Page 25 of Luciano

I didn’t react. Aria thrived off reaction. “You should be scared, Aria.” Aria didn’t understand how much danger her bravado put her in. She had spent her whole life wielding power that didn’t belong to her—first her father’s, now Saint’s. She mistook their protection for her invincibility. But she had no real power. Not the kind that mattered. Without a shield between her and men like me, she wouldn’t last a day in this world. I didn’t understand why Saint let her get away with so much. Why he allowed her to run rampant, reckless, as if she weren’t one wrong move away from getting herself killed.

When she started moving in my direction, Saint slammed his hand onto the desk, the sound like a gunshot. “Enough,” he growled, his voice low and dangerous. “Both of you. Let’s move on, fuck.”

I turned to Saint.

“I apologize for the outburst,” I said to him, knowing it wasa social norm to apologize for insulting one’s wife, though I meant everything I had said to her. “Your wife has a remarkable ability to provoke me. It’s why I tolerate her. She helps me learn how to manage my reactions to challenges without resorting to violence, despite the impulse.”

I turned to leave, pausing at the door. “I’ll inform you of the wedding time later today. Formal wear, please. I may also require your assistance before.”

Chapter 12

Saint

I watched Luciano walk out, then turned my attention to Aria. She stood by the window, wearing that infuriating, knowing smirk.

“Why do you always provoke him?” I asked. If I didn’t know that Aria purposely antagonized Luciano, I would have reacted differently to the way he spoke to her.

She turned to me, amusement filling her eyes. “Because that’s the only time he talks or shows any emotion. He’s usually acting like a robot. It’s for his own good—you heard him. I’m saving lives,” she said, her voice light, almost mocking. “Plus, I like pissing him off. He’s another one of these mob motherfuckers who think I’m making you weak.”

I stood, the chair scraping against the floor as I pushed it back.

“If anything,” she said, stepping closer, “I make you stronger.”

I caught her wrist before she could touch me. “Exactly,” I said, my voice like gravel. “But you don’t need to prove that to him. Or to anyone.”

She laughed, the sound sharp and bitter. “It’s fun, though. He’s so easily roused. Like a dog on a leash.”

I sighed. Aria was chaos incarnate, a storm I couldn’t control, no matter how hard I tried. And I had tried. God, I had tried.

She grew quiet, her smirk fading as she stared at the door Luciano had just walked through. I could see the wheels turning in her head, that sharp, calculating mind of hers working overtime.

“Do not involve yourself in whatever is transpiring between Ava and Luciano. She is not you, and he did not take her. It is none of your concern.”

I was relieved that Luciano had exercised discretion, refraining from mentioning that I had advised him to take Ava when Aria questioned him. He was typically direct—painfully so—whenever he chose to speak at all.

“I wasn’t going to do anything.” She lied. I could see it in her eyes—her pupils were blown open. They only did that when she wanted to fuck or when she lied. I had learned to read her well for my own sake.

“Are you sure?”

Her eyes snapped back to me, dark and unreadable. “You don’t trust me?”

“No,” I said flatly. She knew I didn’t trust her.

She didn’t respond, just walked over to the intercom on my desk and pressed the button. “Tell my guards to come up,” she said, her voice clipped. “I want to go home.”

She instructed, then turned to face me. I stepped closer, my hand cupping her cheek, my thumb brushing over the curve of her jaw.

“I love you, “Dolcezza” I said, meaning it. “Despite the fact that everything Luciano said about you was correct.”

I wasn’t naïve about who she was. Aria was the best liar I had ever met, and I had been raised by men who lied for a living. She told me what I wanted to hear, what I needed to hear, just enough truth laced in to make me doubt my own instincts.

And I let her do it.

Because I loved her anyway. She was the most reckless thing I’d ever done. And I’d do it over and over again.

She laughed, low and throaty. “I’ve apologized to you a million times, and you still won’t let that dark part of our history go.”

I opened my mouth to rebut, but she snatched her hand free, grabbed my jaw, and rose to her tiptoes, sliding her tongue into my mouth, cutting off whatever I was about to say.

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