Page 40 of Under His Protection

I grunted. “Not a threat yet.” But the moment they do strike out, in any direction near us, they’ll be greeted with as much ammunition as we have.

“Are you going to the Sarround Gala?” Romeo lifted his chin to face me directly after sipping his drink.

I sighed, but this time, I didn’t roll my eyes at the mention of that black tie event. I knew it was coming up soon, but I hadn’t been thinking about it recently. Those gatherings were normally a pain in the ass. Too many players in one place. Too much tension that could boil over at any minute. And all the while, we had to smile and act like nothing was amiss.

“Yes.”

“You hate socializing at those things,” he commented with a smirk.

I nodded. “Usually, I do.” Not this time. I was looking forward to that night for the first time in many years. I had just been thinking about wanting another opportunity to take Nina out so I’d have an excuse to kiss her and touch her in public. All to push this idea that we were together. The Sarround Gala was an excellent opportunity for that. “I’ll be there. With Nina.”

Franco scrolled on his phone, furrowing his brow as he focused on whatever he read, but he still nodded, acknowledging what I said.

“With Nina,” Romeo confirmed.

I looked him square in the eye.

“Are you with Nina to throw Vanessa off your tail?” He leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms, looking mighty smug about asking me such a question.

I didn’t take bait to his teasing tone. “Since when do you concern yourself with the women I date?”

Franco laughed once without looking up from his phone as he continued to multitask. “Date? You’ve never dated Vanessa.”

And I never, ever fucking will. Even if Stefan hadn’t crossed a line in presuming the Giovanni Family could count on an alliance with the Constellas, I was sick of that predatory woman.

“You’ve never dated anyone. Period,” Romeo teased.

I shrugged, declining one second of the pressure to reply on this matter.

“What gives?” Romeo asked. “After the situation I found her in at Escott’s, not to mention seeing her sitting on your lap like she’d become your favorite pet…”

I sighed. Pet? That was too damn trivial and cute of a name for the woman I lusted for. I dreamed about her nightly. My random thoughts circled back to her. Nina had crept so close without trying to. She was under my skin and on my mind, and there wasn’t much room for me to try to deny it.

“It started out like that,” I confessed.

“What did?” Romeo asked. Franco glanced at me for a second, curious as well.

“I started to see Nina to show Vanessa that I’m taken.”

Romeo frowned. “She wasn’t at the dinner at Escott’s that night.”

“No,” Franco said, “but I think word is spreading about his being there with Nina.”

“And after I arrive at the Sarround Gala with her on my arm, everyone will see for themselves that she’s with me.”

My son was too astute to just take my word for anything. He focused on a few. “What do you mean you started to see Nina for that reason?”

I searched for the right words to explain it all. While I wasn’t ashamed of admitting that I asked Nina, my friend’s daughter, to pretend to be my girlfriend, it now seemed like a lie. Like an inaccuracy.

Nina had come to matter to me, so much in such a short time. I wanted her with a hunger I wasn’t sure I could stave off for much longer, so telling my top two trusted men that she was only in my life to pretend we were a couple felt like a sham.

I want her. But I swallowed that honest truth, avoiding telling them here and now.

Nina should be the first person to hear that statement. I wanted to express my desire to her—and act on it.

One question remained. Only one decision was left for me to make.

Should I tell her before or after that gala? Because it no longer seemed like such a good choice to bottle it all in.

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