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“I don’t, Dante. I don’t understand.”
“Paulie’s going to have questions about me going insane over you, breaking a man’s wrist in my fuckin' club, taking you off the stage, making you my assistant. I explained it away, but as much as I hate to admit it, he’s not a complete fuckin’ idiot.”
“So, what? You shuttle me to your house, and now I’m some kept woman?”
“Never. You’re here because I need you as close to me as possible. This is partly selfish. I want you here. Need you here. Anyone who works for the family this close has a detail, someone watching them. This isn’t too far off. It’s still going with the plan, Delilah.”
“What plan, Dante? I know nothing about this fucking plan you keep talking about except that every time I get a single bite of the story, it seems to explode even bigger.”
“You will. You’ll get it soon. I’m going to get you what you want, anything you want. What you deserve. You’ll get retribution for your family, baby.” His hand moves, brushing long hair back, his thumb running along the collarbone he loves to kiss when it’s late and we’re alone and I’m sleepy. “You’re going to rule, fiorella. You’re going to get your revenge, and you’re going to be fucking magnificent. But we need to be smart. We need to be safe.” He leans in, pressing to my lips to his gently, and I know that this is bigger. So much bigger than I could ever have imagined.
When I walked into Paulie’s—Dante’s—office to make that deal, priority one was getting Lola free, two was stepping into the role I was born for, and three was to get retribution on the family who killed my father and ruined my mother.
We could have been free, all four of us. Lola would have been loved by Arturo—he said so in his letters. And a sick, twisted part of me thinks that if he hadn’t died, if my mother hadn’t felt that guilt in his wake, she’d still be here.
A part of me thinks it wasn’t cancer that ate her insides and rotted her away until she was gone—it was losing the love of her life.
Did a part of her start dying the second she realized she was falling for a man with power, a man with a gun constantly pointed at the back of his skull?
I consider this because I wonder how long it will take for that infinitesimal part of myself to consume me, the desire and tenderness I feel for the man in front of me to eat me alive.
“Lose the look, Delilah. You and me. All that matters.”
“You’ll still be sneaking in at night?” I ask, exhaustion that matches his own in my voice.
“Lilah . . .”
“And leaving in the morning?” Another sigh. “Like a fuckin’ goumad, a whore you fuck for the night before going back to you fancy life?” The fire in my backbone burns, reminding me of who I am.
I am Rapunzel, taking her future into her own hands.
I am a siren, forcing men to shred their boats at my shores so that I can gain the power I so desire.
I am not a hidden secret, something to enjoy in the dark of night.
“Delilah, you know that’s not true.”
“Do I? Because that’s what this is. I’m your dirty little secret, and you’re essentially my enemy, Dante.”
“I’m not your enemy, you know that.”
“Do I?” I repeat. “Do I? Because I want to take your family down for what it did to mine, and whatever this is between us won’t change that.”
“I know that, Lilah. I also know I’ll do anything to give you that.”
“What about your father?” I ask, my mind moving to the way his face changed in his office.
“What about him?”
“He’s part of the problem, Dante.”
"It’s Paulie. It’s Tony. It’s the men they recruited. Not my father. He’s good. He just . . . He’s gone astray.”
It’s funny to think that just a few months ago, I was Dante. Despite being nearly 15 years younger than him, I was just like him. Cautiously optimistic about my father. I knew he wasn't great, but I thought he wasn’t terrible. That he had something—anything—redeemable about him.
“He hasn’t, Dante. He’s the heart of it.”
“You don’t know him, Lilah.”
