“I’m afraid of losing me and us. And I hate that fear, but you matter to me—more than I think you understand. I just want you to know that.”
His eyes glint hard. “I keep telling you: I’m not letting you go, and he’s damn sure not taking you from me.” He stands, taking me with him, his big body shielding mine while he slides my dress down my legs.
“Thank you,” I murmur as my coat and the scent of him, spicy and rousingly male, wrap around me at the same time, and I slip my arms inside the wool.
“Thank me,” he says, his voice low, almost rough, his fingers branding my hips, “by ending the question of what you’re wearing under this dress besides thigh-highs.”
“Maybe I’m not wearing anything at all,” I tease, sounding breathless, because somehow, some way, in the middle of my blackouts and fears I am oh so very breathless.
One of the valets says something to him in Italian, but before he responds to him, he leans in, his breath a warm fan on my skin as he murmurs, “Careful now, sweetheart. You tempt the beast and I’ll take you to a corner of the party and find out myself.”
Heat zips through me, darn near turning to fire as he walks me to the curb with a quick, smoldering look b
efore turning to the valet, and I’m left with the distinct impression he might just make good on that warning. I watch him talk to the other man, power and confidence wafting off of him, and I’m amazed by how this man makes me feel consumed. And I welcome it, when escape was all I craved with the man in my flashbacks.
Kayden laughs, a deep, sexy rumble from his broad chest, and the way my nipples instantly tighten proves how powerful a drug he is to me. I watch as he palms the man a ridiculously large bill before turning back to me, and I swear, the way he looks at me is like no one else exists. Like I am his moon, sun, and star, and I really do not believe anyone has ever made me feel that special.
“Was that a hundred euros you gave him?” I ask as he drapes his arm over my shoulder and pulls me into the shelter of his body.
“It pays to make friends with the staff.” As we head toward the mile-high red-carpeted steps, two men with cameras start taking photos of us.
“And there’s the press,” I murmur. “Maybe we should stop and pose. That should make tonight the night.”
“That would be a little too obvious,” he says. “Though I have no doubt that Niccolo hacks the press photos for these events. Just not as effectively as I do. Directly or indirectly, I make damn sure The Underground owns every important event in this city, even when I’m not in attendance.”
“Like you own the neighborhood.”
“The neighborhood is like a family, and The Underground has been head of the family for a good fifty years.”
“You mean The Hawk has been the head of the family for all of those years.”
“Yes,” he agrees. “Which means everything The Hawk does is watched, analyzed, and dissected. And as my woman, you inherit that attention. Be prepared to be badgered with probing questions from people with bad English.”
It hits me then how much trust he’s putting in me—and it strikes me how profoundly important it is that he has sometimes trusted me more than I have myself. “I can handle it,” I promise.
He wraps his arm around my neck and leans down to kiss me. “I know, Eleana.”
I grimace as he loosens his hold on my neck, wondering how he’ll explain my new identity to Niccolo, but it’s too late to ask. We reach the final step, and what amounts to a giant stone porch, where two guards stand at attention on either side of a roped-off continuation of the red carpet. One of the men greets us in Italian, then checks our names off a clipboard after asking for identification. Once he’s satisfied with our identities, Kayden and I walk the remainder of the red carpet, where two additional guards monitor the tall double doors, opening them at our approach.
“Is my gun in my purse a problem?” I whisper, suddenly concerned.
“Not for us,” he says, and I don’t ask for details. This is Kayden. This is the power of The Underground.
Moments later we cross the threshold of the magnificent palace, green-and-beige-streaked marble beneath our feet, the room seeming to stretch onward for miles. “It’s breathtaking,” I say as we move to yet another check-in point, my gaze lifting to the curved ceiling adorned with green-and-beige-toned paintings of Roman armored soldiers on horses, while intricate trim work divides it from the beige walls.
“From the fourteen hundreds,” he says, guiding me toward a pedestal where yet another man in a uniform holds a clipboard. “Obviously restored.”
He tells me a bit about the royal family while we are once again checked off a clipboard, and a young woman in a long black dress takes my coat in exchange for a ticket.
“And now the games begin,” Kayden says, linking my arm with his again and setting us in motion deeper into the palace.
“Is that what this is? A game?”
“These parties are always games about positioning. Someone wants something. Someone needs something. Expect them to hint at those things to you, and just soak it all in. Often what doesn’t seem important now becomes so later.”
“Well, I won’t be a big help there since I don’t speak Italian.”
“The brilliance of their choppy English and your lack of Italian is that you’ll speak Italian soon—while the people you meet tonight will assume you don’t.”