Page 23 of Veiled Amor

It would be like her sadistic dad to still have her in shackles when she thought she was free. A vulture circling until it was time to pounce.

This would never end. Not until she fell into line with her father’s choices.

Was it better to give in and let it happen?

Or fight until the bitter end?

Popping to her feet, Giancarlo turned a quizzical eye on her, his brow high on a strong forehead. “I need… eh, excuse me for a second.” She all but wheezed as she headed to the bathroom like her ass was on fire.

Feeling as though her life was being whipped out of control, she took calming breaths on the bathroom floor while the faucet drip-dripped and her heart clattered in her chest.

Capone was here.

And that’s how she needed to think of him now. He was Capone. He laughed a lot more back then. Before her father took his family from him, she was a horrible person to ask him of all people for help.

But it wouldn’t stop her, would it?

She was in this dirty fucking obsession, knee-deep. It meant she was around Capone again, and some small part of her was happy about that.

Damn, she was sick and depraved to lap up any piece of his attention.

Off the floor, she went to the sink to splash water on her face as a knock sounded on the door. “Lucia?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m gonna step out to make a call.”

“Okay.” She replied, drying her hands.

She listened to his steps tracking across the carpeted floor. The door opened and closed quietly behind him. Lucia leaned into the basin, looking at herself in the mirror. “Oh, don’t look at me like that,” she whispered, “you’d do anything to be around him, you freaking addict.”

She married the wrong brother, and God only knows how badly that went, but it didn’t stop her from being in love with the other brother she couldn’t have.

Only three people knew the truth about her marriage.

Santiago was dead. And Nicholas wouldn’t confess to Capone.

Did secrets count if the person it was about was dead?

The etiquette for those kinds of things was unknown to her.

Married to one brother while in love with the other.

How fucking cliché she was.

“Stick around, folks.” She said to herself in the mirror. “Watch how I fuck this up.”

Capone was here to help get her life in order, not to climb into her panties. She had to remember that. No matter how gorgeous he was or how he made her stomach whip like an out of control washing machine, he was going to help her and then take off back to his badass life. Probably full of women falling all over themselves to get to him.Ugh.

Welcome to the real world, Lucia.

Maybe she preferred her cage, after all.

She opened the door and watched Capone through the window, talking on his phone.

One room, one bed.

Being around an irresistible man was about to test her inner strength.