I’m supposed to go back to the party. But as I step out into the hallway, I can’t bring myself to keep going back towards the banquet room where everyone is gathered. I can’t bring myself to face Luca, or deal with being introduced to more people whose names I don’t know, I need to be alone, to breathe, to get away from all of this—
Against my better judgement, I find myself walking away from the party, my pace picking up more and more with every step.I’m not running away,I tell myself.Just getting some air. Just going outside.I hurry towards the glass doors at the front of the restaurant, the faint chatter from the room at the back where the party is fading even more as I shove the doors open and burst out into the cool spring air.
I breathe in, sucking in huge gulps of it, realizing how on the verge of a panic attack I really was. It’s hitting me now full force—I’m getting married tomorrow—and I want to scream. I’m going to be legally bound to a man I hardly know and don’t even like, a man who has been both cruel and kind to me in turns, and although I have some small hope of finding a way out eventually—there’s no guarantee.
This could be my forever. And that knowledge suddenly feels suffocating.
I don’t mean to walk away from the restaurant. My feet just carry me a few steps, and a few more, until I’m at the far end of a bar a little further down the street, leaning up against the brick wall with my eyes closed and my breath coming in small, quick pants as I try to calm down.
It’s going to be okay,I tell myself, repeating Caterina’s assurance from earlier in my head.This won’t be so bad. It could be worse—you could be dead.
Somehow that doesn’t make me feel much better, though—that my only options are marrying Luca or death.
He’s the prince of the Italian mafia, heir to the throne, and I can’t say he isn’t charming. But a Prince Charming? He’s anything but that.
All fairytales have a dark side.
My throat closes over as I remember my father handing me the book of Grimm’s fairytales, speaking those exact words to me. He must have known, somehow, that the darkness would eventually come for me. That I would have to make an impossible choice.
I should go back inside, before someone comes looking for me. Before Luca or anyone else who sees me out here gets the wrong idea. But I can’t bring myself to move. The cool air, the traffic passing by and the scents and sounds of the city all help to ground me, make me feel just a little less afraid. This city has been my home all my life, but I’ve never felt more lost than this past week.
There’s people passing by on the sidewalk, but one set of footsteps comes closer, growing louder until they stop very close to me.
“Sofia.”
It’s Luca’s voice. It’s cold and angry, and my heart drops into my stomach at the sound of it.
Fuck.
“Didn’t I tell you what would happen if you tried to run away?”
My eyes fly open. “No,” I say quickly, turning to face him. “I wasn’t—I just needed some air. I wasn’t going anywhere—”
“Then why are you a block and a half away from Vitto’s, over here like you’re waiting on someone? Maybe you’re waiting for Ana to come get you and sweep you away? Or to catch a cab?” His face is like granite, hard and set in cold lines that make me feel like I want to throw up. He looks furious. “I told you what would happen if you tried to leave.”
“I’m not, I swear—”
“Come on.” Luca’s hand darts out, grasping my elbow. “We’re leaving, now. I’ve already made our excuses to everyone else.”
“Wait—where are we going?” I dig my heels in as he starts to pull me away from the building. “Where are you taking me?” I have sudden visions of bloody basements and cold warehouses on the docks, wherever he and men like him do the awful things that they do. Is he really going to have me killed because I went for a short walk?”
Luca turns to me, his face silhouetted in the streetlight. Even his eyes look dark, angry and full of seething frustration.
“We’re going home,” he says coldly. And then he pulls me forward, towards the curb where his driver is waiting.
Luca
Ican’t remember the last time I was so furious with anyone.
Sofia doesn’t seem to grasp how frail of a thread her life hangs by. How I’m the only one keeping that thread intact—how much Don Rossi would like an excuse to call this whole expensive mess off, and just have her killed.
A bullet is cheaper than a wedding ring. And a divorce will cost her life.
That was the last thing he’d said to me, in that meeting when I’d lied to him about Sofia’s virginity. And now I’ve had it with her. I’ve spent the last week rescuing her, protecting her, lying for her and walking into a marriage I don’t want for her, and now she’s got me so messed up that I can’t even get a good casual fuck to unwind. My balls and my brain are both boiling over with frustration, and now I have to deal with her disappearing in the middle of our fuckingrehearsal dinner, with all of my and Don Rossi’s families there, with the highest ranking members in attendance, leading to questions about where my beautiful bride-to-be has gone and embarrassing me in front of everyone.
She’s going to learn tonight how to behave. How a proper mafia wife acts in public. How much danger she’s really in.
Sofia doesn’t speak a word for the entire ride back to my apartment. She stays on the far side of the limo, her arms wrapped around herself, and frankly I don’t care. I’ve tried giving her space, I’ve tried catering to her emotions as much as I can manage, and now she needs to understand, once and for all, that everything she knew before is over.