Page 85 of Captured Fantasy

“This will make us vulnerable to Russian attack,” I said.

He shook his head. “I’ve spoken with Viktor Anatole, the godfather, and he’s agreed to peace when I take power. He’s providing me firepower, I’m offering him my cousin, Sienna, in marriage. We’ll have peace.”

I stared at him, my brain struggling to catch up with his words. “How long have you been planning this?”

“A long fucking time.”

I stared at him.

“I’m not asking you, Barone,” he said. “I’m telling you so that once I’m the boss, you’ll be ready to step up and take your place. It’s not like you have a choice. You’re my wife’s family so if I fail, you’ll be guilty by association.”

My God, he wasn’t giving me a choice. He was right—Romano would kill me as complicit if Lucien was discovered. I lifted my gaze, settling it on him, too impressed to be angry any longer. He had me right where he wanted me—he had us all set up like pieces on a chessboard.

“Now, let’s go. I have another meeting,” Lucien said flatly.

He turned and began walking toward the horses.

“Lucien,” I called.

He turned.

“I’ll be your right hand,” I said. “But I want Lorenza Russo.”

Lucien’s eyelid twitched, letting me know he was out of patience. “I’m not negotiating.”

“I know what you did with her,” I said, before I could bite back the words. “I know why you don’t want me to have her.”

Lucien’s cold eyes remained unchanged. He put the cigarette to his lips and breathed the smoke out around it.

“I’ve never touched Mrs. Russo in my life,” he said. “I need the Antonucci family’s loyalty secured and Rico’s stepsister is young, unmarried, and reasonably pretty. If you want to thrive in my world, Barone, you will marry Rosalia Antonucci and be my right hand. Forget Lorenza fucking Russo.”

He walked back across the field, a gray figure in the billowing cold.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

LORENZA

In late November, I lay beneath Federico and for the first time, I didn’t fake my orgasm when he urged me to finish. I felt his frustration, my body shaking beneath his thrusts, until he came. He rolled off me and put on his pants on and I kept my eyes down.

There was a tense silence. He emptied the glass of whiskey on the bedside table and sat it down with a hard click. The sound echoed in my body as I listened to him walk down the hall. The front door slammed.

I rose, going to the window and looking down. He stood in his shirtsleeves, smoking on the front step.

Something snapped inside me and I walked down the stairs. As I stepped in the kitchen, I heard him come back inside and move down the hallway. When I entered the dining room, he halted. His dark gaze glittered in a pale light.

“Rico, I don’t want to fuck you anymore,” I said in a rush.

He drew in a slow breath and released it. “Is that what this is, Enza? Just fucking?”

That threw me off guard. “What is it to you?”

“I thought you felt something for me.”

I stood there, gaping like an idiot. It hadn’t occurred to me that Federico might have developed feelings for me over the last year. He hadn’t acted like it. Our entire relationship up until now had consisted of him treating me like his personal prostitute and occasionally letting me out of the house on a short leash. If he was trying to convey emotions, he’d failed miserably.

“What do you feel for me, Rico?” I managed.

His lids flickered and he stepped forward, his hand sliding beneath the strap of my slip. “I want you,” he said simply.

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