He takes his hand back, looking momentarily speechless, like he doesn’t know what to say.
“Eliza,” Dad barks. “Stand up and meet your fiancé.”
“Oh, right,” I say, struggling to rise from the overly soft couch. “Sorry, Daddy. I’ll be on my best behavior. Nobody wants a diamond with flaws.”
King offers a hand again, this time to help me up, but I ignore it again. I heave myself up and find myself staring straight at his chest. Damn, this guy is tall, easily six foot four and clad in an Armani suit. I thought he was just some grunt like my ex, Tommy. He must be important to afford that kind of wardrobe—or at least rich.
For a second, I check out the way he fills out that suit from his broad shoulders to the sculpted muscles I can see hinted at beneath his white shirt. He checks me out at the same time, looking me over like he’s making sure his purchase is up to his standards. When at last I raise my eyes to his, he’s scowling even more fiercely.
He can’t possibly find fault with my appearance. Can he?
“Let’s give these two a moment to get acquainted,” Sylvia says, edging toward the door. “I’ll have sandwiches sent up.”
“Good idea,” Dad says. “I’ll be right here.”
I almost laugh. No way is Daddy leaving his little girl alone with a Valenti. Maybe there’s still hope for me yet. I may have cried and begged when he told me about the engagement, but there are other ways to get what I want. I have no power here, so I have to rely on the power of manipulation. But hey, a girl has to work with what she’s got.
King is still glaring daggers at me, not stepping back. He’s so close I could reach out and touch him if I wanted, see if those muscles are as hard as they look.
“Are you drunk?” he asks, an edge of incredulousness in his voice.
“Are you judging me?” I shoot back.
He just stares at me a long moment, the muscle in his jaw working like he’s holding back from saying what he wants. Good. He should be intimidated. If not by me, then by my father, one of the heads of the five Italian families in the city. I have to hand it to the guy, he’s got balls, coming in here alone while our families have been at war for a decade. It could have been a trap. Still, he’s smart enough not to insult Daddy’s little girl in front of him.
“It’s nice meeting you,” he says flatly. “Let me know if you’d like to get together again before the wedding to discuss specifics. Otherwise, I trust that you’re more than capable of making the arrangements.”
Now I’m the one left speechless. I gape at him, caught between indignation and anger. He seems as uninterested in me as I am in him. Much to my annoyance, I find myself feeling resentful, even insulted, by his indifference.
“Haven’t you come to woo me?” I ask, a mocking edge to my voice.
“I don’t think that will be necessary,” he says. “If you need my approval on any wedding decisions, you can email me, and I’ll sign off on it.”
“Email you?” I repeat incredulously. “Approval?”
“Unless you’d like to meet again before that,” he says, leveling me with a look my father can’t see from his position behind him. King is challenging me.
Well, two can play that game.
“No need,” I say, lifting my chin. “We’ve got an event coordinator.”
“Then it’s settled,” King says. “I’ll see you at the altar.”
Without another word, he turns and strides over to shake my father’s hand. “Your daughter is as lovely as I’d heard,” he says. “I’m honored to have the opportunity to bring our families together with this union.”
I want to scream and hurl the bottle of tequila at his head, but my father already looks like a pressure cooker about to blow its gasket, so I settle for sloshing more alcohol into the two shot glasses I retrieved earlier. As soon as King is gone, Dad strides over to the bar and rips the shot glass from my hand.
“You will not disrespect our family like that again, do you understand me?” he roars, his face twisted in rage. The legendary Pomponio temper is nothing to mess with. Dad doesn’t have a short fuse, but when that fuse is lit…
I scurry off the chair and around the bar, putting the solid oak between us.
“I’m sorry,” I wail. “It’s just that he’s so horrible, Daddy! He’s going to kill me. He’s going to make me pay for the war between our families. I can’t marry him, Daddy! I just can’t. I’ll die!”
My father’s nostrils flare, and he heaves a series of heavy breaths as he stares at me, his face returning to something closer to its normal color. He used to always fall for my tantrums, but I think he’s catching on. Maybe he’s right. Maybe it is time I moved on to a new family, a new man who doesn’t know my tricks quite so well.
“The wedding is happening,” he says. “And that’s final. Do you understand me?”
I nod, swallowing down the lump in my throat. I might have been faking the hysterics, but that man really was horrid, and I really do fear what the future holds, what punishments he’ll consider fitting to pay for the crimes of my family. As much as I hate it, though, there’s no escaping fate.