He presses a hand down on my shoulder and I wait for him to tell me to breathe, to be patient and let the boys handle it, but that’s not even close to what comes pouring out of his mouth. “Good,” he tells me, his obsidian eyes darkening with venom. “Hold onto that feeling. Let it burn deep inside you like a fucking inferno and build up like cancer growing inside of you. You will get what’s owed to you. I promise you, babe. You will get your chance with him, and when you do, I want you to bring up those flames and extinguish them against him. It’s going to be a fucking bloody masterpiece. Brutal and vicious, and you’re going to look like a fucking avenging angel doing it. Vengeance will be yours.”
I swallow hard, his determination and excitement at the very thought of me getting my hands on their father making something burn deep within me, and not the kind of burning that Giovanni’s wicked games invoke in me, a very different kind of burn that has me ready to throw Marcus down on the table and fuck him until I scream. “What about you guys?” I ask, keeping my filthy mind on track. “You’ve all been tortured at your father’s hands for years, and I know you would give me anything I wanted, but you guys deserve to be the ones to tear his flesh from his body.”
“Don’t be fooled, my sweet girl. Just because we will allow you to end him in the most priceless way imaginable, doesn’t mean that he will be given to you in one piece. We will get our own. We have years of bullshit to make up for. You’ll be lucky if you get to play with him long before he finally gives out.”
That familiar burn intensifies, and as I remember Levi ready and waiting for me upstairs, that need pulses erratically through me. I wonder if they’d be down for a three-way.
My eyes blaze with excitement as I take a cherry off my plate and pop it into my mouth. My fingers trail up the side of Marcus’ leg as I close my mouth over the cherry and tear the stem from between my lips. Marcus watches me with desire, and I slowly spread my legs, letting my other hand fall to my thigh.
Marcus pulls my chair back from the table and positions me so that I face him directly. He stands over me and grips my chin, forcing my heated stare to his dark eyes, and while he doesn’t say a damn word, the desire is clear in his eyes, along with a million other silent thoughts passing between us, most of them thoughts that I’m not ready to hear just yet.
Marcus begins to lean down, and I tilt my chin up higher, ready to capture his lips in mine when I hear the front door slam before the sound of heavy boots thumping through the foyer.
My back stiffens and it’s like having a bucket of ice water tipped over my head. “Don’t move,” Marcus murmurs, straightening and gliding across the dining room to discreetly peer out into the foyer. Nerves crash through my body. The only time we ever had to deal with intruders at the prison castle was when Giovanni showed up, or bitches stormed my room with a gun. I’m sure had the home not been locked up like Fort Knox, there would have been more enemies barging through the doors, but here in Giovanni’s mansion, his doors are open, and anyone could walk through at any moment. The thought makes it difficult to sleep at night, especially with Giovanni on the rampage, determined to get his home and empire back under his hold.
Marcus pauses a moment, his hand falling to the small of his back where he pulls a gun from the waistband of his pants. My breath catches in my throat, and while I know Marcus could take down an intruder in a matter of seconds, I still hate the thought of him putting himself in danger, especially when his brothers aren’t at his back. Though I don’t doubt the sound of the front door slamming has Levi slowly creeping toward the top of the stairs.
Marcus slips through the opening, and just as I expect to hear a gunshot ring loudly through the foyer, Marcus lets out an irritated sigh. “Fuck’s sake,” he mutters before calling back through to the dining room. “It’s just Roman.”
I let out a relieved breath as Roman’s loud stomping continues through the mansion and toward the dining room. “Where the fuck have you been?” I hear Marcus’ low murmurs as he berates his brother for disappearing on us. “Shayne is in there shitting herself because she thinks someone was trying to break in.”
Roman doesn’t respond as he flies through the entrance of the dining room and storms right over to the open bar. He pours himself a glass of whiskey and throws it back before immediately pouring another. Marcus stops in the doorway and watches him with a frown as a heaviness comes down over my shoulders.
Roman’s eyes are hard, and the sharp set of his jaw has me pushing up out of my chair. I cross the room and sense him watching me from the corner of his eye. He pours another drink before pulling the cap off a bottle of vodka and pouring one for me. He silently slides it across the bar, putting it right in front of me as I step in beside him.
“What’s going on?” I question as Marcus remains by the door, silently listening.
Roman indicates the shot of vodka as he throws back another glass of whiskey. Realizing that I won’t get any answers until I give him what he wants, I pick up the small glass and revel in the burn as the vodka makes its way down my throat.
Slamming the glass back down on the bar, I release it before reaching up and taking his chin. I force his stare to mine, knowing that I’m probably the last person he wants to see after I allowed his father to walk out with his newborn baby. “What is it?”
Roman’s lips press into a hard line as he reaches up and grips my hand, releasing it from his chin. He doesn’t let go and holds onto my hand as though it’s his only lifeline. His dark gaze meets mine and there’s something so devastating about it. It’s filled with pain and grief, and it’s almost impossible to hold his stare for a second longer.
Roman lets out a breath, and as his shoulders sink, the words come falling from his lips. “I buried Felicity.”
Pain shoots through my chest and I’m completely lost for words, so instead of struggling to say the right thing, I step into him and wrap my arms around his strong body, holding him tight. Roman sinks into me and curls his arms around me as I distantly notice Marcus slipping out of the dining room to give Roman some privacy, despite the pain he must be feeling in his own heart. Marcus was close with Felicity, but his emotions have been a mess after she stormed into my bedroom and shot him. We’ve all been a mess since then.
“I’m sorry,” I tell him, absolutely shattered by the idea of Roman standing out in some field or on a beach all alone, digging a hole for the mother of his child, the woman who holds such a high place in his heart. “We could have helped you. You didn’t need to do that alone.”
“I did,” he tells me, his hand winding up into the back of my hair as his arm tightens around my waist and lifts me up off the ground. He pushes me back onto the bar and steps between my legs as I keep holding onto him. He braces himself against the bar and hangs his head so that his forehead presses against my shoulder. “I let her down. I let my father fool me, and because of that, she suffered in a fucking cell while growing my baby in her womb. She needed me more than ever and I let her down.”
My fingers knot into his hair as Felicity’s innocent face settles into my head and I find myself holding onto him tighter. Felicity wasn’t built for this world. I only knew her for those few short minutes before her death, but even that was enough to show me who she was. She would have been the quiet girl at school, blushing when the popular guy paid her a little attention. This world would have eaten her up and spit her out the other end.
“We all let her down, Roman,” I tell him, holding back the tears that well in my eyes, hating seeing Roman so crushed. I’ve never seen him hurting like this, and something tells me that opening up and showing his vulnerabilities isn’t something he does often. Hell, for so long, I thought these guys weren’t capable of feeling these normal human emotions, but every day they prove to me that they’re more human than anyone I’ve ever met. “She wasn’t scared of death,” I continue, noticing the dirt under his nails from his long morning of digging her grave. “She was just glad that it was over and she didn’t have to live with this fear anymore. She loved you, and she was so lucky to have had that reciprocated.”
Roman scoffs and raises his head, his dead eyes lingering on mine. “To love me and my brothers means to live in fear and being loved in return means certain death. Is that something that you want? Because that’s how it’s going to end. You’re going to be just like her.”
I shake my head, knowing it’s his fear and grief talking, though on some level, I think it might be true. “That won’t happen to me,” I tell him, my confidence in the brothers knowing no bounds. “You and your brothers won’t allow it. You’re going to take down your father and finally put an end to this. We’re going to find your son and you’ll get to live a million more years, ruling over this world and raising your son to be a proud, honest man, just like you and your brothers. Felicity may be gone, just like so many other innocent lives that have been lost in this war, but you have an opportunity to rise up. This is your game now, and your father is nothing but a pawn that you get to play. Enjoy it, Roman. Take revenge and make him pay for it all.”
A flicker of fire burns deep in his eyes and he reaches around me, grabbing the bottle of whiskey off the bar before taking a step back, not once taking his eyes off mine. He holds my stare for a long moment as he brings the bottle of whiskey to his lips, and after throwing it back, the fire burns a little bit brighter. Roman moves into me again and curls his hand around the back of my neck before pulling me in. I smell him all around me, his addictive scent like a shot right to the heart as he holds me tight, then just when I think it’s all over, he presses a firm, lingering kiss to my temple.
My eyes flutter closed, soaking in his touch, and then all too soon, he pulls away from me and strides out of the dining room without another damn word.
11
The doctor packs up her tools as I glance down at my scarred arm, looking over my latest bandage, though at least this one is self-inflicted. “Thank you,” I say again as she pushes back from her chair, studiously ignoring Marcus’ hard stare from across the room.
“Of course,” she says, side eyeing him with tight lips before pulling out a piece of paper and sliding it across the table toward me. “And remember, if you need anything … and I mean anything, you call me, okay?”