to hold such beauty in, was like watching a Wyoming sunrise and sunset. Fucking heartbreaking.

“Fuck me sideways,” I grumbled. “I’ve turned into my old man.”

“If you’ve turned into your old man,” a soft voice whispered from beside me, “I’d say he did a mighty fine job of raising you.”

My eyes turned to the left.

The blond who’d tried to bid for me the night of the auction.

She tipped her glimmering cowboy hat at me. “Hiya, Italian Cowboy. We meet again.”

“We’ve never met,” I said.

“You’re Mariano Fausti. I’m Carlie Killingsworth. I’ll be working with Atta on her world tour. That’s all a man like you needs to know, right?” She winked at me.

I shook my head, about to walk off. She grabbed me by the arm. I looked down at it. Back up at her. She smiled at me, fixing a strand of her hair with the other hand.

“Come on,” she said playfully, flirting. “I’ve been keeping an eye on you since I arrived in Wyoming. I’ve been looking for a little fun.” She winked again.

“You can keep looking,” I said, about to walk off.

She held tighter to my arm.

My eyes crashed with my Annie’s. Hers were narrowed, and her lips were pinched. She handed her beer to a woman next to her. The woman with my arm in a strangle hold connected the dots—my eyes on Sistine, and Sistine’s fiery eyes on her.

She exploded with laughter. “This must be a joke! Atta’s little cousin from Italy? Pah -lease. You’d break her in two!”

Sistine wasn’t charging, but the fire in her eyes was deadly.

“If I were you,” I said in a low voice, “I’d let me go.”

She laughed again.

“Hi,” Sistine said to Atta’s attendant, or whoever the fuck she was, when she was next to me.

While her attention was on Sistine, I removed my arm from her grip, moving closer to Sistine.

She might have looked innocent, except for those fiery eyes that connected to her spirit, but except for those closest to her, I doubted anyone would suspect what she could do with a gun.

Hit a man from across a field right where she had aimed.

Her eyes were aimed at the assistant. I wasn’t sure if I could catch her before she swung on this woman.

“Atta’s little—” the assistant started.

“You seem to have something in your eye,” Sistine said, narrowing hers on the assistant’s, like she was checking her for something. “Perhaps a bug. Let me help you with that.”

Sistine’s arm shot out, and before I could pull her away, her fist contacted the assistant’s eye.

The woman screeched, then went after Sistine, but I had wrapped my arm around Sistine’s waist, hauling her back.

Remo grabbed the assistant. The assistant was screaming about how she was going to sue Sistine.

Sistine was shouting at her in Italian, insults that would go down in the fucking books.

“Try to wink again!” Sistine said in English.

The assistant winked at me with the other eye.

I had to tighten my grip on Sistine. She was wiggling, trying to get me to release my hold, while she was screaming more Italian insults.

“Still,” I whispered in her ear. “Still yourself, my Annie.”

She took a deep breath, her hands still in the position to try to remove my grip, but she was still. Panting, but still. I walked her to where her cousin was standing, knowing she might be in control of herself, but her temper was still hot.

“Wash your arm!” Sistine shouted.

And…there it was.

“Consider it fucking done,” I said, setting my lips against her neck, placing a soft kiss over her pulse.

She took a deep breath, then nodded.

Angelo and Marciano grinned at me.

I shot them both fuck you looks.

Marciano started laughing, the sound low and raspy. “Way to go, Spicy Sis.” He held his hand up for a high five.

She eyed him with fire until she realized he wasn’t fucking with her. She raised her palm and slapped his.

He pretended it hurt and shook it out. “Fuck me,” he said. “You have weight to that five.”

Everyone started laughing, even Atta.

“What happened?” Atta asked, fixing Sistine’s hair while I looked over her knuckles.

Sistine took a deep breath. She nodded toward me. “He drives me crazy!”

My eyebrows shot up.

“You do,” she said with a snap. “You are a, ah , chick magnet!” She was so incensed, her accent was stronger.

Marciano exploded with laughter, laughing so hard that he was wheezing for breath.

I thought she might pummel him, too, but a grin came to her face.

Hannah laughed from her seat before the fire. Her hair was braided, and her shoulders were covered in a bear-skin blanket. “Hunter with the lion’s heart and mustang’s spirit,” she called to me, “you have a fire on your hands with that one.”

“Yeah,” I said, bringing her knuckles to my mouth, kissing them. “And she needs some ice.”

Her eyes wouldn’t fully meet mine. Her cheeks were red. She wasn’t embarrassed but pissed off. Her eyes kept going to the spot where the assistant had been.

“I will walk with you to get some,” Angelo offered.

He never offered. He always waited for an order to do anything. In America, though, we were freer to be cousins and not just Fausti royalty. I nodded at him, and after he kissed Atta, he stepped in line next to me.

“You going to be all right, Annie?” I asked.

She waved me off. “I do not even need ice.”

I grinned at her and lifted my eyebrows. “Tell me, my Annie, what you need,” I said in Italian.

“To take another swing at that ass-face!”

I pulled her close and kissed her, and when we parted, I breathed in her ear, “This fucking outlaw has met his match.”

“Annie Oakley!” Marciano hollered, lifting his beer toward Sistine. “Here’s to her and all her entertaining scenes!”

Fucking Marciano.

I gave him orders to watch over her, and he smiled at me.

“Seems like Spicy Sissy needs to watch over me. She has the muscles. She can shoot. I’m just the brain in this situation.” He opened his arms and grinned.

I resisted the urge to pop him upside his fucking head. He looked at me, tilted his head to the side, and then rubbed it. He knew my fucking intention. Atta pulled Sistine to the side, Marciano keeping a safe distance, while the two women whispered to each other.