Page 71 of Modern Romance September 2026 Books 5-8

“Clearly,” I say.

“In my life, this life I was born into, not making it into your thirties is a skill issue. One I don’t have. So as an insult, going after my age won’t work.”

“Very modest, gangster.”

“I’m not a gangster. And I’m not modest. Get on the plane.” He’s holding on to me again as I’m dragged up into a luxury seating area. Everything in the aircraft is representative of more money and excess than I’ve ever seen in my entire life.

“You’re not a gangster?” I ask, just because he already said he wasn’t and I have a feeling it will annoy the hell out of him for me to keep pushing.

I sit down on the plush couch, and I’m irritated that my sore body appreciates the luxury.

“No. First of all, crime families are not gangs. Not in the way that you’re thinking.”

“It’s the Mafia,” I point out dryly.

“No,” he says, looking almost wounded for a second. “There’s no such thing as the Mafia.”

Then he grins, like the very devil. I’m not going to respond to that smile. I’m sure women literally throw themselves on his body daily. I’m not going to be one of those women.

“Okay,” I say, doing my best to be uninterested. “Likely story.”

“Think of it as kingdoms, if you like. You asked before if I was a king, and in some ways, the answer is yes. Now that my father is dead. What I have inherited is a kingdom filled with corruption. What I have inherited is a kingdom that I do not want. But it does not change the fact that I inherited it. If a king dies, what happens?”

“‘The king is dead, long live the king.’” I pull a face. “They are immediately replaced.”

“Exactly. If not me, it will be someone else. Someone probably far worse and far more dangerous. That is a fact. Now, I have made no secret of the fact that I did not approve of my father’s actions. And everyone knows that me taking control is going to signal change. Which is why they want a war. To break the Corretti family into factions and absorb them into themselves. Kill me, likely kill my sister if they can and then go after any of my father’s other children.”

“But you said that one of your enemies wants to marry her.”

“Complicated. What he wants is an alliance. Again, think of it like kingdoms.”

“Yeah, but these aren’t kingdoms. You exist underneath the real world, like rats in tunnels under the actual city, the true kingdom, chewing holes in people’s genuine lives. You’re just planting a flag on a kingdom, a country, a city, that exists already.”

“And tell me, what about that is not like a kingdom? Are you not educated on colonialism?”

I laugh, short and rueful. “Wow. The woke mob. Anyway—” I roll my eyes at him “—I don’t need to be lectured about the history of the world by a man participating in a corrupt system. I can acknowledge that the world is corrupt, and that the systems that run it are inherently wrong, and not engage in the moral relativism that allows for him to decide that because there is corruption he gets to traffic guns and human beings.”

“I already told you. I have no interest in continuing. But…”

“But you have to make something else. There can’t be nothing. And there can’t be an empty throne.”

“Precisely.” He regards me for a moment. “You’re smart.”

“I would have to be. Given how hard I worked to get where I am.”

He didn’t ask, and won’t. But I’m his prisoner and if I can make him feel like he’s also mine, I’ll feel like I’ve done something. So I continue. “I’m always amused when people’s snobbery prevents them from seeing my intelligence. I don’t have any insecurity about it, but at school I’m constantly surrounded by people who were launched into their positions by their parents. Connections and favors that have been called in.

Must be nice. I had so many people try to tell me that they’re smarter than me because of their private school backgrounds.

My favorite thing to ask, which immediately shuts them up, is that if I got into the same school, and am in fact doing much better at it, as they did, with their superior educational background, it would suggest that they are not, in fact, the smart ones.

It’s weird that I don’t have more friends.

Weird that the mobster’s daughter was able to befriend me, and get right in there without any competition from any other social connections, because I don’t have them.

Talk about power vacuums.

Though, Vittoria isn’t exactly normal herself. She seemed young to me, overly exuberant about everything. A girl who was experiencing freedom for the very first time.