Page 120 of Bratva Bride

“Where is-” Arturo began, but a loud whooping noise made him pause.

“Illayana!” Lukyan yelled, running down the stairs. “Dude, you’ve gotta come check this out! The bathroom is like something out of a SciFi movie! There’s an iPad in the wall that controls everything-” his words broke off as he noticed Arturo standing at my side and he glared, any trace of excitement vanishing in an instant.

“Hello, Lukyan,” Arturo said pleasantly. My brows raised at how civil he was being, considering my brother was looking at him like he just killed his dog. “I’m glad you were able to make it inside without any problems.”

Lukyan’s glare increased tenfold. “Are you?” he sneered.

“I am. Have you been shown where you’ll be staying yet?” Arturo wasn’t rising to the bait. Weird.

“No, I just dropped Illayana’s bag off in her room.”

“Ah, excellent. Here, let me show you.” He clasped my hand and led me down the hallway. I glanced behind me and shrugged my shoulders at Lukyan as I followed him. Lukyan trailed after us and we all left Gabriella standing in the foyer by herself.

Later, bitch.

Arturo led us past several rooms, a lounge room, a formal dining area and the kitchen, until we got to the backyard. Frowning, I followed him out onto the back deck and burst into laughter.

Sitting on the grass outside where two dog houses. One had the name ‘Brutus’ stamped across the front of it with a gorgeous German Shepherd sitting inside and the other had ‘Lukyan’ on it. When my brother saw it, he scowled.

“Ha, ha. Very funny,” he snapped.

Arturo smirked. “What? You don’t like it? I had the best carpenter in New York make this for you.”

“You fucking-”

I jumped in front of Lukyan as he came barrelling towards my husband, fists at the ready.

Vincenzo sighed. “I told him not to do it.”

“Come on, Lukyan,” I said, pushing him away from Arturo. “Even you can see this is funny.”

Arturo just kept that smirk on his face, thoroughly impressed with himself. I shook my head. If this was how things were going to be around here, I would end up killing one of them.

* * *

After finally managing to wrangle Lukyan away and back into the house, Arturo showed him where he would really be staying. It was a room on the second floor, next to Adrian.

Arturo gave me a quick tour, showing me the beauty of the house and everything it had to offer. It had recently been modernized, little gadgets installed throughout the house that did things for you. It was kinda cool and made me feel like I was living in the future.

Gabriella hung around like a bad smell, following us around and adding in her input when it wasn’t fucking asked for. She kept throwing in little phrases that showed she’d been here a million times like, ‘I’ve always loved this room, it’s my favourite in the house’, or ‘Isabella and I picked out this painting’. She was begging for a beatdown.

We came to a stop in front of a closed door and Arturo flicked his head to the side. “Off you go, Gabriella.”

She pursed her lips, her eyes flicking to the door and back. “I thought maybe we could all have lunch? I’m sure Illayana is hungry.”

“Illayana is fine,” I said, smiling. I wasn’t sure what was behind this door, but I could tell she didn’t want us going in.

“But-”

“Gabriella,” Arturo said sternly. “Go on.”

With a huff, she spun on her heels and stomped away.

Now that she was out of my sight, all the anger and rage I had felt seeing her here burst to the surface. The second we stepped into the room and the door shut, I stepped out of his embrace and punched him in the gut.

He grunted, taken by surprise, and doubled over in pain. But I wasn’t fucking done. I was so mad that he didn’t tell me that Gabriella was living here. That instead, he had left me to find out by having her answer the fucking door.

I moved to knee him in the face but he was prepared now, expecting another blow. He blocked, swiped my leg out from under me and took me to the ground hard, landing on top of me.

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