Vin chuckled. “With the way you stare at him, that’s hard to believe.”
That brought her up short. “What do you mean?” she asked, her voice coming out high as her heartbeat picked up. Ugh, she needed to work on her pitch. Her music teacher at school kept telling her she had a great voice but her pitch was totally off.
Vin shrugged. “You just look at him like he’s Zia’s best batch of cookies and you’ve been hungry for a month. Like he’s fresh out of the oven and you’re waiting for him to cool before eating.”
Her stomach grumbled at that very vivid visual.
Okay. This wasn’t good. This wasn’t good at all. No one was supposed to know.
Amara swallowed. “Do you think he noticed?”
“It’s kinda hard not to,” Vin pointed out, clearly amused. “You come here every time and it’s not to read your book.”
Amara groaned. “Vinnie?”
“Hmm?”
“Kill me, please.”
Her friend chuckled. “Oh, don’t be so dramatic. It’s not that bad. Plus, it’s a phase. You’ll grow out of it.”
Amara shook her head. “I can’t help it. Trust me, I’ve tried. My eyes are traitors.”
Vin huffed a laugh before drawing his knees up, his hands dangling over them. “A crush
is fine. Hell, it’s even natural. But don’t want more than that.”
Amara turned to look at his profile as he stared at the cottage, feeling the sun on her skin. “Why?” she asked softly.
“Because he’s Dante Maroni, ‘Mara,” Vin replied, equally soft. “We’re young right now and it doesn’t feel like anything. But he’s going to be a king. He’ll have enemies. Hell, he already does. He’ll be everything dark and you’re afraid of the dark, remember? You don’t belong in that world. You deserve better.”
The lump in her throat was lodged there tightly. Even though Amara never imagined anything, she knew Vin was right. Dante Maroni was destined to rule the underworld. And she was the furniture people like him forgot about.
Breathing out through her mouth, Amara rested her head on Vin’s shoulder, finding comfort in knowing he was someone who knew her, loved her as fully as she did.
“Will you be dark too, Vinnie?” she asked him quietly, wondering about where his fate was taking him. If his training, his father’s life was anything to go by, it wasn’t a good place.
“I don’t know,” he sighed. “But I’ll never be dark for you.”
Amara smiled slightly. “I’ll love you anyway, you know.”
“Yeah, me too,” Vin nodded. “Please don’t get mushy on me now.”
Chuckling, Amara hit him lightly with her book, and they both watched as Dante Maroni came out of the cottage. He nodded to them, before climbing back up to his castle, a king in the making, while she stayed on the ground.
The only good thing about becoming an adult was moving out of the main house and into his own wing. And although his brother at fifteen wasn’t allowed, Dante sure as hell wasn’t going to leave him behind.
Not a lot of people outside of the compound knew about Damien. The reason for that was pretty simple – Damien was Lorenzo Maroni’s imperfect child. Somehow, he’d had the umbilical cord wrapped around his neck during his birth, which cut off his supply of oxygen for a few precious seconds, a few seconds too many. That had cost Damien his ability to gauge the world. Dante was sure he was on some spectrum of autism, especially because his mind was too high-functioning for his age while his social skills weren’t good. It had never been properly diagnosed though, so he couldn’t be sure.
Bloodhound Maroni could not accept that his younger son could have a mental condition that required some help. While he had the abundance of resources to get Damien help anytime, he turned a blind eye to his younger son. Even though he was a great kid, Dante knew he had issues expressing himself, certain behaviors that were not appropriate in the world but appropriate for him. Dante knew that Damien would never, ever find acceptance and love in the world he lived in, and he deserved both those things.
Dante wasn’t even sure exactly what it was – trauma from his birth or the fact that he had been in the room when Dante found their mother pooled in her own blood or just one of those things. Some of that blood had been on a five-year-old Damien, and Dante at all of eight-years had stepped into the blood, scooped up his brother, and walked out of the room. Somehow, he had known his mother had been dead just by looking. Some days, he hated her so much for abandoning her children like a coward.
Dante took a deep breath, his fingers itching to pull out a cigarette but he refrained. Flexing his fingers, he watched the building from behind his expensive shades, taking measure as his pink-haired girlfriend, Roni, clung to his arm.
Morning Star Home for Lost Boys
He had heard about this place through the grapevine. One of their soldiers had a nephew who had been diagnosed with a low-functioning spectrum of autism and he said this place had helped the boy. While Dante was old enough to take care of his brother as he had been for a long time, he wanted Damien to get the help he needed and deserved. More importantly, the compound was not a good place mentally for any of them. Dante had already started going out of the city for trips and business, and every time his mind kept going back to Damien and his safety. Even though it lodged a rock on his chest, this was for the best.