“Shhh, Ashlyn.” He shushed me softly, but steel lurked beneath his horrifyingly gentle tone. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
I recognized the voice. I’d heard it once before. The low rumble haunted me in my dreams, leaving me sweating and twisting in my sheets at the memory of the darkness that pulsed from his powerful frame.
Marco. Joseph’s frightening acquaintance. Marco, the dangerous man who had appeared one night and stolen the man I loved away from me. He’d made Joseph disappear and abandon me, shattering my heart in the process.
Anger swelled along with fear, and I shoved at Marco’s chest. When that accomplished nothing, I curled my fingers into claws, ready to rake my short nails across his face.
He caught my hands easily before I could inflict damage. He released my mouth for a moment while he grasped my wrists. Then, he shifted them into one hand and pinned them over my head. His other hand returned to my mouth to cover my fresh scream.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” he said again. “I need you to calm down and listen to me. You’re in danger, and I need to get you out of here.”
I shook my head as best I could with his firm grip on my face. The only danger was the threat he posed.
“You don’t understand,” he continued. “Joseph didn’t tell you about who he really is. Who we are. The kind of men we are. He wanted to shield you from it, but that’s over now.”
My mind spun, struggling to process what he was saying. What could he possibly mean? Joseph had possessed a sinfully sexy bad boy vibe, but he’d worshipped me. He’d treated me like something precious and called me his angel. It was why I’d fallen for him, hard and fast. My first love.
It was why my heart was ravaged and I walked around with a hollow place in my chest, aching deep in my soul for the last month that had passed without him in my life.
“Our enemies will come for you,” Marco said. “I won’t put you at risk like that. I won’t let Joseph go through that. He can’t lose you again. Not forever. Not like this. I won’t fucking allow it.”
Enemies? What the hell was he talking about?
I twisted in his grip, sure that he was my enemy. He was pinning me against the wall and smothering my panicked screams. Fear I’d never known rolled over me in a toxic wave, making my head spin and my stomach turn.
Marco stared down at me. The faint streetlight streaming through the windows caught on his features, the shadows enhancing the hard planes of his face and stubble-covered jaw. The light gleamed on his close-cropped dark hair, and the illumination caught in his black eyes. They sparkled with keen intelligence as he considered me.
After a moment, his lips hardened to a thin slash, and he nodded.
“You’re not going to come willingly. I can see that. But I planned for this.”
He released my wrists, and my hands closed around his forearm, trying to pry his hand away from my mouth so I could let out the scream he was trapping behind my lips.
He swiftly retrieved something from his pocket. Dread weighed like a stone in my stomach when I saw the syringe.
I redoubled my efforts to escape as he removed the cap with his teeth. I tried to kick him, but he was too close for me to get any leverage, his thigh wedged between my legs. My harsh cries caught against his hand, and mindless panic prevented me from fighting effectively. All I could do was try to free my face from his hold, but his strong arm kept me securely pinned despite my frantic efforts.
The needle gleamed in the dim light just before the sting kissed my neck. His movements were careful rather than violent, and there was minimal pain.
Seconds later, the fear that wracked my senses began to fade away. Warmth enfolded me, and I sagged against him. One final whimper of protest slipped through my lips, but my tongue was too heavy to form the pleas for mercy that tickled at the back of my mind.
“Everything will be okay.” His promise floated down to me as I sank into darkness. Corded arms closed around me, catching me before I fell.
“You’ll be with Joseph again soon,” he said, his voice smooth and oddly comforting. “We’ll keep you safe.”
Safe. With that strange reassurance, I surrendered to the darkness, and the world disappeared.
Chapter Twelve
Joseph
“I got you a present,” Marco said, a sly smile on his lips that I didn’t trust for one second.
I shrugged, unimpressed and uninterested. Nothing interested me these days. Not since I’d lost her. I’d tried to run away and find a normal life, and I’d found Ashlyn: my pure, perfect angel.
But Marco had tracked me down and dragged me back into my own personal hell. I didn’t want this life of violence and cruelty. All I wanted was to be free of it all. I thought I’d had a chance at that when I met Ashlyn. Now that the dream had crumbled, I was hollow and apathetic.
So I didn’t really give a fuck if Marco had gotten me a golden unicorn. Nothing would faze me now.
“Is that why you made me come here?” I demanded, wondering why he’d invited me to his family’s estate on Long Island. I’d been with my father in the city, trying to defend his claim as the head of our family once the current don—Victor Lombardi—passed. And Victor’s death of natural causes was imminent.
Unfortunately for my blood relatives, there were other powerful men within our mafia family who wanted to take power. That was why Marco had dragged me home: to protect my dad and his presumptive position. And they’d all been worried that I was dead, so I supposed it was a small mercy for them that I’d finally been found after months of hiding out around the Harvard campus.
Besides, I might not like my life, but I didn’t hate my father. I didn’t want to see him dead.
And I didn’t want to put Marco at risk, either. The man who’d been my lifelong surrogate brother might’ve been killed if I’d stayed away. He needed me to watch his back, and I’d abandoned him. I knew that must have hurt him, and I still carried guilt over my decision to leave him behind.
So why the fuck had he gotten me a gift?
The sly smile was still fixed on his hard face. “I told you, I got you a present. I had to stash it here. Come inside and see.”
I blew out an exasperated sigh, but I stepped across the threshold and entered the ostentatious mansion. There was enough white marble and gold gilding in the décor to blind a man. The effect was overwhelming, but Marco’s father, Leo De Luca, had never been a subtle man, and this was his home. Even if he rarely came here these days. He was too busy defending my father’s position from within the city, too. As Dad’s best friend, Leo would die to protect him. Just as Marco would do for me.
Marco began walking toward the elegant curved double staircase, and I followed. Curiosity stirred somewhere deep inside me, but it was faint. Nothing really caught my interest these days. Not since I’d lost Ashlyn and my dream of a normal life with her.
When we got to the top of the stairs and turned toward Marco’s bedroom, I stopped. Anger—my one familiar emotion—bubbled up.
“Do not tell me you have a girl in there,” I warned through gritted teeth. If a three-way was Marco’s idea of a present, he’d fucked up big time. I wasn’t interested in anyone but Ashlyn. The idea of touching another woman made my stomach turn.