I groan, adjust myself and learn something about Scarlett De La Cruz a moment later.
She snores. It’s a quiet little snore. Mostly. It makes me smile.
Nothing but a harmless little kitten.
But when she nuzzles against me again, I don’t think about how cute the snore is or how warm she is or how good her ass feels against my dick because, fuck me, it’s going to be long night.
8
Scarlett
I wake to a violent pounding in my head. I groan, turn over, burying my face in the pillow, the unfamiliar feel of it—mine is softer.
And mine doesn’t smell like him.
My eyelids fly open and bright sunlight makes my head hurt worse. Two days now that I wake with a headache. This one I did to myself.
Whiskey.
Too much of it.
It takes me a long minute to get up the courage to look behind me. But when I do, I find the bed empty and realize what that sound is. The shower.
He did sleep here, I realize. I still see the indentation from his head on the pillow and when I reach to touch it, it’s still warm.
I wanted this, right? To be passed out when he touched me? So, I wouldn’t remember it.
What do I remember? Not much.
Lifting the comforter, I peer underneath and am surprised to find I’m still wearing his clothes. The tie is gone, and the pants are down around my ankles, but I don’t feel anything. I would feel it if he’d touched me. I’ve had sex before. I know how much it hurts.
No. That wasn’t sex, I guess. That was me being fucked in every sense of the word.
Nausea at the memory almost makes me forget about my headache. I manage to shove it away though. I’ve gotten better at that but I’m still not quite there. Not to the point of not feeling anything when I remember. I wish I could forget it. Have the memories wiped clean.
So maybe Cristiano didn’t fuck me while I was out.
I reach down and tentatively touch myself. It would be sticky or at least the blood would have crusted. Men leave a mess. But I feel nothing.
The bathroom door opens, snagging my attention.
“Morning,” he says when he sees me.
I draw the covers up and sit up a little, scratching my head, trying to pat down my hair. I can be a pretty wild sleeper. I know what I look like first thing in the morning. And it’s not pretty.
Not that I want to be pretty for him.
“How’s your head?” he asks, adjusting the tuck of the towel at his hips, drawing my eye to how low slung it is. To the V of his belly. The line of dark hair that goes from his navel to disappear beneath the towel.
My face heats up and I open my mouth to speak but find it’s gone dry. I clear my throat. “It’s fine.” I really want to brush my teeth.
“I’m sure,” he says with a grin and gestures to the nightstand. “That’s not expired. And you’ll want to drink all of that water.”
I look over, see the container of aspirin and the big bottle of water. “Did you…” I stop.
He raises an eyebrow. “Did I what?” He opens a drawer at the dresser to take out a pair of briefs. He drops the towel.
“Can you at least warn me?” It takes me a split second to avert my gaze but it’s too late. He sees.
He grins. “Too much for you, Little Kitten?”
Little Kitten.
Give Fury a little whiskey and she turns into a little kitten.
I make myself meet his gaze. “I’ve seen bigger and better,” I lie.
“I doubt that.” He chuckles and walks into the closet to return a moment later, zipping up a pair of slacks. “And I’ve just figured out how to tell when you’re lying.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Your voice gets higher.”
“Fuck you.”
“Well, that was the plan, but you passed out.”
So, that confirms that we didn’t fuck, right? I turn my attention to the aspirin, busying myself twisting the lid as I remember that my pants were around my ankles. “Why were my pants off then?”
“Probably because they’re about five sizes too big. I took the tie you’d knotted around your middle off, but I didn’t touch you otherwise.”
“Oh.”
He walks over, takes the bottle from me and twists the lid off easily. “Child lock.”
“Ha-ha.”
“By the way, you snore.”
God, did I? How embarrassing. “Everyone snores,” I say to deflect.
He disappears into the closet once again and this time when he returns, he’s pulling on a shirt. I remember that part of the night. The muscle. The scars. Those tattoos.
The lines through my brother’s names. Noah’s name still line-less.
“Why is my name not on your list?”
“You’re a woman. Barely.”
“I’m twenty-two and that’s sexist.”
“You’d prefer me to add you to my reaper’s list?”
“Reaper’s list?”
“Grim reaper. I will steal the life of everyone unfortunate enough to have their name inked on my skin.”
“Well, in that case my brother doesn’t belong there. He had no hand in the attack and you know it.”
“I know no such thing. I have a meeting. You’ll stay on the island.” He tucks the shirt into his pants then wraps a tie around his neck.
“Are you going to cross another name off?”
He just gives me a quick grin.
“Where’s my uncle? Is he here?” I ask.
“Jacob? Fuck no. After you’ve eaten, Lenore will make a plate of exactly the amount of food you eat for your brother and you can deliver it to him.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Wait. Why do you care how much I eat?”
“Because I don’t want to break you in half when I—”
“You know what? Never mind. I get it. Can I visit with Noah or is it really just deliver his plate and leave?”
“Five minutes.” He pulls on his jacket. “Do I need to put bars on the windows?”
“What?” But then I remember how I told him I’d rather throw myself out the window than have to fuck Marcus Rinaldi. “I don’t know, is Marcus Rinaldi here?”
He chuckles. “Don’t go snooping where you don’t belong. You can help Lenore in the kitchen if you get bored and you’ll stay indoors.”
“What about clothes?”
He gestures to the chair where a dress is folded over the back.
“Anything else?” he asks as he pulls his jacket on, making it hard to look away from him as muscle stretches the material.
I shake my head. What the hell is wrong with me?
He comes over to me and I tug the blankets higher. With a hand beneath my chin, he tilts my face upward. “Tonight, we’ll figure out if you’ll be useful to me.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means you’d better be useful.”
“You mean I’d better not pass out so you can feel better about taking something that I don’t give?” I don’t know why I say it because in my heart, I know he won’t do that. He would have already done it if he were that kind of man.
He snorts, eyes growing darker looking like a midnight sky. “Careful, Little Kitten.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Why not? It fits. I was wrong.”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re not Fury. You’re just a harmless Little Kitten.”
I tug my face out of his grasp, but he grips it again, this time tighter.
“Let go of me. Don’t ever touch me.” I close my hands around his forearm which feels like a steel bar.
“Did I touch you last night?”
“You’re hurting me.”
“Or did I take care of you when you needed to be taken care of?” When I don’t answer, he presses the back of my head against the headboard. At least it’s soft. “Answer me.”
“I don’t need you—”
&nb
sp; “Answer me. Did I hurt you? Did I take what I wanted with no regard for you?”
I stare up at him and he stares down at me.
But then he cocks his head to the side. “Or are you not sure? Can’t you remember?”
“I thought I was wrong about you, Cristiano. I thought you were nice.”
He laughs at that. At me. And I hear how naïve I sound, how ridiculous and stupid.
“I’m not nice, Little Kitten. I’m nowhere near nice.” He studies me, softens his grip then runs his knuckles over the curve of my neck. He tickles my collarbone and I wonder if he can see how hard my heart is beating in my pulse. He lets his gaze fall to my mouth then back up. “Or are you disappointed that I didn’t do it? Were you hoping to get fucked? Wanting it?”
“Fuck you.” I try to move away but he captures my arm to stop me.
“I see how you look at me. Would it make you feel better about yourself if I took it?”
“That’s not…Shut up!”
“Then you could say it wasn’t your choice. That’s how it was with your brothers, right? The wedding? Not your choice? Your little hunger strike all you could actually do instead of standing up for yourself, instead of fighting. You say you’d have thrown yourself out the window rather than fuck Rinaldi but maybe that’s a lie.”
I dig my nails into his skin. “Let go!”
“I’ll let go when I’m ready to let go.”
“I hate you!”
“Is it a lie? Tell me.”
“Let me go!” I reach my hands to his face wanting to scratch him again, but he takes my wrists and flips me over onto my belly. He leans his weight over me, so I feel him at my back. Feel how much bigger he is than me. How much stronger.
“Don’t fucking do that ever again.”
“Let me go!”
“Tell me. Is it a lie?”
“Stop.” I squirm beneath him.
“Or is it that you just don’t hate him enough. And if that’s the case, if you don’t hate him enough, then you are my enemy, Scarlett De La Cruz.”
“I’m not weak. I did the only thing I could. You weren’t there. You don’t know what happened. What—” my voice breaks. I turn my face into the bed. I hate this. Hate that it all still makes me feel like this. That it has so much power over me still.
He draws back and suddenly I’m spun over onto my back. He studies me, watches my eyes, a momentary softening in his. But then it’s gone and he’s all hard edges again. A high wall erected with bricks of hate laid one on top of another.
“You’ll apologize to me tonight. First thing. You will get on your knees and you will apologize for what you accused me of. Am I clear?”
“Or you’ll make my brother pay? That’s what they did too, and it worked. Kept me in line. It’s what you’re going to do too, isn’t it? You’re just like them.”
His hand is around my throat in an instant. Instinct kicks in and I claw at his forearm. He’s too strong though and if he squeezes any harder, I’m dead.
“No, Little Kitten. I’m nothing like them,” he says through his teeth, eyes dark with rage. “And I’ll make you pay.”
9
Cristiano
She’s ruffled me. Gotten under my skin.
I’m distracted when I walk out of the room. I fist my hand, relax it. I swear I can still feel the pulse at her throat in my fist. I need to be careful. I need to check my rage. I may need her yet.
And I don’t want to hurt her.
“Cristiano,” Alec calls out. He has to do it a second time before I stop and turn. I didn’t even see him outside the door. “Everything okay?”
“Fine. Stay with her. She can spend five minutes with her brother after she eats. Then I want her in that room unless she’s in the kitchen with Lenore. She’s not to go outside and you’re not to leave her side, understand?”
He appears momentarily confused and I realize how intense I sound but he schools his features and nods.
“Good.” I look at my bedroom door behind which is my infuriating captive. I give a shake of my head to clear the assault of her words. I’m walking down the stairs but before I’ve even reached the bottom, I smell it. Burnt sugar.
I inhale deeply and when I look at my mother’s portrait, I see it. A flash of memory. Us in the kitchen. All of us. Her four boys. Elizabeth wasn’t born yet. My brave little men, she’d call us when we were young. We were always her brave little men.
And for a moment, for an instant, I hear her say those words in her soft voice. I swear I fucking hear it.
“Cristiano?”
I blink and it’s gone. Gone like it never even happened.
“Are you all right?” Lenore is rushing to me and I realize how I must look.
I straighten, scrub my face, glance up at mom.
My brave little men.
Lenore is calling for Alec to hurry down. He’s the only one she trusts, too.
“I’m fine. It’s fine.” I take a steadying breath. “Is it ready?” I ask eagerly.
She appears confused but then her face breaks into a warm smile. “No, not yet. It’ll take another half hour to bake and it needs to cool. You can’t have it for breakfast until tomorrow. Do you remember how your mother would let you boys eat dessert for breakfast?”
“Yeah,” I say, wanting to remember. Wishing that if I say that I do, maybe I will. “I remember.”
Her smile falters a little and I wonder again if she hears the lie. If she knows I can’t remember, not the events themselves. And not my family.
“It’s all right, dear. It’s very painful, I know.”
I clear my throat, steel myself. “The girl.” My voice comes out hoarse. “Feed her, make sure she eats every meal. I’ll be back late. Only when she eats does her brother eat.”
“She’s very young and the boy even younger.”
“What does that have to do with anything?” I snap, and the look on her face makes me pause. I take another deep breath in, wondering what the fuck is wrong with me. “They’re part of the De La Cruz Cartel. Blood of those who killed my family. Our family.” Because Lenore is as close to family as one can be.
“I know. I know who they are. But they were children, Cristiano.”
“Like Luca and Gianni were children. Like Elizabeth and Mara.”
She steps back and looks down for a moment. “Come have breakfast.”
“I’m late to meet Charlie.”
“Better Charlie than David,” she says with an edge to her tone.
“What is it? Why don’t you like him? What is it with you two?”
“It’s not that I don’t like your uncle, of course. I just worry because you’re different when you get back after time with him.”
“Hm.” I check my watch. “I have to go.” I think of something then. “Do one more thing for me. Have someone change the lock on Elizabeth’s room. Put it on the outside.”
She understands why, I’m sure, but doesn’t comment. Just nods.
“I’ll see you tonight, Lenore.”
“Be safe, Cristiano.”
That’s her standard goodbye whenever I leave the island.
I get my shoulder holster from the study and tuck my gun beneath my jacket. I head toward the front doors, two eight-foot steel reinforced doors. I’m not taking any chances. The pilot of the chopper is in close conversation with Antonio, the head of my security detail.
“Cristiano, you want us to ready the chopper? You didn’t call down, but it’ll just take a few minutes.”
“No, I’m taking the boat today. Alone.”
“That’s not a good idea. Tensions are high. People are anxious,” Antonio says.
“Then follow me with another boat. I don’t care but I’m taking the boat. Alone.”
For a moment I’m sure he’s going to argue with me, but I walk out the door into the bright sunlight. It’s late fall so even though the sun shines, it’s a cool day. Good. It’s just what I need to clear my head. Today is a big day.
&n
bsp; 10
Cristiano
By the time I dock the speedboat in Naples, I’m more focused.
I’m surprised when I see my uncle David is here to greet me. He’s standing beside the first SUV, one hand in the pocket of his pants, the other around the phone he’s got to his ear. He simply nods in greeting, expression serious.
Antonio and the soldiers who will accompany me dock beside my boat as I secure mine. I wonder what we look like, me ahead of the three, all of us in dark suits, dark sunglasses, heading to the row of waiting SUVs with their tinted windows.
Money, I guess. We look like money.
And trouble.
The Grigori family back to take its rightful place at the top. Except that we’re not much of a family anymore. We’re a two-man show.
“Uncle,” I greet him. “I didn’t expect to see you this morning.”
He tucks his phone into his pocket and shakes my hand, glancing behind me. “You should take the chopper. It’s safer.”
“I’m fine. I needed the air. Why are you here?”
He studies me as he considers this. “I have two names.”
I feel my jaw tense but nod.
“Tell me you did what I said,” he says.
“Which part?”
“The girl. Is she out of your system?”
“She was never in my system,” I lie.
“You didn’t do it, did you? You didn’t get rid of her.”
“She’ll warm my bed for another few days. Leave it. She’s not your concern.”
“She’s a threat. Her family will want her back.”
“Her family’s dead. You mean the cartel will want her back. Maybe. Maybe not. And if they do, it could be to make her queen or to kill her. If it’s to make her queen, then she’s valuable. There are those who are loyal to her, to her family. We have to think farther down the road, Uncle. We can still use the cartel and if I have their princess, then I hold something of value.”
“And her fiancé?”
I raise my eyebrows. “He’s no longer her fiancé.”
“Call him what you want. He can use her to secure his position with the cartel. It’s easier to be rid of her.”
With This Ring: To Have and To Hold Duet Book One Page 7
