Page 5 of Fortress of the Heart

My twin brothers Dante and Fynn are polar opposites and get into more trouble than I can keep up with, and Valentina, being the baby of the family at twenty-three, is utterly spoiled by all of us. Ma was pregnant with her when my father was gunned down. Valentina never had the pleasure of knowing what a good man our father was, and that saddens me.

She slaps me upside the head. “The Russian, idiota.”

I frown.

Great, of course mom already knows she’s here.

What she doesn’t know is that I have no intention of going anywhere near that woman again tonight.

Angelo can make all the rules he likes, including putting me in charge of Katiya temporarily, but if she wants to eat, someone can deliver her food like a fucking servant, since it won’t be me.

My mind travels back to when she kicked and screamed her way out of that building after we rescued her, thinking we were the men sent to take her and Mia off where they’d be sold as sex slaves. My blood runs cold at such a thought.

I can understand her anger, truly, I can, but I was merely trying to get her to safety. Even after she realized that we weren’t the bad guys, she continued insulting me in Russian.

I speak enough to know that she thinks I’m a stinking fucking pig in Armani.

“Oww,” I say, rubbing the back of my head as Ma walks off to fetch more garlic bread.

Valentina laughs at me childishly.

“Do as I say, Marco,” Ma replies.

“Ma, she doesn’t want anything. She made that abundantly clear,” I tell her.

I don’t add that she was throwing herself around like a mad woman, and given the chance, I’m sure she would have stabbed me with the nearest object the minute my back was turned.

“He’s right, she’s pissed.” Valentina shrugs.

Ma gives her a look that says everything; she doesn’t like the men cursing, but for my sister to do so implies she’ll be an old spinster who’ll never find a good husband or produce well-bred children with a filthy mouth like that.

“How do you know?” I ask, giving her a chin lift. “You were told not to go in there.”

“I heard from Enzo,” she says casually.

I should’ve known that Enzo can’t keep his goddamn mouth shut. He’s Angelo’s best friend and practically grew up with us.

I also know we should have locked the crazy bitch down in the dungeon, just to safeguard ourselves from her outbursts. We don’t really have a dungeon, but I affectionately call our holding cells that when I want to get a rise out of Angelo.

The fact that we have Aleksi Petrov’s niece under our roof doesn’t sit well with me.

And she needs to be dealt with swiftly. Instead, she’s about to be served my mother’s prize-winning spaghetti and meatballs, washed down with the finest Rose this side of Boston.

Angelo, Dante, and Fynn still aren’t convinced she’s telling the truth about who she is, what she’s doing there, and why nobody is looking for her.

All good questions, but I’m unsure how deep we need to be delving. I don’t trust the Russians, any of them.

It’s no secret that Katiya, while not directly involved with the Russian Mafia, is part of the family by blood. What’s more, Aleksi apparently dotes on her like no other, she’s a favorite in the family.

She shouldn’t be here.

However, she is until Angelo says otherwise.

Even though she’s a spitfire who hates all of us, one thing I can’t deny is how beautiful they make Russian Princesses.

Those long limbs, the soft coloring of her skin, her long flowing dark hair, and her sharp blue eyes that could cut you like glass.

It didn’t matter how many times I told her that I wasn’t there to hurt her, those big blue eyes didn’t believe a word of it. I saw fear in them, and that doesn’t sit well with me, Petrov or not.

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