Page 122 of King of the Cage

Madly in love?

“Listen, as fun it is listening to you two argue, I’m tired and I want to go home,” I interrupted.

“I’ll take you.” Elio went to stand.

“Let’s go, then, wee one,” Bran said at the same time Elio spoke.

“She’s not going anywhere with you,” Elio said sharply.

“She’s my wife!” Bran’s fist crashed down on the table.

“Enough!” I stood, my chair scraping back harshly. I couldn’t breathe in this room. The air-conditioning was stifling me. Ineeded to be outside, preferably far, far away from all the arguing and confusion.

“I’m leaving. You two can fight, kill each other, whatever. I don’t care. Sol, let’s go.”

Sol stood and slid her arm through mine. “I brought you clothes,” she murmured to me.

“Thanks. Get me out of here.”

I didn’t go backto Casa Nera. I couldn’t stand the thought of Elio watching me all the time like I was a bomb about to go off.

I wanted my own place in the city. My brother compensated for his loss of control by siccing a De Sanctis personal security team on me round the clock.

Luckily, they didn’t insist on coming into my apartment. They stood outside the door, the elevator, and the building entrance on rotating shifts.

After a week of babysitting, I was climbing the walls and called in reinforcements.

“I don’t know, we could invite a few of them in… They look lonely out there,” Marco called from the hallway, where he was continuously pressing the entry phone so he could watch the guards outside my front door.

“They’re fine,” Sol snapped, carrying popcorn into the living room.

We were having a movie marathon, and I was trying my best not to think about the last few months that had somehow disappeared from my head.

“Spoilsport,” Marco muttered and sat beside us.

“You think he’ll come back today?” My mind strayed to the man who’d been haunting my apartment building like a ghost.

Every day, no matter when I stared out at the street in front of the building with binoculars, I could make out the Irish. There were men there around the clock, like the De Sanctis men at my door. More often than not, it was Bran himself. I wasn’t allowed to leave the building without Elio’s say-so. He was taking his protective tendencies way too far, and I was almost out of patience with him.

Since I was locked in my apartment, I settled for looking down and watching the man who claimed we’d gotten married. He watched me, and I watched him back. Sometimes, he peered up right when I was staring. I knew he couldn’t see me through the tinted glass – and from twenty floors up, no less – but it was like he knew when I was spying on him.

Bran O’Connor. Your husband.

“Maybe not. I’m sure he has shit to do, given who his family is,” Marco pointed out.

“Yeah, probably. I don’t know why he’s even bothering. Elio said his father probably ordered him to marry me so they could sort out a business alliance or some crap. It’s not like we were anything real.”

Sol watched the side of my face. I had the feeling that she wanted to say something but was holding back.

After a moment, Marco grabbed the remote.

“Let’s watch the movie.”

Nighttime wasmy favorite time of day. I slept as much as I could. In my dreams, I wasn’t confused or injured. No one looked at me with sympathetic glances. Why everyone thought it was so shocking to lose a couple of months, I didn’t really get. What was the big deal?

Unless your life seriously changed in that time, like you fell in love and got married...

That wasn’t a line of thinking I could bear to go down. The idea was so unlike me, it seemed impossible. Surely a person couldn’t change that much in such a short time. The real question was why Bran O’Connor was sticking around. If he knew me at all, he should find me too loud and annoying to stick by. Hadn’t I gotten on his nerves by now? Was there something wrong with him?

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