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“You’ll be home by tomorrow night,” she tells me sternly. “You meet Santino the following day and you’ll need your rest to look presentable and be on time for him.”

I gnash my teeth together to keep my mouth shut and to keep from saying something I can’t take back. I’ve never talked back to my mom. I’ve never been rude or disrespectful to her. Especially after my dad was killed.

“Sure,” I say through a tight throat, and walk right out the door.

I live with my mom in the building my family owns in Manhattan, but Aria and Gia live ten blocks away in a gorgeous apartment that their agency puts them up in as a part of their contract.

Gia opens the door and her jaw drops. “You look fucking amazing, Mia!” she exclaims, touching my hair. Aria comes running over and her eyes widen when she sees me.

“Holy shit, you’re a hot blonde, Mia! I love it!”

My first smile in days lifts my lips. “Thanks.”

“But you need to tell us everything,” Gia demands. “Right now.” She drags me to the couch and I drop my bag and flop down, my legs giving way under the weight I feel on my shoulders.

“There’s not much to tell.” I shrug. “I met with Leo, Nico, and Vinny the other day, and they told me I needed to marrySantino in order for a deal to go through. Santino said he wantedmespecifically after seeing me at Leo’s wedding. He wants me so that Leo won’t screw him over in whatever deal they have going. I don’t even know what the deal is for. Of course, I’m not privy to that information, but I can be handed over to a stranger that I’m sure expects me to share his bed and be a good little wife to him all because he saw me across the room and wanted me.”

I can’t keep the seething animosity from my voice, and Jesus, saying it all out loud and seeing their shocked faces has me feeling even more like a piece of cattle to be used as currency.

“I’m so sorry, Mia,” Aria finally says after a long pause.

“What the actual fuck?” Gia asks. “I honestly have no idea what to even say right now because my mind is reeling, but I don’t think there is anything I can say to make it okay or make you feel better. So, we’re taking you out tonight. We’re going to go crazy tonight and get you drunk to forget all of this.”

“What about your shadows?” Aria and Gia don’t go anywhere without their bodyguards. It was the only way their brother, Saverio, agreed to let them sign with the agency and move out on their own when they were eighteen.

Gia shrugs. “I’ll make sure they don’t say anything to Leo. And even if they do, who cares?”

“You deserve a night of uninhibited fun,” Aria adds.

“And maybe there will be a hot guy I can dance with and have pressed against me before I’m in a loveless marriage with a man I refuse to let touch me.”

“Have you met him yet?”

“No.”

“Maybe he’s hot?” Gia offers hopefully. “Did you ask Kat?”

“No, of course I didn’t ask her, and it wouldn’t matter. But if he is, wouldn’t he have found a woman for himself by now?”

She lifts one shoulder. “True. Which means you need a hot man to show you a good time tonight to carry you into yourmarriage.” The evil glint in her eyes has me smiling. “Maybe even do a little more than just have him grind all up on you on the dance floor.”

“I’ve never agreed with you more.”

“I’ll try not to take that as an insult since I think I have great ideas all the time.”

Laughing, I nervously twist my fingers together. I don’t want to tell them what I have in mind for tonight. The biggest rebellion I’ve done in my life up until now was sneak out of my family’s apartment and go one floor down to Aria and Gia’s when we were in high school. I was mad at brothers for not letting me go on a date with the guy I had the biggest crush on. They told me no, and then scared him so badly, he texted me saying he couldn’t talk to me anymore and to not try to change his mind.

I was so mad, sad, and disappointed, but then Aria told me that I don’t want a guy who’s easily scared off by my brothers anyway. That if they are, then it just goes to show they’re weak and not worthy of my time. She told me the right guy will have no problem standing in front of my family and claiming me as his.

I took her words as the true wisdom they are, and have always had them in the back of my mind since. I didn’t think the first man to stand before my brothers and tell them he wants me would be one I don’t even know.

Tonight, I want to do something for myself. I refuse to have the choice taken from me as to who I give myself to, and who I give any of my firsts to.

I’m painfully a virgin in every way, and I’ll bet everything I have that Santino expects to get a nice little virgin as a wife that he’ll be able to easily manipulate and keep locked away to have whenever he wants. Or maybe he’ll use me as a trophy to keep quiet at his side and parade around like a prize he’s won. Either way, I already know he probably thinks I’m going to go alongwith anything he says for the sake of my family and his stupid deal with Leo.

Well, he’s going to be in for a big surprise, because I refuse to give him all my firsts.

Chapter 4

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