Page 65 of The Mafia’s Girlfriend

I shoved his hand out of the way, sick of him using my full name like it’d make me listen. I wouldn’t. I’d never listen to anyone telling me to give her up.

“You’re starting a motherfucking war if you sleep with her.” He shook his head, serious and stern. “You can’t have her.”

Determination to prove him wrong coursed through me. “It’s too fucking late for that.”

I glowered at him.

Emma was mine.

Nothing could change that fact.

He clenched his teeth and swore as he turned away. His phone rang, and he stalked off to take the call.

“We’re not done talking about this, Luke,” he called over his shoulder.

Rain started to fall as a warm drizzle.

“Yes, we are,” I replied, too quietly for him to hear me.

I was done talking about the impossible. It should’ve been impossible for me and Emma to ever hit it off and fall this quickly into love. But we had. Nothing would deter me from keeping her.

I turned, shaking my head to clear the rain water dripping through my hair.

As I pivoted, I caught sight of Emma staring after me. She stood further down the sidewalk, mouth agape, eyes wide.

She must have heard it all.

Chapter 24

Emma

Marlo Rossini?

Luke is Marlo Rossini’s son?

“Oh, fuck.” I swallowed hard as rain fell faster.

I’d come out here, hoping to follow Luke home to keep her mom company in case she was ever lonely. But I hadn’t planned on seeing James Rossini, Marlo’s brother, telling Luke that he was the heir to my father’s biggest rival.

“Oh, fuck,” I repeated as Luke jogged toward me. He didn’t react to the rain. It streaked down faster, and I involuntarily blinked and squinted to see through it. I wasn’t capable of moving. I wasn’t capable of thinking past the chant of panic.

“Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck, Luke.”

He reached me, wrapping me in his arms. “Emma. It’ll be okay.”

I snapped out of this trance of shock and wrestled free. “No. It will not be okay!”

“I’m not going to listen to him.” He shook his head and raked his hand through his hair to whisk the rain out of it. Staring at me intently, he frowned deeper. “I’m not giving you up.”

I choked on an incredulous laugh. It was hysteria, tugging me into a response. “It’s not the fact that you refuse to give me up. It’s that we got together at all!”

He was supposed to be a stranger. An ordinary man. Someone not at all connected to the layered mess of my life.

“You’re the bastard son of Marlo Rossini?” I asked, stuck in disbelief that this could be happening. That fate could be so cruel and twisted like this.

That I’d find the man I’d love and know I couldn’t have him after the fact.

“It doesn’t change a thing about who I am.”