Page 118 of Vicious Little Princess

To us all.

That was the last thing I wanted.

But what had really settled it for me where confessing this secret was concerned had been walking in on the guys going at each other in the kitchen, seeing them strained with each other like that, on rocky ground. It had brought it slamming home to me how much I needed us to be together right now, how much I neededthem,and, most of all,us.

I’d admired their comradery, their deep friendship and the familial bond between them all from the outset as soon as I’d borne witness to it, but being a part of it now was a whole other level. The idea of losing that, of it fracturing, I couldn’t stand it.

And I wouldn’t have it.Icertainly didn’t want to become a factor for risking that.

Yes, I was concerned about being benched once they knew, but I’d also been able to recognize that it was driven in a large part by my trust issues that my father and his demeaning and misogynistic treatment of me were at the root of.

The guys didn’t deserve to have that put upon them.

They’d done so much to earn my trust, I had to be able to do the same in return.

And I’d been about tountilNico had mistaken what I’d intended as referencing Carlo’s intel that he’d been temporarily holding back from Milo.

Once he’d put that revelation out there, the opportunity to reveal the pregnancy in that moment had gone to hell.

Milo had been devastated.

After he’d walked out, we’d all gone after him and he’d locked his door and told us he needed time alone.

Since then, Nico had been corresponding with his soldiers and Carlo, double and triple checking that everything was in place for tomorrow. He’d also put feelers out to find out what the reaction to Shawn Price’s operations being destroyed had been from the Marchettis and the Leones, but nothing had been determined yet.

That was actually more concerning than if there had been something.

So was the fact that there’d been no activity from either Marco or Santino’s phones since the first couple of days that I’d infiltrated them when we’d been searching for Julian. Given how often they used them, like an extension of themselves, with everything they had to deal with on a day-to-day basis, the only realistic explanation was that they’d ditched them and had acquired new ones, which obviously also meant they’d somehow discovered that they’d been infiltrated. I was no amateur when it came to that, so the four of us had reasoned that it had to have been Angelo who’d tipped them off. He must have put the pieces together when I’d shown up to extract Julian, when he’d seen what I’d been capable of. He must have also tried to access the surveillance footage at that godforsaken house that I’d corrupted beyond functionality.

If he didn’t know it was me who was capable of that, he definitely would have suspected it was one of the four of us.

While I’d warned Nico about it during our drive to meet with Carlo that day, he’d reframed it as something positive, as both a deterrent to them now they were aware of the damage we could do even from afar, and also as another stand against them.

I believed some part of him thought that Marco would question his recent unhinged actions, including allying with my father, through seeing how much his own son was opposing him.

I understood it. I’d thought the same thing about my father until the point of no return a few years ago. I’d thought he could be saved, that he could turn back from the bad path he’d been headed down. But that hadn’t happened in the least.

Whether it would for Marco remained to be seen.

My phone buzzed, cutting through my concerned thoughts, and I snatched it up from my nightstand to see a text from Julian.

Julian:What do you think?

I frowned, wondering what he was getting at until another message came in—a screenshot.

I jolted as I opened it to see what he’d just posted on his IG.

Nico had asked him to spread word about the truth of our marriage.

Well, what we’d thought had been a marriage until tonight.

I gritted my teeth and forced myself to swallow that down and the issues with Joe that had arisen as a result, and I focused on what I was seeing on my screen now.

My best bud, Nico, and his new bride? Forced arranged marriage, guys. Sickening, right? They tried to silence us, but you’re getting the truth right here and now. She’s ours. Our woman, our love, our everything. Loved and adored. FU Santino. You too, Marco. #ourgirl #nowandalways

As if the caption wasn’t bold enough, the accompanying photo really drove it home.

Julian took a lot of selfies and shots of this and that, being an IG fanatic. But he didn’t post any that he’d taken of the four of us together. I hadn’t even seen him take this one, and the reason was made clear as I stared at the image of him grinning salaciously at the camera as me, Nico, and Milo were asleep, the four of us all wrapped up in one another in Nico’s bed. Although we were covered by a blanket, it was obvious we were naked beneath and my hair screamed just-fucked, too.

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