CHAPTER THREE
Isabella
He was my warden, though, wasn’t he?
Because I couldn’t leave. Not without him seeking out and slaughtering everyone I loved. I could never let that happen.
I actually felt a little whiplashed from the whole thing. It didn’t help that I’d been locked in that teeny room with no window or hope for escape. Each moment inside there had the walls closing in tighter and tighter until it seemed like all the air had gotten sucked up, making my chest heavy and my throat tight.
That was when I finally broke down and lost the battle with the tears. I didn’t want to shed them. I didn’t want to be that weak. But I’d had issues with small spaces ever since I’d gotten myself trapped inside a shed at my Great Aunt’s farm once. I’d been stuck there for almost twelve hours and had been almost out of my mind with fear by the time the family found me.
It had been an issue ever since.
I actually felt like I was choking a bit when I had to step into my closet to find something in the corner of it.
So being in that little rooms for hours had set my anxiety through the roof. Then to be dragged out to see my family there, to hear that I was being used as some sort of white flag in their war, and to realize that if I didn’t let myself be used that way, my loved ones would die, well, yeah, it was no wonder I literally felt a little unstable on my own two feet. And as for my head, well, it kept shooting off in a dozen different directions every second.
I needed to focus.
Even as I thought that, though, a ring was what I first saw.
And, God, what a ring.
I didn’t want to like it. It was a fancier version of the cuff he’d taken off my wrist. It was a symbol of my imprisonment, of his ownership of me.
But the part of me that had always loved unique jewelry was a little fluttery at what the man who was going to be my husband had picked out.
It was a large kite-cut black rutilated quartz on what looked like a platinum band. On each side of the main stone was a trio of black stones that my gut said were black diamonds.
It was oddly fitting.
For a man as dark as him.
It was a symbol of that darkness.
And my attachment to it.
For life.
My stomach sloshed at that realization, immediately spoiling my enjoyment of the ring itself. How could I like it when I knew what is symbolized? A life with a monster in a man’s clothing. The loss of all my hopes and dreams for my future. Having to endure spousal attentions from a man who plucked me out of my life like fucking Hades taking poor Persephone from a field of flowers and pulling her down into his underworld and forcing her to rule with him.
Persephone eventually fell for Hades, though.
I couldn’t fall for Primo Esposito.
Even if he was, objectively, attractive. Darkly attractive, if that was a thing.
He was a psychopath who used his position and power and money to bend people to his will. I had absolutely no doubt that the reason no one helped me on the street was because he ran his neighborhood with an iron fist. He kept good, normal citizens terrified of him and what he might do to them if they stepped into his business.
That was the kind of evil bastard I was marrying.
The kind I would need to share a bed with.
“Isabella,” Primo’s voice snapped, the sound like a whip cracking in the oversized, silent space, making my head whip up to find him looking down at me, those dark eyes unreadable.
“What?”
“Your hand,” he said, tone impatient.
“You’re being snippy with me?” I asked, but I raised my hand. “This was your plan,” I reminded him.
“Yes,” he agreed as his hand grabbed mine.
And it didn’t, it absolutely did not, make a strange spark ping off my nerve endings. If it did, it was because I was revolted that he was touching me. That was the only logical explanation.
“But you are the one being difficult,” he told me as he slid the ring on my finger.
“Just the words a woman wants to hear while getting an engagement ring,” I grumbled, trying not to wonder how the damn ring fit me perfectly.
“If you were expecting romance from a man like me, Isabella, you were very much mistaken.”
“I don’t want romance from you,” I insisted, snatching my hand back, crossing it over my chest, tucking the hand under my other arm, hiding the ring.
“Good. Then you won’t be disappointed.”
“Every single thing about this situation is disappointing,” I corrected him, feeling my jaw quiver.
I had a temper. Everyone knew that about me. But I almost always ended up crying when I was angry. It was frustrating and embarrassing and something my brother had teased me about a lot when we were kids. Even well into adulthood, though, it wasn’t something I could shake.
Primo’s mouth opened as if he was going to snap back at me before he shut it again, thinking for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was calm, patient even.
“You will learn that there are benefits to being with me.”
“Your probable early death, you mean?” I asked, watching as one of his dark brows rose. I couldn’t decide if he was surprised or annoyed. Or maybe both. “I am banking on that. I imagine there are at least a dozen men who want you dead.”
“A thousand or more,” he said, shrugging it off.
“So I will just bide my time then.”
“Perhaps you should wait until the marriage is official and the papers are signed before you hope for my death, little lamb. At least then you’d be entitled to it all.”
“I don’t want anything from you,” I hissed, wrapping my arms around myself more tightly.
“An inexpensive wife. How unexpected,” he said, reaching for his phone as it buzzed, taking a second to check the screen. “I have some business to attend to. Terzo will see you to my apartment. You have a few hours to clean up for the wedding.”
That soon?
I guess he didn’t want there to be any chance of me sneaking out of the deal. Or for my family to figure out how to get me out of it.
“Terzo?” I asked, stiffening, not wanting one of those guys who’d kidnapped me near me again.
“My brother,” Primo said, waving toward the side of the room where another tall—but not quite as tall—, dark, and handsome man with an unmistakable resemblance to Primo, but younger by a good eight or so years. “Terzo. You know the schedule?” he asked, not sparing his brother a glance as he shot off a text.
“Yeah.”
“Good. She stays in the apartment until I tell you to bring her.”
“Oh, but I’m not a prisoner or anything, right, warden?” I griped, getting his gaze to lift, that brow quirked up again.
“Just do what you’re told, Isabella.”
“If you thought that was the kind of wife you were going to get, you chose the wrong woman, Primo.” I spat out his name like it was sour on my tongue. He kept using mine, so I wanted to use his. Even if I said it like it was a curse.
“You’re only going to make things harder on yourself with that attitude,” Primo said, shrugging. “But whatever sets your panties on fire, baby.”
“Don’t talk about my panties,” I snapped, jaw tight.