Page 9 of Massimo

She twists her head to look at me, playing at being timid and scared. Those big brown eyes lock on me. The longer I stare into them, it's like a wall raises and blocks the window to her mind and soul.

This reinforces my belief that she's hiding the kind of person she truly is from me. Mancini's perfect little princess, created and groomed to be his snake in the grass.

"Welcome to San Francisco,princess." I pour the malice coursing through my veins into that word. "You're in my world now."

Chapter 4

Nova

Princess.

I despise that word. It's what my father molded me into, what he demanded I become.

It, along with my virginity, was to serve him to make an alliance fit for a king. Apparently, that alliance was to the French mafia and Julien Moreau.

But that's not what I'm focused on.

I'm focused on two things.

One, the vicious malice and menacing hate rolling off the huge man named Massimo.

And two, he said San Francisco.

I slot the pieces of information together. Massimo Santoro, Don of the family who controls California.

I knew my father would try to marry me off, so over the past few years, I'd secretly studied whatever I could find out about all the major players on the US criminal underworld chessboard. Such as Alessio Candreva, the strongest Italian family in New York; Volk Aleeksev, Bratva in New York; Rurik Frolov, Bratva in New Jersey, or the Irish mob prince, Riordan Byrne from Chicago. Those were my best bets, since the territories were closer and made more sense for aligning and expanding power. I never even considered my father could make an international alliance. His rule isn't as strong or influential as he likes to portray it to be.

Nor did I really think the Western US players were viable, but I still acquainted myself with who they were. I also know of the Santoro family because my father often spit vitriol about them, and how Tommaso Santoro would eventually pay for making him look like a fool.

I studied what I could find out about these people. Not because I was excited about the possibility of marrying any of them, but so I could better understand the monsters of this world in case they became my new one.

And Jesus Christ…Massimo Santoro.

I've heard stories of his gruesome kills. Where he wedges his hand into a wound and rips the complete insides of a man out. Where he has ripped out the throat of more than one man.

My eyes fall to his hand fisted on his thigh.

It's huge. That one hand alone would wrap more than halfway around my neck.

Massimo is huge. Powerful. And he hates me.

"Don't fight the monsters, princess. Because the monsters always win."

I may not be under my father's thumb right now, but I heed his lesson all the same. Because Massimo is a new threat sitting beside me, and one I need to navigate carefully.

I'll need to use every brutal lesson my father taught me in order to survive.

Massimo's dark brown eyes swirl with malicious darkness, and I feel like he's trying to peel me back, layer by layer, to see what's inside.

And I double down on the demureness, the meekest. The no-fight-ness.

"Massimo," Gemma says with a frown in her voice.

I don't lift my head; instead, I keep it bowed, with my shoulders curled forward. I stare at my hands, which are clenched so tight they're white.

"Gemma." Massimo's deep, rumbling voice makes me think of a mountain shifting. Ready to collapse and crush everything in its vicinity.

I shudder.

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