I thought of the way he would have died for me, and the way I nearly died for him.
“Isn’t it?” I asked softly. “I think it’s romantic as hell.”
“Literally,” Alexander quipped with a roguish grin that made me tip my head back to the mural of Persephone and her Dead God and laugh and laugh and laugh.
And when I looked back down at Alexander, my once Dead God was laughing too.
Cosima
The courtroom vibrated with hushed, anticipatory chatter as the gathered waited for the venerable Judge Hartford to take the stand and begin the proceedings. I could hear the cacophony of press and spectators outside the closed doors to the chamber and even outside on the street. It was the biggest trial against a supposed mafioso since the Mafia Commission Trial in the eighties, and it was sensational news throughout New York City and beyond.
This was helped, of course, by the fact that the man on trial for first-degree murder, racketeering, and illegal gambling was the gorgeous, charmingly incorrigible, and dangerously intense Edward Dante Davenport.
The noise rose tidal strong as the side door opened, and the man himself was ushered through by two guards and his law team. He wore all black even though it made him look wickedly sinful and sinister, his hair pushed back from his face but for one wavy lock that draped over her forehead into his black eyes.
He looked like an ad for mad, bad, and dangerous to know.
I shook my head as I caught eyes with Elena, who stood behind him with the rest of his law team with her red-painted lips pressed together in a line that underscored her fury at losing that particular battle with her client.
He should have worn a white button-up, at least, to soften his appearance and make him seem like your average businessman.
But of course, Dante didn’t care to look innocuous, and I was certain he had argued wearing such a getup would only make it more obvious that he was a lion dressed as a lamb.
“Bloody idiot,” Alexander muttered at my side as he glared at his brother.
My husband was not in a good mood.
Not only because his brother was on trial for murder but also because his being so made it necessary for us to be in New York.
Alexander hated the city.
It was the symbol of our years apart and my refuge when I’d been lost without him.
If he had it his way, we probably would never again set foot on Manhattan island again.
But Dante was on trial for murder, so here we were, sitting in the first row reserved for his family, lending the weight of the Davenport name and Greythorn rank to Dante’s case.
It was hard for the public to believe the brother of a duke would resort to becoming a mafioso.
“Tesoro,” Dante murmured with a small smile as the guards slotted him between the railing and the table he would sit at and then pushed him down hard into his chair.
My heart twisted up in my chest, turning my reassuring smile into a wince.
“Fratello,” I offered softly, leaning forward to place my hand on the railing where he could see it and know I wished it was on his arm or around his back in a fierce embrace.
The hard cast of his face softened for a moment as he stared at me, his love shining out from every pore. He had sacrificed so much for me over the years, and I refused to believe he would be punished for it by spending the next twenty-five years in prison.
“We will win.” Alexander cut into my thoughts with his strong, sure words. “I won’t let them do this to you.”
Dante’s grin turned wry as he looked over at his brother, his twin in form if not colouring. Gold and black, bad wrapped up in a pretty package and good trapped in bad boy form.
They were a yin and yang pairing I didn’t want to ever again think about living without.
“You think you can do anything.” Dante shook his head fondly. “You know the entire world does not bow down to your grace, si?”
Xan raised one cool brow in silent rebuttal.
Dante laughed, and the visual was captured by the court reporters many flashing cameras.
I had no doubt it would grace the headlines of all the popular newspapers tomorrow.
Mafia capo laughs in the face of his crimes.
“Shut up and face forward, Edward,” Elena snapped, pinching his leg hard as she took the seat between him and her co-counsel. “For once in your life, do as you’re told.”
“Make me,” he taunted her before shooting me an inveterate wink.
I smiled at him as he wanted me to, but I didn’t feel light-hearted.
Elena locked eyes with me, and her prim, professional mask shifted for a moment to show me her quiet worry. She had made me a promise to fight for Dante as she would fight for me, but I could see at the moment how much of a long shot it was that Dante would be found not guilty.