by L A Cotton
Arianne had left her cell in the bedroom all day.
“If you need to talk—”
“I said I have nothing to say to him.” Irritation laced her words.
“It’s okay.” I squeezed her knee. “Luis will handle it.” I shot him a pointed look, and Luis clambered to his feet, disappearing down the hall.
Tristan was buying us time. Mike Fascini knew about Scott’s latest attack. He knew Luis had taken Arianne to a safe place. As far as we were aware, Roberto had told him Arianne needed some space. But he wasn’t a fool. Eventually, he would piece together that I was with her, that we were planning to make our move against him.
“Are you two staying?” she asked Matteo and Enzo.
“Yeah, we’re going to crash here.”
“What about classes?”
“It’s all about keeping up pretenses, but maybe after all this, we won’t need to—” Matteo elbowed Enzo in the ribs.
“Let me guess, you guys aren’t supposed to talk about it.” Arianne’s expression fell.
“I’m sorry.” I brushed my lips over her forehead.
“It’s late,” she let out a small sigh, “we should probably get some sleep.”
“Like you’ll be doing any of that,” Enzo snorted.
I swiped a bottle cap off the table and threw it at his head. “Watch your mouth.”
“I’ll clean up first.” Arianne got up but I grabbed her hand.
“They can handle it.” I glared at my cousins. “We’ll see you in the morning.”
Guiding Arianne down the hall, we fell into the bedroom in a tangle of kisses and soft moans. “I feel bad,” she breathed against my lips.
“What for?”
“Because they’re stuck here while we...” Her cheeks flamed.
“They get it.”
“Do they?”
“Enzo not so much but Matteo understands.”
“What do you—”
“Bambolina?” I advanced on Arianne, not stopping until she was caged between my body and the wall.
“Yes?” She looked at me through her lashes.
“Stop talking.”
“Why?” Her lips curved and I lowered my head, capturing them in a bruising kiss.
“Because, amore mio, I’m going to strip the clothes from your body, lay you down, and worship every single inch of you.”
“Oh.” She blushed.
“Still want to talk?” I cocked a brow.
Arianne shook her head. “I’ll be quiet now.”
“Good.” Kissing the corner of her mouth, I whispered, “The only word I want to hear falling from your lips while we’re in this room is my name.”
THE NEXT MORNING, I left Arianne sleeping and went to find my cousins. They were already dressed, tucking into a stack of pancakes.
“Smells good,” I said to Matteo.
“Hey, what makes you think he cooked them?” Enzo asked, and I frowned at him.
“When was the last time you cooked?”
“I cook.”
“Dialing for pizza is not cooking.”
He flipped me off. “Where’s Arianne?”
“Sleeping.”
“Did you wear her out?”
“Watch it.” I jabbed my finger at him. “Any news?”
“Nothing to report,” Matteo said, passing me a plate.
“Perhaps you need to think about what your old man—”
“Not. Happening,” I growled.
“Okay, okay.” Enzo’s hands shot up. “Forget I said anything.”
“We wait and see what Tristan finds out before we make any decisions.”
“He needs putting down. He orchestrated the hit on Arianne when she was just a kid, Nicco. And then he let his son—”
“She’s not strong enough.” Arianne wasn’t ready to enter our world, not really. I wanted to shield her from it for as long as possible.
“You’re going to have to choose eventually.” Enzo let out an exasperated sigh.
“He’s right, Cous,” Matteo added. “You might have to make the decision for her.”
“I need more time. She needs more time.”
“I hope you know what you’re doing, man.” Enzo got up and stalked out of the cabin. It was becoming a regular pattern with us. But at least we weren’t solving our problems with fists these days.
“I know you want to do the right thing, but in our life, doing the right thing means something different in their world.” Matteo gave me a pointed look.
“Their world?”
“Arianne, Nora, even Roberto. They live by a different moral code to us. I know you know that.”
“I won’t give her up.”
I wouldn’t give her up for anything.
“I know. I’m not saying you have to let her go. I’m just saying that you might have to make the hard decisions to keep her conscience clean.”
I ran a hand down my face, letting out a strained breath. But Matteo wasn’t done.
“If he was here right now, if Fascini walked in here, what would you do?”
My eyes narrowed to slits, anger reverberating through me. “You know.”
“So, is Mike really any different? He wants to destroy us, Nic. He wants to take Capizola Holdings first and then come after us. He is the enemy.”
“You think I don’t know that?” I seethed, my fist clenched at my side. “It’s all I think about.”
It would be so easy to take them both out. We had several guys on the books who could do it. Hell, I could probably do it.
“We still don’t know if he has a backup plan.”
“Even if he does, it’s nothing we can’t find a way around. You’re stalling.”
He was right, I was stalling.
Because I wanted something better for Arianne. I wanted to be able to give her things, things I might not ever be able to provide.
“This is who you are, Nic. If she’s going to be with you, you both have to accept that.” Matteo clapped me on the back. “That girl loves you, more than she probably should. You’re Niccolò Marchetti, Prince of fucking Hearts. You don’t cower and you certainly don’t shy away from making the hard decisions.”
He left me with my thoughts.
I didn’t want to be Arianne’s prince. I wanted to be her king. The king of her heart.
The king of her soul.
But I was still holding back. I was trying to divide myself between Niccolò Marchetti, son of the boss, and Nicco Marchetti the guy in love with a girl.
Matteo and Enzo were right.
I couldn’t be both.
There was no escaping my fate.
And yet, I still wanted to protect her from the inevitable.
I SPENT THE DAY AGONIZING over my father’s visit. He wanted to move against Mike sooner rather than later. But he knew what Arianne meant to me. He knew he risked losing me if anything was to happen to her.
But in the end, my torment was all for nothing.
Tristan arrived with news, and it wasn’t what we’d hoped to hear.
“Mike has given my father until the weekend to bring Arianne back.” He cast his bloodshot eyes to the quiet girl beside me. “I’m so sorry.”
“Or what?” Luis barked.
“Or he’s going to...” The color drained from Tristan’s face. “Kill Uncle Roberto.”
“What?” Arianne leaped up, her body trembling. “You’re lying... he can’t—”
“It’s true. Uncle Roberto insisted I didn’t tell you. But this isn’t a game. Mike Fascini isn’t playing around this time.”
I grabbed Arianne’s hand, gently coaxing her back down onto the couch. “How did he issue the threat?”
“There was a package. A letter and...” He ran a hand through his hair.
“Tristan,” I urged.
“A flash drive. It contained live feeds of the entire estate.”
“He bugged the house?”
He nodded.
“Fuck.” Mike Fascini was more organized
than we first thought.
“My uncle’s study, the kitchen ... the bedrooms. He has enough to bring down Capizola Holdings at the press of a button.”
Arianne clapped a hand over her mouth, smothering a gasp.
“He won’t do it. He wants everything Roberto has. He’s just trying to show him he holds all the cards.”
“Maybe my parents can leave... maybe they can—”
“It won’t change anything.” I squeezed Arianne’s hand in mine. “Mike Fascini has gone too far now. He doesn’t care which way it ends, just that he holds all the power.”
“I’ll go back then. I’ll go back and maybe you can—oh God.”
“Bambolina, look at me.” Cupping Arianne’s face, I brushed her cheek. “You can’t go back. Not now. It isn’t only Mike we have to worry about, it’s Scott too. He’s unstable.” And there wasn’t a chance in hell he was getting within two feet of Arianne.
“He’s my father, Nicco, I can’t just let him...” Arianne let out a garbled cry and I pulled her into my arms, holding the back of her head as she sobbed gently.
“You know what has to be done.” Tristan gave me a hard look.
“What?” Arianne eased back, gulping down her tears as she smoothed the hair from her eyes. “What has to be done?” She glanced from me to Tristan and back again.
I inhaled a ragged breath and whispered, “Mike Fascini has to die.”
“D- die?” she choked out, edging away from me.
Her reaction stung but I’d expected no less. This was the ugly side of my world. The dark and tainted part I’d hoped never to share with her.
“As in you’re going to kill him? That’s... you can’t...”
“If it means keeping you safe, I’ll do whatever it takes.”
“But killing a man?”
“Bambolina.” I gave her a sad smile. “I have done much worse.”
“It doesn’t have to be you. It can be someone else, anyone else.” Her voice rose as tears streamed down her face.
“It doesn’t matter if it’s me or if it’s someone else. This is who I am.”
“Okay,” Luis said, standing. “Perhaps we should give the two of you some space.”
But Arianne didn’t look like she wanted space from them, she looked like she wanted space... from me.
“You two stay, I’ll go.” The words almost choked me. “I could do with some air.”
“Nicco,” she cried, and I lifted my eyes to hers. But nothing else came out.
She didn’t ask me to stay...
She didn’t say anything.
“Take your time.” I gave him a stiff nod. “I won’t go far.”
I walked out of the cabin and didn’t look back.
Because I knew if I did, I would break.
And a prince with a broken kingdom couldn’t protect his queen.
WHEN I FINALLY GOT back to the cabin, it was dark. I slipped inside with a heavy heart. What would Arianne say? Would she want me to leave and never return?
I braced myself but found only Luis and Tristan in the main room.
“She’s sleeping,” Luis said. “How are you?”
“It’s not me I’m worried about.” I sat down and my eyes flicked to the long hall leading to our bedroom.
“It’s been a lot for her to process.”
“That’s what worries me. How much more of this can she take?”
“Don’t underestimate her,” Luis said.
“What about you, what do you make of all this?” I asked Tristan.
“Honestly, I haven’t got a fucking clue what to say. I knew, man. I knew my uncle planned to marry her off to that piece of shit. It cuts me up inside knowing I never saw his true colors until now.”
My brow arched. “Arianne spoke like he’d hurt other girls before.”
“He’s known to be a little forward when he’s had a drink, yeah. But he never—fuck, you think there are others?”
“Maybe. But not like Arianne. What he did to her at the hotel...” My spine stiffened.
“How do you do it?”
“Do what?” I asked Tristan.
“I want to kill him with my bare hands for ever hurting her, so I can’t imagine how you must be feeling.”
I didn’t answer. I couldn’t verbalize the things I wanted to do to that fucker.
“Do you think she’ll come around?”
“Eventually.” Tristan’s brows pinched. “She hates Roberto right now, but he’s her family, her blood. She would never want harm to come to him. That’s not who she is.”
“So we agree then? This is the only option?” The two of them nodded. “I’ll need to call my father and make arrangements.”
“You think he’ll help?” Tristan asked.
“I know he will. He always knew this was how it would go. You can’t negotiate with men like Fascini.”
“And after... what happens then?”
I could read between the lines. He wanted to know what happened after Mike was gone.
“I love Arianne and I want a life with her. If she still wants me, I guess we’ll be family one day.”
He gave me a slight nod. “My uncle will be in the debt of the Marchetti; he won’t like that.”
“Not my problem.”
I was doing this for Arianne.
To protect her.
“I’ll talk to him again, try to explain that we have a plan.”
I shrugged. “Do whatever you got to do, but just know, I will always put Arianne first. Always.”
“Noted.” He ran a hand over his jaw. “You know, Marchetti, we might not have always seen eye to eye, but I’m glad she’s had you through all of this.”
Standing, I narrowed my eyes at him. We were done here. I wasn’t looking for his approval or even his gratitude. He hadn’t been there when she’d needed him, too busy playing king of the campus at MU.
“Yeah, well she should have had you too.” The words spilled out, but I didn’t regret them. I couldn’t. “Scott was your best friend, your guy. What happened between Arianne and him... some of that’s on you.”
“Shit, Marchetti, you think I don’t know that? You think I don’t lie awake at night thinking how different things might have been if I’d have been more clued in?
“Look, I can’t change what happened but I’m here and I’m trying to do right by her now. I won’t stand in your way. You love her and fuck knows she’s made it abundantly clear she loves you.”
I smirked.
As if he could actually come between us.
Arianne was a part of me now.
As much as I was a part of her.
Chapter 24
Arianne
I dreamed of death. Of blood and screams, guns and fists.
I dreamed of Mike Fascini beaten and bloody on the ground, a ruby red halo around him, the life gone from his eyes. And standing above him, like a dark angel, was Nicco.
Startled, I clutched the sheet to my body, willing my heart to slow down.
“What is it?” Nicco asked, pressing his lips to my shoulder.
“Just a nightmare, go back to sleep.”
He let out a quiet sigh, but soon slipped back under. But I couldn’t sleep, not after the nightmare.
They wanted to kill Mike Fascini.
Perhaps it shouldn’t have bothered me. The man was the villain of our story; hellbent on revenge and willing to do whatever it took to see our families fall. But I couldn’t help but think there had to be another way. A way that didn’t require his life in return for my father’s freedom.
For my freedom.
Nicco seemed dead set on making me understand that this was his life, that his soul was already tainted.
I didn’t doubt it.
But I still wanted to keep it as clean as possible.
Maybe it was a foolish notion, to think it mattered.
It did matter though.
To me, it mattered.
Mike and Scott deserved to pay for their sins, they deser
ved to feel everything slip through their fingers and fall away.
But death?
My conscience wasn’t ready to accept that this was how it had to be.
“Do you wish you had never met me?” Nicco whispered against my skin.
“No. Never.” My heart ached at the very idea of it. “But I do wish things could be different. I wish that I was just a girl and you were just a boy.”
Nicco looped his arm tighter, tucking me against the hard lines of his body. “I love you with everything that I am. I hope you know that, Bambolina. I hope it’s enough.”
“I do. It is.” I laid my hand over his. “But there must be another way.”
“There isn’t...”
“It isn’t fair.”
“Life isn’t fair, Arianne. It’s cold and cruel and painful. But there are sparks of light in the dark. You are my spark, amore mio. Your brightness outshines the darkness in my soul.” He lifted his chin to rest in the curve of where my shoulder met my neck.
“I don’t want it to be like this, Nicco.”
“Sometimes we must make the hard choices, Bambolina. That’s all we are at the end of the day; a chain of decisions, some good, some bad.”
I thought back to that night in the alley. If Scott hadn’t tried to hurt me, I wouldn’t have run. And if I’d never run, I might have never met Nicco.
Scott’s bad choice led me here. It was the catalyst of a series of events that had forever changed me. Yet, I still had faith in humanity, in people choosing to do the right thing. The morally just thing.
I closed my eyes and inhaled a shaky breath. There had to be another way.
There had to.
NICCO WAS GONE WHEN I woke up. He’d left a note in his wake. Four little words that eased the knot in my stomach.
I’ll see you later.
When I finally dragged myself into the living room, Luis confirmed what I already knew. Nicco had gone to see his father. I felt conflicted. On the one hand, I knew he was trying to protect me from what was to come. But on the other, it seemed cowardly.
“This is the right move, Arianne,” Luis said over his coffee.
“Is it?”
“He tried to kill you. That is not a man you want to negotiate with.”
“But to murder him?” Bile washed in my stomach.
