Page 4 of Claimed By Him

She tipped her head to the side, giving me an angry stare. I kept slowly stepping forward, getting closer and closer to her while I continued my lecture.

“Could it be that you’re wearing a fucking blouse as a dress?” I dropped my eyes to her legs, then took my last step into her space, ducking my head down, and resting my hands against the counter on either side of her hips. “Or could it be that you’re standing here, flirting with a little boy in your own house? And he’s the help, no less?”

She scoffed. “He’s twenty-one, okay? That’s adult age. And he’s certainly much more fun than you are.”

“Fun?” I spat out. “I think you have more than enough fun as it is.”

“Jesus, Tony.” She put her hand flat on my chest and pushed me away from her. “You’re still following me around, aren't you?”

I stepped back and settled my hands into my pockets. “As long as you keep ditching your guards and disappearing into the night, yes, I am.”

“I’m just trying to breathe!” She raised her voice, waving her hands in frustration, but I kept my demeanor smooth and calm.

“In crowded clubs and smokey bars? Yeah, I’m sure it’s real refreshing for you.” My voice dripped with sarcasm.

“Compared to living in this house with Antonio breathing down my neck, it’s fucking breezy, thank you.”

I shook my head, looking to the side and back at her. “You don’t fucking get it. Even after all these years and all the trouble you’ve put him through—and me, for that matter—you still don’t fucking get that your life is in constant danger!”

“Oh no!” She began imitating a scared little girl, clasping her hands together at her chest. “Someone’s going to kidnap me and hold me for ransom!”

Then, she became cold, stepping up to me, and poking a finger into my chest.

“At least that would bring some excitement to my life. Who knows, maybe they’ll rough me up a little and have me call them ‘daddy’ by the end of the week.”

Rage boiled inside of me. She had no fucking idea how ruthless men could be; she was taunting fate to snatch her up and kill her. I grabbed her arms tightly and pushed her back against the counter, speaking dangerously low.

“You want that? Do you want to be manhandled and chained up? Raped and tortured?” My eyes bored into hers, and my breath hissed through my teeth while she looked down at my lips, a small smile tugging the corner of her full, irresistible lips.

“As opposed to being held captive in my own home and told who to marry? Who to give my body to?” She leaned in and whispered into my ear. “I don’t hear much of a difference.”

I sighed loudly, letting her go, and stepping back. Biting my bottom lip, I clenched my fist, then pointed at her smirking face. “Just put some more fucking clothes on, would ya’?”

I stormed out into the house, through the foyer, and out the front doors. She’d gotten me with that last statement, and she knew it. But not for the same reasons she thought. The truth was that I agreed with her. My father put my sisters through absolute torture and emotional pain when he arranged their marriages.

Not to mention, our own mother had been forced to marry him. It was an endless cycle of domestic abuse and mental anguish. I would never, ever, force my children to marry—screw—and devote their lives to someone they hadn’t chosen themselves.

I would also never, ever, force Fiona to marry someone.

She might have been the most annoying, spoiled brat I’d ever known, but she was also the most beautiful, elegant, and downright sexy woman I’d ever seen. Watching her grow up was confusing for me. As a six-year-old kid, running around playing soccer with Antonio and Huxley, she was the most beautiful little baby girl.

As a 12-year-old kid, starting my combat training, and beginning to understand the life I was destined to live, she was the cutest, most innocent wide-eyed girl I knew.

By the time I was 18 and she was 12, it was weird for me to find her beautiful. It was wrong for me to think she resembled an actual princess from some kind of fairy realm and that she had the sweetest looking lips and softest looking hair of all the girls in my family or hers.

I chastised myself for thinking such things about her when I was becoming a man. A man with a huge responsibility on my shoulders and a future that many depended on. My whole family, as well as the Romano contingency and their families, trusted me to be an upstanding, respectable, and dependable man who would protect their women and children against all the evils this city had to offer. Which was a lot.

No, I couldn’t waste my time and poison my own future by falling in love with a young girl. It actually turned out pretty convenient that she’d grown into such a conceited brat. At least I could reason my way out of the urge I felt to pick her up and kiss her dirty loudmouth until she never spoke to me like that again.

3

Fiona

Three years ago, age 17

“Yes, bitches! It’s time to party!”

My best friend, Ari, swung her head from side to side, whipping her long, blonde hair around the car as she drove. We were 17, on our way to a house party in Ari’s brand-new Audi A1, and I’d just successfully snuck out of my house yet again.

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