Chapter 6 - A Dance with the Devil
The silence in the room was thicker than concrete.
Bellini looked like he was about to suffer a coronary. "Boss... Boss, please! She attacked me! She cornered me, she knows about—"
"Silence," Domenico said. The word was not loud, but it struck the room like thunder.
Bellini snapped his mouth shut, his teeth clicking together.
Domenico stepped into the room, his eyes fixed entirely on me. He walked with a predator’s lazy confidence, stopping three feet away. He looked down at my hands, which were still clutching Bellini’s lapels, then up at my face.
"Let him go, Beatrice," Domenico said softly.
I slowly released my grip. Bellini slumped against the wood paneling, gasping for air and clutching his bruised throat.
"Get out, Marco," Domenico commanded, without breaking eye contact with me.
"Boss, the money—"
"Leave the briefcase. Leave the room. Leave the state before midnight," Domenico whispered. "If my men see your face within fifty miles of Manhattan by sunrise, Lorenzo will skin you like a deer. Go."
Bellini didn't wait for a second warning. He scrambled across the Persian rug, slipped through the door, and bolted down the mezzanine corridor like a rabbit running from a fox.
When the door clicked shut again, Domenico turned his full attention back to me.
"You have five seconds to explain why my fiancée is shaking down my harbor liaison in a private suite," he said, his voice devoid of all warmth.
My heart was racing, but I refused to cower. I had come too far. I drew upon every shred of stage training Juilliard had ever given me.
"He was stealing from you," I said coldly, pointing at the open lockbox spilling hundreds across the carpet. "I came up here looking for some quiet away from your sociopathic business partners. I heard someone rummaging inside. I looked through the crack of the door and saw him stuffing cash into a bag. When I confronted him, he tried to intimidate me."
Domenico looked down at the money, then back up at me. His eyes narrowed, parsing the lie, searching for the crack in the stone.
"And you decided to physically assault a union executive instead of calling my security?"
"I don't need your security to handle a coward who sweats through his collar," I snapped, letting my authentic anger bleed into the cover story. "I grew up in Queens, Domenico. I worked sixty hours a week in clubs where men like him thought they could put their hands on me because I was the waitress. I learned how to pin a man against a wall before I learned how to sing opera."
Domenico stared at me. The tension in the air was so dense I could barely draw breath.
Then, slowly, the hard lines of his mouth softened. A low, dark laugh rumbled in his chest.
"You really are something extraordinary," he murmured, taking a step toward me.
Before I could move back, he closed the distance. His large hands came up, cupping my jawline, his thumbs tracing the tension along my cheekbones. His touch was burning hot against my cold skin.
"Most women in this life run from violence, Beatrice," he whispered, his eyes dropping to my lips before rising to meet mine. "You charge straight into it with your teeth bared."
"I don't like thieves," I said, my voice barely above a whisper, trying to ignore how my body betrayed me, reacting to his sheer physical gravity. "And I don't like being managed."
"Good," he said, his fingers sliding back into my hair, holding my head still. "Because a queen does not get managed. She rules."
He leaned in and kissed me.
It was not gentle. It was dark, demanding, and possessive—the kiss of a king claiming territory. A thousand alarms screamed in my head to pull away, to bite his tongue, to remind myself that his father’s blood ran through his veins. But the sheer, intoxicating heat of him overwhelmed my defenses for a single, terrifying second. My fingers curled into the lapels of his suit jacket, gripping the fine wool as the room seemed to spin.
When he finally pulled back, his breathing was shallow, his dark eyes ablaze with a hunger that had nothing to do with contracts or syndicates.
"The gala is ending," Domenico said, his thumb brushing over my swollen bottom lip. "We have a wedding to plan. And I believe it’s time you learned everything about the family you are marrying into."
He turned and held out his arm.
I took it, my heart hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird.
*The vault behind the wine cellar,* Bellini’s words echoed in my mind. *The manifests. The arson reports.*
May you like
I had found the key to his destruction. Now, I just had to survive long enough to turn it.
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