Page 195 of The Morally Grey Billionaires Boxset

A year later

Solene

"The weather is hotter than Naples." I place my hands in my lap.

Massimo glances up from his perusal of his phone. "I’ll take your word for it." He goes back to texting.

O-k-a-y, when you have to resort to talking about the weather things are dire. But how else am I to open a conversation with someone I don’t know at all? Someone who’s much older than me. Someone who I met only a few days ago. Someone I’m engaged to and am going to marry very soon.

"It’s so nice of you to organize this dinner with my sister and her fiancé," I offer. Yep, not only am I engaged, but Olivia, too, now has a fiancé, and this is supposed to be a get to know each other dinner, which Massimo took the initiative to plan.

"Nice?" Massimo tilts his head, without taking his gaze off that infernal phone. "Trust me when I say that was far from my intention in organizing this dinner."

"Oh." I hunch my shoulders. What do I say to that? What does he mean by saying his intentions were not what they seemed to be on the surface? I glance away, then back at him. "Palermo is much more beautiful than Naples," I murmur.

OMG, how pathetic. Now you’re comparing the two cities. Of course, Palermo's a more scenic space; it’s smaller than my hometown but has a lot more money. It’s why crime is rife there and why my family was able to hold sway for so long. I drum my fingers on the table.

"I haven’t seen much of the city. Do you think you’ll have time to show me around?"

Massimo finally glances up at me. "I’m sorry, I’ve been a shit fiancé, haven't I?"

I blink, then look away. "It’s fine, I know you must be busy with matters of the Cosa Nostra."

Yep, Massimo belongs to the clan who were once bitter rivals of my father's, which is how this engagement came about. I knew I’d be a bargaining piece, but I couldn’t have predicted my wedding arrangement would carry this much significance.

He widens his stance. "I’m sorry you didn’t get to have a say in who you’re going to marry."

"Neither did you." I wince. I didn’t mean to say that. I mean, that’s what crossed my mind the moment I noticed Massimo didn’t seem particularly happy at our engagement, but I should have learned by now that one does not go around voicing everything one thinks.

You’d think after the pains my family took to drill that into me over the years, I’d have learned my lesson, but nope, the link between my brain and my mouth is often tremulous.

It means, I tend to speak my mind at the most inopportune moment, like now.

"What makes you say that?" he asks slowly.

The fact that you couldn’t stop looking at my sister, for one.

Yeah, at my engagement, my sister Olivia burst in to congratulate me.

My sister defied my mother to leave home to become an actress.

That was when my father was alive, and he believed in her.

But after my father passed away, my brother and mother ensured I submitted to the role of a Mafia princess.

They made sure I didn’t spend any extended periods of time with my sister, even when she visited.

They wanted to use me in an arranged marriage to further Diego’s ambitions within the organized crime syndicate network.

They impressed upon me how much they were depending on me to come through for them, since my sister couldn’t be counted on.

I was high-spirited, but when it came down to it, the need to make my family happy weighed heavily on me, which is why I agreed to this engagement.

I hoped my fiancé might come to love me over a period of time, but that hope flew out the window when Olivia walked into my engagement party.

I saw how Massimo couldn’t take his gaze off of her, how he followed her out of the room when she left, much to everyone’s chagrin.

My family were upset by what he did, but I didn’t care.

How could I, when not a day goes by that I don’t remember Declan, when I don’t regret what I did to him?

I hoped his memory would fade with time, but his face is still the last thing I see before I fall asleep, and his name is my first thought every morning.

"I’m sorry; I didn’t mean that," I murmur.

Massimo’s eyebrows draw down, then he leans forward and says, "You’re an obedient girl; you care for your family. It’s why you agreed to their demands."

"I do respect my family, and I’ve been brought up in the ways of the Camorra.

I know it’s my duty to make a good match for them, however—" I place my fingers on his shoulder. My pulse rate shoots up, but I ignore it. I may have agreed to my parent’s demands, but I’m never going to be someone who’ll take things lying down.

I tip up my chin. "Just because I’m a blonde doesn’t mean I’m stupid. "

His gaze narrows, then he laughs lightly. "You’re not as compliant as you come across, are you?"

"Nope." I half smile. OMG, thank god, he has a sense of humor. He’ll make Olivia a very good husband. A-n-d that’s the issue.

It's clear there's something going on between the two of them, but even if there weren't, I can’t see this guy as my husband. I can’t. I can’t see anyone except the man whose name I will not permit myself to think of as my husband.

The hair on the back of my neck rises. I look up, and as if summoned from the depths of my subconscious, I meet a pair of azure blue eyes.

The same eyes that have haunted my dreams and my waking moments and made me change my personality; change the trajectory of my life as punishment for what I allowed to happen to him.

The same eyes I’ve seen on film posters in the city so I know he made good on his dream, which I knew he would, for I sensed that steely determination in him when we met.

His hair is shorter than when I met him, his jawline more pronounced.

His cheekbones seem to have gotten more angular, if that's possible. There’s also a scar across the right side of his forehead.

That wasn't there the last time I saw him.

It's also not evident in the posters I’ve seen with him on them.

Guess he must use make up to cover the worst of it.

How did he get it, though? Did that happen when my brother’s men beat him up? I clench my fingers together.

Not a day goes by when I don’t regret what I accused him of.

At least now, I can tell him. I begin to rise to my feet, but Declan’s gaze narrows.

His eyes widen in recognition, then harden until they become almost silver.

Chips of ice that would jab me and freeze me.

His jaw tightens. Even across the distance in the restaurant, I can feel the waves of hate that shimmer off of him.

I swallow, and my butt hits the chair. Declan wraps his fingers around the wrist of the woman walking in front of him.

He’s holding Olivia’s hand? He’s with my sister? No, no, no, this can’t be happening.

I track their approach toward the table, but when I glance at my sister, her gaze is locked with Massimo's. I turn my gaze on Declan to find he still hasn’t looked away from me.

I swallow. Oh, god, this is not what I was expecting.

Why did I agree to this dinner? They come to a halt in front of our table, and for a few seconds, no one speaks.

The tension is so thick in the air, it presses down on my shoulders.

The band around my chest tightens. A heavy weight sinks to the bottom of my stomach.

This is it; all my sins come home to roost. I’ve often wondered what it would be like to meet Declan again.

What would I tell him? What would he say?

Would I ever throw my arms about him and climb him like I wanted to that day?

I never thought when I met him again, I’d be engaged and he…

He’d be with my sister. Declan is engaged to Olivia, and oh, my god, is this the universe’s way of sticking it to me?

Is this my punishment for what I did to him?

He could have been killed, but I was so worried about saving my own skin that I didn’t think about what could happen to him.

And why does he look even more gorgeous, bigger, wider, taller?

His shoulders look like they are going to burst out of his suit jacket, his biceps stretch the sleeves, and his pants cling to his powerful thighs like they were stitched using him as a live model.

He shifts his stance, and I glance up to find he’s smirking at me.

His eyes though… They’re cold, hard, merciless.

What happened to the man I met? That softness in him that had called out to me.

That empathy I sensed in him when he assured me he’d never hurt me.

That sensitivity that touched his features and declared that he was a romantic at heart.

That…gentleness in his eyes with which he surveyed me like I was the most exquisite creation he’d ever seen.

The silence stretches, and my nerve endings chafe.

My muscles are so tight, a headache begins to knock behind my eyes.

Every part of my body feels like it’s so tightly wound up, I’m surely going to explode unless I do something to defuse the situation.

Say something, anything. I jump up to my feet.

"Livvy, you look beautiful," I burst out.

My sister’s face breaks into a smile. "And you look angelic." She moves around the table, takes me by the face and kisses me on both cheeks.

"This must be your sister," Declan says from behind her. That low, deep voice sends my pulse-rate sky high. My toes curl. No, no, no, I can’t have this reaction to him. Not when he’s my sister’s fiancé now.

I risk a glance at him, and his lips curl.

There’s a look of satisfaction on his features.

Damn him, but he’s aware of exactly how much of a disadvantage I am at here.

Did he know I was Olivia’s sister? Was he aware he would meet me when he agreed to this dinner?