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“My authority is sufficient.”
Adriana shifted beside me. I reached out and caught her hand. Her fingers were cold and clammy. I held them tightly.
“She’s not leaving with you. She has nothing to give you. If the Coccico believe otherwise, they can send someone with enough authority to explain exactly what they want and why.”
The man looked down at our joined hands. Then he glanced at the men around me.
“You would risk war for a woman none of you knew a week ago?”
“You came to the wrong family if you expected an answer,” Atlas replied.
Marcello folded his arms. “She crossed our gate under DeMarco’s protection.”
The representative studied us. No one looked away. My throat tightened. I had spent ten years believing that leaving had severed me from them. That I had forfeited every right to their loyalty. That if I ever returned, I would stand before them as a trespasser, yet now they formed a wall around me and the woman I had brought home. Because I had asked for shelter without knowing how to say the words. And they had heard me anyway.
The representative straightened his cuffs.
“I will deliver your response.”
“You do that.”
He opened the door of the sedan, then paused.
His gaze found Adriana once more.
“You’ll do well to remember what happened to your father, Adriana.”
Adriana flinched. The movement was unmistakable.
The man smiled. Then he entered the car. The sedan pulled away from the gate without haste. We watched until it disappeared beyond the trees. Only then did I turn to Adriana. Her hand remained locked around mine. The other pressed against the rosary beneath her clothes.
“What did he mean about you having something that belongs to them?” I asked.
She looked at me. Fear had drained the color from her face.
“I don’t know.”
It was the first lie she had told me since I’d met her. I was sure of it.
Behind us, my family waited. They gave her space, but they didn’t leave. Whatever came next, none of us would face it alone. And as I watched Adriana clutch the only thing her father had left her, I understood that the Coccico had not come to negotiate. They had come to confirm she still had it.
24
ADRIANA
Demitri caught my wrist before I reached the staircase.
“Adriana.”
I stopped with one foot on the first step. His grip was not painful, but the firmness of his fingers around my wrist carried an unmistakable command.
Tone paused farther down the hallway. Her gaze settled on his hand around my wrist before lifting to my face. “I’ll be in the dining room.”
I wanted to ask her to stay. The plea lodged on my tongue, trapped by the shame of needing protection from a man who had done nothing but protect me.
Demitri released me once the others had moved beyond earshot. He guided me into a smaller sitting room off the main hall and closed the door behind us.
The latch clicked into place.
