Page 28 of His Cursed Heart

The mansion is quiet when I go out of the car.

The lights are out and the wind is almost as quiet as the house. The bodyguards are at the entrance and are as tall as mountains.

How is Hanibal training these people?

The hall is dark, and I don’t feel like going to bed. I change my direction and I move my legs toward the garden.

Perfectly shaped trees, a fountain in the middle of it and a swing are making this feel like a fantasy.

But what makes me almost gag is the huge snake statue that is in the middle of the fountain. The details are too perfect. It’s like he took a real snake and put someone to paint it with marble.

A sudden sound breaks the silence and I turn slowly, my hand on the gun in my waistband.

My breath is gone when I see Althea in the swing, wearing a black summer dress and smoking a cigarette.

I shouldn’t feel this when I see her.

Her hair is loose and it reaches right above her ass. Even her face is flawless without any makeup.

I should hate her for what she put Keres through.

“Did you bring my dick?” Her question makes me crack a smile.

“I still have to put the ribbon around it. Consider it a wedding gift.” She lets the smoke out as she shows me a sarcastic little smile.

And even that little smile makes her face more soft, more relaxed. Like she’s actually twenty-three years old, not forty.

“A wedding gift will be canceling the wedding.” She looks at me like she expects me to agree with her.

“I will make you my wife even if the wedding will turn into a bloody massacre.” She stands suddenly and comes toward me.

“Do you plan to kill me too?” She spats.

“What. Did. You. Say?” I feel my body grow in anger.

“Does the truth stings?” The venom she has in her

eyes make me even angrier. “Admit it, Keaton.”

“Admit what?” I say in a low voice. We were dangerously close and if one of us snaps, we would kill each other.

Because Althea knows how to fight.

“That you broke the promise you made. Do you remember our first ever conversation?” She throws the cigar on the perfectly green grass and she squeezes her hands into fists.

It feels like yesterday. Our first ever conversation. We didn’t even greet each other. Never said ‘hello’.

There are two conversations going on at the dining table that the Famiglia’s Capo arranged for our arrival.

I came here to ask the girl who saved me to marry me. Because I don’t want anyone else as my wife. I am twenty-three years old and soon I will take over the mafia.

I’ll be more powerful with a wife next to me.

My father and Hanibal are talking about the union of the two mafias, while my mother is talking with…her.

Keres.

My future wife.

---