Page 116 of Where the Wicked Reign

Triumph shone from my father. “Now then, Nico, if you don’t mind, I have a few more things to discuss with my daughter.”

“Actually, I do mind. I’d like to drive her home.” A twisted smile played on his face, but it didn’t reach his eyes. There was no expression there at all. It was the mask again. “Prepare her for what this marriage will entail.”

Sadism lit up my father’s face as he realized what Nico was saying, obviously referring to the things outlined in the contract. “Hmm, I approve. Very much so. But ensure you don’t sully the merchandise before the wedding night, yes?”

My fists clenched white-hot.

“Of course not,” Nico actually managed to tell him with a straight face.

Jeez,he was something else. He and Julian both when it came to this sort of thing.

“Go then,” my father said. “Make haste.”

Nico turned and headed for the door.

As I followed him out, dragging my feet to portray my reluctance, my father called out, “You’re bound by this now, Caterina. Remember what I warned you about. Fall in line.”

I gritted my teeth and then Nico opened the door and ushered me out.

22

~Emilio~

“I don’t think this is a good idea,” I warned Nico.

“I can’t help her if I don’t know what happened,” he argued right back.

Goddammit.I eyed Julian, who was typing on his phone while also paying attention to our conversation. “We’re all in this together. I’m in agreement with Nico.”

“And if he loses control?” He’d been holding it so tightly together over the last couple of weeks. We were expecting the snap at any time.

“He won’t. At least not in the way you mean. Caterina is around.”

We were actually standing in her apartment.

Nico had asked us to meet him here as he’d been driving back from retrieving her from the Leone Estate. Getting her the hell out of there had been more like it.

After Nico had reported to us exactly what had happened during his pre-meeting with Santino and Marco and it had been discovered what Santino had planned for Caterina, beyond the actual marriage, we’d been on high alert. Hence me keeping watch over her.

Julian had gone to the Business Forum event tonight to keep an eye on her, because he blended in much better in a public, fancy setting like that than I did, and it was his thing. When Angelo had shown up, he’d taken the opportunity to read him and he’d picked up on his ill intent toward her. And the immediacy of it as well. I’d then hacked into the surveillance system at the Leone Estate and I’d come across the conversation the old bastard had been having with Caterina, realizing where it had been headed—to her being hurt, and I’d warned Nico. He’d reached out to Dante, who we knew had an affinity for Caterina, an almost fatherly sentiment toward her, really. Nico had pretended that he’d wished toseal the dealwith the engagement and Dante, obviously suspicious about the way Caterina had been brought in like a fucking criminal, had easily agreed to allow him passage. Anything to interrupt the meeting with her father.

And thank fuck we’d managed it, because Nico had reported that when he’d walked in, Santino had been strangling her. As if it hadn’t been enough that he’d slapped her twice, even making her bleed.

I’d seen the whole thing prior to him heading down there, then I’d closed my connection, not wanting to be in their system too long in case we got caught. I hadn’t shown what I’d seen to Nico. It went against my hatred of having secrets between us, but this was different, something that I worried could send him headlong into a full-onferalstate. When things were so precarious and knowing that state would be directed at Santino Leone, it was beyond concerning.

Now he was insisting on reviewing it because Caterina had barely looked at any of us when we’d come back to her apartment and had instead rushed into her bedroom and locked the door. Nico had mentioned that she’d been silent the whole car ride as he’d driven her here, too.

She hadn’t even snatched up her laptop that was on the coffee table to keep it from us like she usually would have.

What had happened tonight had really messed her up.

I wasn’t fucking surprised after what I’d borne witness to.

“Fine,” I relented, handing Nico my phone with the footage I’d acquired.

As he took it, I stepped back and perched on the edge of the couch beside Julian.

I looked over his shoulder, finding him working on some plans for another hotel, it seemed. With a club inside? “What’s that all about? Didn’t know you were expanding.”

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