Page 43 of Vengeful Mafia Prince

She kisses me on the cheek. Hearing those words come out of her mouth is an enormous relief, though I have no doubt that she's going to have some mixed feelings about all of this in the future. It's never that simple when it comes to grief. You can't just brush it off with good sense and logic. No matter how sure she is that I've done the right thing, she's still talking about theloss of her father, and that's just not the kind of thing you can breeze across.

"But I'm sorry I've made things so complicated for you," she admits. "I don't want to cause trouble between you and Valentina, but I don't want... I don't want to lose you either, Gio."

"You're never going to lose me," I tell her, my voice laced with so much certainty that it catches me off guard. "I promise you that. You're never going to lose me. Valentina isn't the warmest person in the world, and she's still got a lot to wrap her head around when it comes to you, but she understands that you've been through something awful. Something pretty close to what we went through. She knows what it feels like. She's willing to give you grace. If you just give her a bit of space."

"A lot of space," she corrects me, and I chuckle.

"Alright, yeah," I concede. "A lot of space. But she'll get there, I know she will."

She takes my hands in hers, squeezing them tight. "Just checking you're really here," she murmurs, offering me a small smile.

"I am," I promise. "I'm not going anywhere, you have my word on that." I kiss her again. "I love you, Elena. So fucking much."

"I love you too, Giovanni."

The two of us just stand there for a moment, letting the sweetness of those words course over us. In this moment, nothing else in the world could matter more than being herewith her, knowing that she doesn't want to be anywhere else but in my arms.

But I know it's been a long time since she ate, and I want to make her something. If she's going to be staying here—which it looks like, for the foreseeable future, at least—then she's going to have to get used to treating this place like a home.

"You hungry?" I ask as I pull back from her.

She plants her hands on her stomach as though checking and then nods. "Starving."

"Let me make you some French toast. Double portions. I'm feeling generous."

"Oh, don't worry, I can get something for myself—"

"Elena." I cut her off and turn to her, the pan in one hand. "I'm not doing this because I'm worried. I'm doing this because I want to take care of you. Okay?"

She bites her lip and crosses her arms over her chest. "Hey, if you insist..."

And with that, I set about cooking her a meal in my home for the very first time.

Epilogue—Elena

"Okay, yeah, I'm going to be in touch again later this week, once I've had a chance to talk to my graphic designer," I tell the client on the other end of the line. "It won't be long till you hear from me, I promise. Okay? Speak soon!"

And with that, I hang up, pushing my phone into my pocket and copping some of the nasty looks from the other students at the library who were just trying to get some actual studying done while I took a work call.

A work call. I could get used to that. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that yes, I actually get work calls now. Ever since I set up the little design brand out of my dorm room the semester before, I've been getting more and more clients who are looking to work with me.

My own business.

It's a big risk, of course, but it's one that I know I'm ready to take. And Giovanni has made it clear that he's willing to invest anything it takes to get this thing off the ground. It's a little company of freelancers, coordinated by me, creating logos and other art and designs for local businesses. The freelancers are mostly just other students who were trying to bring in a little extra money to pay their dorm rent, but it's been going well so far.

And I'm so damn proud to be able to say that I truly stand on my own two feet. I never thought I would get here, not as long as I lived. I had always imagined that I would be working for my father's company, trying to make a name for myself in thehalls of that office, where I would always be little more than his daughter to so many people who worked there.

But since my father's death last year, everything has changed.

He was found in the forest a few weeks later. Giovanni and I kept a close watch on the news for anything that might indicate someone was on to us, but as it turned out, his death was ruled a suicide from work stress. And from what I heard at the office, his criminal dealings were quickly dissolved. The power changed hands a few times until Kyra came out on top, steering the company into a new direction, something a little more public-facing.

She offered me a job there, but I turned it down. I know I can't have anything to do with my dad and his history, not after everything I've been through. Whenever I think of him, I'm drawn back to those horrible days when I first found out what he was capable of, having to come to terms with the reality of the fact that my dad had caused so much pain and suffering and death over the years and I just stood by, allowing it to happen.

And it's not like I don't get an up-close view of what that man has left behind, either. No, spending more time with Valentina, I can see the tension in her face whenever she so much as thinks about her parents. She usually tries to steer clear of the conversation about them when I'm around, clearly not wanting to veer into that topic when she knows it's still so tense for us. But every now and then, she mentions them briefly, and I can tell how much pain she is still in, knowing they're gone.

Something I've learned to relate to all too well.

The more time that passes, the more sure I am that Giovanni did the right thing in taking out my father on that day. At the time, it seemed like the worst thing that could have happened, and I still have nightmares about the sound of that bullet entering his chest, the thick crunch of bone and muscle at that the velocity.

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