Page 65 of Bound to Him

“I don’t think we could love normal guys,” I blurted out, speaking as I thought of it.

“Normal guys?” Mia asked.

“Like that guy from your school, Viola. And Steven for me. I thought it was what love was supposed to be like, in the normal world out there, far away from all this mafia business. But after Huxley… I guess I can see that it never would have compared.”

“Even though it comes with this heartache when waiting for them to return from a fight,” Mia agreed.

“Yeah, exactly.”

“Do you think that fear makes the love more worth it?” Viola asked.

I lifted a shoulder. “I don’t think it’s a perk or anything… But I don’t know where or who our men would be if they weren’t exactly who they are now.”

“Truth,” Fiona agreed.

“And who is your guy, Fiona?” I asked, smiling playfully.

Her eyes widened. “I was just commenting on the conversation, okay?”

We all laughed. “Yeah, okay!”

After coming down from the high of romantic girl talk, we headed to the kitchen to get some dinner. It was getting late, and I kept wondering what the fuck was happening? Was Huxley even okay? What was Christian doing? It ate at me inside, but I tried to take a page from Mia’s book and trust that everything would be okay.

“Girls.” My father walked into the kitchen. We spun around and crowded together, asking him if he’d heard anything. “Yes. I just got a call from Vinnie.” Papà looked worried. “He said it was tougher than they thought.”

Mia and I held hands, while Viola asked, “Is Tony okay?”

“Is Huxley okay?” I had to ask.

“I don’t know,” he shook his head, “he said there were some casualties they needed to deal with, then cut the call.”

“Merda!” I swore, not able to stop the stress bubbling up in my throat.

“They’ll be on their way back soon. Don’t worry. Eat something and get some rest.”

He turned and left. The room was quiet while we all pondered what happened out there. I was glad it was over, but I couldn’t eat anything until I knew if he was okay.

29

Huxley

After Olivia ran to me and kissed me in front of our families, I felt like the most confident man in the world. Nothing would stop me now that I had so much to live for. We were basically official already; we just couldn’t let Christian get a whiff of that or he’d know something was up with the meeting tonight.

Also, we couldn’t be official until I asked her to marry me. I knew that it was technically an arranged marriage and that she’d already accepted, but I had to show her that it wasn’t only business; that I loved her, and I would have chosen to marry her, treaty or not. This thought alone gave me enough motivation to fuck Christian up and then go back home to my girl.

I messaged Christian earlier in the day to meet us at a location in the industrial side of town. It was the abandoned warehouse Vinnie and I cleaned out a few weeks ago. Pretty poetic, if you asked me. Chances were that Christian didn’t even know the locations of his failed drug dens on our turf, and if he did, well then let it weigh on his fucking nerves when he faced us.

We arrived first and pulled out a fold-up table and a chair. Antonio sat down on the seat, flicking his jacket out behind him, and resting one leg over the other. I took my position to his left, just behind him. Vinnie waited at the table with another of our Moretti crewmen. We had two guys posted outside and another two at the entrance to the warehouse, visible to Christian.

When he walked in, he had 10 guys in black suits following him.

Christ, we hadn’t been expecting that. Clearly, Christian didn’t trust us and came with his own backup. Clever on his part, slightly inconvenient on ours.

“Don Antonio, good to see you again.” He smiled broadly as he stopped in front of us, then looked to the side to let his men know they should position themselves. Two of them tried to get behind us, but Vinnie and I stepped out to stop them, shaking our heads.

“Mr. Reyes. I see you aren’t entirely trusting of us just yet,” Antonio said, not standing from his seat.

Christian shrugged innocently. “Can’t be too careful in this business.”

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