Page 5 of The Hitman's Secret Baby
"No," Enzo replies, eyes steady and hard. "I just don't care."
Cesare's gaze flicks to Enzo's face and sticks there, locking onto the kind of stillness that does not bluff.
He is no fool, and if he dares stir that pot, the Salvatores will pull their favor, and with the way the tides are shifting in Nuova Speranza, even Cesare Bellanti knows better than to gamble his family's position for a grudge.
Instead, he mutters something inaudible and vanishes back through the terrace doors.
"You didn't have to do that," I murmur, moments after I realize I am all alone in the gazebo with the one man I have pined for all evening.
"It didn't seem that way."
Is he implying that I cannot take care of myself?
Beneath the slow ache of desire, stubbornness rears its head. "You're very sure of yourself," I say.
"I don't need to be sure," he replies without looking at me. "I only need to be right."
"And are you?"
He finally turns his gaze to mine. "Your little suitor is the best your Papa can muster for now. The heir to a crumbling pipeline and three warehouses that haven't been profitable in five years. But he comes with a name that still opens doors in the right circles. That's all that matters."
I lift my chin, willing myself to stop my lips from trembling. "You think you know a great deal about my family."
"I do know a lot about your family," he replies smoothly. "It's part of my job."
He lets the words settle, and when he speaks again, his voice is quieter, but somehow heavier.
"Your Papa is playing a dying game, still chasing old loyalties while the ground shifts under his feet. He trades his daughter and calls it diplomacy. You know that. You've always known that."
I feel the words hit deep in my ribs.
Not like a strike, but like truth, and somehow that is worse.
"You don't know me," I whisper.
"I don't need to," he replies. "You've been made in his image, whether you want to admit it or not. Gilded cage. Perfect manners. Wrapped in beauty like it's armor. But I see the way you bite your tongue until it bleeds. I see the storm you bury just beneath your skin."
He steps closer, and I should step back, but my body forgets how to move.
"You're what," he murmurs, "twenty-two?"
"Twenty-one," I correct, my voice catching in my throat.
He nods once, his mouth curving just slightly, but it isn't soft.
"I could be your father," he says, and the way he says it—quiet, factual, not self-deprecating butdaring—makes heat crawl up my neck and down between my thighs.
"You're not," I manage.
"No," he agrees, his voice a notch lower, rougher now. "I'm not."
His fingers brush my jaw, barely a touch, just enough to feel like a question.
I should slap him and walk away, given who I am and who he is and everything that separates us.
But then his hand curls around the side of my neck and pulls me in.
The kiss is everything I have never been allowed to want pressed into the shape of a man I was never meant to touch.
