Page 18 of Married to the Mafia

six

Change is Awkward

Mikey had expected to be struck. Some kind of slap or other blow to the head, most likely, even though his family wasn’t generally physical with each other. He had not expected the stinging strike to come from his mother.

“Michele De Salvo! What have you done? What sort of nonsense did I just hear from your mouth? Are you really so lonely up in that mansion that you would strongarm some poor, beaten-down woman into marrying you?”

“Mother,” Dante said, stepping up behind their ranting mother and easing her backward. “He can’t answer if you don’t take a breath.” He guided her to the seat she’d practically flown from, squeezed her shoulder, and turned to Mikey. When their mother could no longer see his expression, his eyes went cold with anger. “You are going to explain it all to us, brother. In excruciating detail.”

Mikey bit back a sigh. Showing irritation would only make his punishment worse. “I already explained it. It’s not as if I blackmailed her—which wouldn’t be nearly the worst thing any of us has done, anyway.”

Romeo crossed an ankle over his knee. “We don’t do that shit to our wives, Mikey.”

“First,” Mikey said, holding up a hand as he prepared to tick off his points. “Both of you, and Cris, were lucky enough to marry for love.” He gave Romeo a pointed look. “And I do mean lucky.”

“Don’t forget I’m armed,” Romeo shot back.

Mikey ignored the empty threat. “Second, I gave Brandi an out even after the fact. It’s not a once-and-forever, ironclad deal. If she hates it, she can bail, and she’ll be better off for it than if she’d just held on to the job as it’s been for one more year.” He wasn’t an idiot. Presuming she took the out after the year was up, she’d leave the company, too. An unavoidable loss. He looked across to his mother and put an effort into gentling his tone. “Third, this is the most effective way to protect her from all the people who are actually endangering her right now. It takes away the leverage her father might have, and gives her a suit of armor against his enemies.”

“His other enemies,” Romeo said.

“We can’t ignore Wesley after this,” Dante declared.

Mikey nodded. “I don’t want to. I just also don’t want Brandi getting caught up in something she’s only ever been a victim of.”

Eleonora clicked her tongue, still dissatisfied. “We raised you better than this. Your father made it clear—”

Mikey lowered his arm. “This isn’t an arranged marriage, Mom. I’m not holding her captive. She’s voluntarily locking herself up in the manor right now because she doesn’t want to be seen covered in bruises from the man who scared her bad enough she was willing to abandon her entire life. I’m giving her an alternate choice. If she’d said no, if she’d gotten up and marched out of my office, I would have let her.”

A tense silence settled in the room. He’d known that declaring his intent to marry the daughter of a man Dante considered on the verge of a death sentence would be hard for his brothers to swallow. He’d neglected to consider that this situation might trigger his mother’s very personal opinions on impersonal, forced marriages.

Though their parents had developed a strong and enduring love, it hadn’t started out that way. Eleonora had been given to their father by a coward with little money or resources to offer aside from his two daughters, and since his eldest was of marrying age, he’d handed her over. He hadn’t asked her opinion first, hadn’t arranged for her to meet and forge any sort of bond with her future husband. She’d met her husband the day they’d married. Her father and her younger sister had disappeared barely a month after.

It had been a hard time for her. She still didn’t care to talk about those early days. But the experience had prompted her to insist that her children did not fall victim to—or take part in—what she considered to be heartless customs. Their father had agreed, though he’d always explained it with a smile fighting his lips. Mikey had figured their father didn’t quite hate those old, heartless customs as much as their mother, but he loved his wife, so he’d relented.

In Mikey’s mind, the deal he’d purposed to Brandi was different. In large part because she could leave without consequence, but also because Brandi hadn’t come to him for help in the first place. She’d come strictly to offer the respect of quitting face-to-face. She hadn’t even asked for a ride. He had put the idea out there, an alternative to fleeing and starting life with nothing but a target on her back, and let her choose. He was well aware he was merely the lesser of two evils.

Eleonora lifted her iced tea from the table beside her. “I still don’t like it. If you want to protect her, then protect her. Don’t force her into your bed.”

Mikey rubbed at his cheek absently. “I don’t have any intentions of forcing her into my bed, Mom. We’ll be married legally, we’ll present as a married couple where and when we need to, but privately I may not even see her. I’m not that kind of bastard.”

Romeo chuckled. “Look at that, you drag us all home and declare you’re getting married, and already you’re tossing out excuses for why you won’t be offering up more grandbabies.”

Mikey rolled his eyes and turned a bored glare on his brother. “You sound like an old man when you talk like that.”

“Who gets married just to stay lonely?” Romeo countered.

Mikey narrowed his eyes. “Who says I’m—”

“Enough.”

Mikey snapped his mouth shut and sat straight, shifting his focus to Dante. In his peripheral, he saw their mother set down her tea.

Dante eyed him coolly. “If Brandi signs that agreement, she will be family. We will treat her as such. But she will be expected at family engagements whenever possible, and her loyalty to the family will also be expected.”

Mikey nodded. “I’ll make sure she heard that part before she signs.”

“And you’re sure this is what you want?”

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