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“Gino can never find out?” I spit his words back at him, loaded with disgust.
“What the fuck is wrong with that? We both know that’s not an option.”
“Jackass. Do I mean anything to you?”
He turned gray, his features sobering.
“You’re the only thing that ever meant something to me. I don’t know how to tell you how I feel, Cat. You make my head spin; every time you walk into a room, I hear a fucking song and then realize it’s my heart beating faster. I want to fuck you constantly. I want to hear you laugh. I want to have you, baby girl. You are everything to me.”
I tried to keep my poker face intact and not show him how affected I was, but it was hard. His words dug under my skin, making their way to my soul like arrows. He wanted me? I was his in every way that was humanly possible.
“Good, because I love you.” I paused to take in a deep breath. “And you love me too. That is love, Hugo.”
“Maybe I do.” He wasn’t sure because no one had ever showed him love.
All I wanted now was to go back to meet that little boy that dad brought home in raggedy clothes with dirt on his face and hug him tight; tell him how loved he was.
“Love is worth fighting for, you moron! Hugo, I can’t imagine my life without you, but it seems you have a pretty solid plan for yourself. Tell me, Mustafa, how will it be? You wait until it’s too exhausting for us to hide and then leave me for a threesome?”
“Jealousy is overrated, baby girl. You can stop with the threesomes. I will never leave you, Cat. All my life I waited to die. My only purpose is to cover for your brother if he gets into shit. If someone came for his head, they’d end up with mine instead.”
“Stop talking like that. That is insane.”
“It’s true, and I’m fine with it. The son of a bitch is not only my boss; he is my brother. But you, baby girl? You’re the first person that ever made me want to live. If it was up to me, I would never let you go. I’d meet my end holding your hand, Cat.”
Oh, God. I was melting like butter in the sun. For a man who claimed to have a block of ice where his heart should be, Hugo could even make death sound romantic.
“It is up to you, baby.” I placed a gentle hand on his arm, desperate to feel him. “It’s up to us.”
“No, Catherinelle. You know that’s not an option. You’ll change your mind in a few months anyways.”
I stopped at the last second and chose not to hit him again.
“That’s not how love works, Monster.”
“Baby girl, you’re young. What’s gonna happen next year when you decide you want to travel the world or maybe go to college?”
“What does that have to do with us?”
“I’m not the man for you, Cat. You’ll see then that you deserve so much more; you’ll find someone who will not make you feel ashamed.”
“Baby. Baby!” I wasn’t able to bear it anymore, so I shut him up by crawling up his body and sealing his lips with small kisses. “I could never be ashamed of you. Where do you keep getting these bullshit ideas?”
He paused and sighed, taking my face in his hands. An understanding warmth settled in the dusky grey of his eyes.
“The Albanian scum,” he simply said. “A dog that was fed scraps. That’s how your father thought about me. That’s how they all see me. Your family…”
“My family is made of a bunch of counterfeiters, smugglers and gangsters. No one cares you weren’t born into wealth, Hugo. We weren’t either. Our fortune was made climbing up just like you did. I am a princess, yes, a mafia principessa, but it’s a crooked empire. You and Gino are cut from the same cloth; when will you see this?”
“No. Your brother has honor; he has principles. I can’t afford that if it would stand in the way of executing his orders.”
“You are a good man. We don’t live like the others; this is the underworld. I don’t care that you killed or hurt people. If you wouldn’t have done that, they would have come for us. You’re loyal; you’re protective. You put my brother above your own happiness for fuck’s sake. This is goodness, Monster. I could never be ashamed for everyone to know I’m yours, and don’t forget that I’m a Nucci too. No one would dare to talk about us.”
In our famiglia, there was respect, but there was also fear. This was the man I loved, and I would never let anyone bash him. Not that they would. Hugo Mustafa was a product of the Nucci family. My mother looked after him; my uncles watched him grow up. He had their respect, but he didn’t respect himself.
“You could do better than I, Cat.”
“Jesus Christ. Yes, I probably could because you are a complete moron sometimes.” I stomped my foot to the ground, exasperated by this conversation. “Answer me this: do you wanna be with me? I’m not talking about sex. Do you see yourself with me, or do you still think I’m a spoiled little girl who has no idea what she’s doing?”
