Page 146 of Fortress of the Heart

“Thanks,” I mutter.

It’s just me and him in the Penthouse, but Angelo also didn’t leave.

I nurse a cup of steaming hot coffee and sit back on the sofa.

All I can think about isher. I’m itching to talk to her. I need to know what is going down this very minute, but I know I can’t. I can’t go in there guns blazing.

None of us will live to tell the tale.

“I’ll set up a meeting with Aleksi at first light,” I offer to my brother, who is still upset.

I’m sure Rayne will be pissed too, that he hasn’t been to bed yet either. I keep telling him to wait, but he’s convinced an attack is imminent. “He owes us, Angelo. You know it as well as I do.”

“It doesn’t matter what you think he fucking owes us. He’s not going to hand her over to you as your reward! Jesus fucking Christ.”

“Marco does have a point in what he’s saying,” Enzo’s words seem to stick. He usually tries to stay on both sides of the coin—the mediator. “So far, Aleksi hasn’t done a lot to show any appreciation. An alliance must be formed to infiltrate the rest of Rombaldi’s people smuggling operation, regardless of Katiya and Marco’s shortcomings. The fact of the matter is, we still don’t know who else was working with them or the mess with Allegra.”

Yes, now would be a good time for me to try to say something, anything, to get out of this. But I won’t deny it. I won’t pretend she doesn’t mean anything to me.

“Don’t you fucking start.” Angelo sighs. “We’ve got enough on our plates without you trying to reason with everyone.”

“He is right, though,” I concede. “Those that hurt Mia and Katiya and turned their backs on us when we needed them cannot go unpunished.”

“I am a pretty good mediator.” Enzo shrugs. “Worst case scenario, Marco, you could always tell Aleksi she came to you because she’s still upset and confused about everything, she’s formed an attachment to her rescuer. He may buy it. She has him wrapped around her little finger.”

He’s not the only one.

I shake my head. “One thing I’m not is confused.”

I fucking want her, and we have to find a solution. Maybe this talk of an alliance could work. Even temporarily.

Angelo curses at me once more.

A truce between both families?He knows beyond a doubt that I would protect her with my life, like I have done since I carried her out of that building.

Obviously, that didn’t mean I had to take her virginity and fuck her every which way till Sunday, but here we are.

“You need to end it,” Angelo says in no uncertain terms. “Now.”

I stare at him. “You can’t sit there all high and mighty after finding out Rayne wasn’t so honest about who she was. You fell in love with her. A woman who almost killed you.”

“That’s the second time you’ve brought that up tonight, and it didn’t go down well the first time,” he growls.

“What I’m saying is, you can’t always choose who you…”

“Do not tell me you were going to say,love?”His eyes look thunderous.

Enzo stays completely quiet.

“No, I wasn’t.” It’s a lie. Somewhere deep down in my blackened heart, I know that I am capable of loving again, and somehow this crazy Russian has made me see the light.

I can’t explain how.

“Youcouldn’t lie straight in bed,” Angelo says, running one hand down his face. “Now you’ve almost fucked us all.”

I have no more words.

Tonight’s been a big night. I need to get some sleep and work out what to do tomorrow.

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