Page 118 of The Wrong Mafia Bride
My father's voice is cold when I answer. "My office. One hour."
The line goes dead. He does not need to explain. We have been circling this conversation for months, maybe years.
I stand there with the phone in my hand for a long moment, staring at nothing. An hour. Sixty minutes to prepare myself for what is coming. Sixty minutes to steel myself against the inevitable criticism, the disappointed sighs, the carefully constructed arguments about why I am not good enough, smart enough, strong enough to lead.
Except this time, I am not going to defend myself.
This time, I am going to tell him the truth.
The realization settles over me like a weight and a relief at the same time. I am done. Done trying to prove myself. Done bending myself into shapes that do not fit. Done prioritizing his approval over my own happiness.
I am done being his son in the way he wants me to be.
Gabriel looks up from his newspaper, his gray eyes sharp and assessing. "Giovanni?"
"He wants to see me." I turn off the stove, abandoning the eggs that are starting to brown at the edges. My hands are steady, which surprises me. I expected them to shake. "About Patrick. Or the Frank Lucas deal I never closed. Maybe both."
"You want us to come?" Gabriel asks, already folding his newspaper with that precise, military efficiency he brings to everything.
For a moment I consider it. Having Gabriel and Luca at my back would make this easier. My father respects strength in numbers, respects the united front we present. But this is not about strength in numbers.
This is about me finally standing on my own two feet and saying no.
"No. This is something I need to handle alone." I can feel the weight of the decision settling in my chest. "This conversation has been coming for a long time. It needs to be just him and me."
Rosalina appears in the doorway, and my heart does that thing it always does when I see her—that catch, that skip, that sudden certainty that everything else is just noise. She is wearing one of my t-shirts, her golden bronze hair pulled into a messy bun, her hand resting on her stomach where our child is growing.
"Handle what alone?" Her voice is careful, but I can see the fear in her hazel eyes.
"My father wants to see me."
She crosses the kitchen in three quick steps, her hands framing my face. "What are you going to say to him?"
I cover her hands with mine, breathing in her scent—vanilla and warmth and home. "The truth. That I am done trying to be the son he wants me to be. That I am building my own family now."
"You are talking about leaving the mafia," Gabriel says quietly.
I look at him, at Luca who has appeared in the doorway. "If that means choosing the people I love over the organization, then yes."
The words feel lighter than I expected. Not heavy with dread, but almost liberating. I have been carrying this decision around for weeks now, maybe longer. Ever since Rosalina stood up to my father at that dinner. Ever since I realized there were people in this world who would defend me without expecting anything in return.
"We are with you," Luca says, his expression fierce and loyal. "Whatever you decide. Whatever happens."
"All of us," Rosalina adds, her fingers tightening against my face.
I pull her against my chest, feeling her heartbeat against mine. Three months ago I was preparing to marry a woman I had never met to secure an alliance I did not believe in. Now I have a wife I would die for, a baby on the way, and a family that chose me.
My father can take away my position. He can disown me. He can strip me of the Salvatore name.
But he cannot take this. He cannot take them.
The drive to the compound takes forty-five minutes, and I spend every one of them thinking about what I am about to do.
I am about to walk away from everything. The legacy my grandfather built. The empire my father has spent his life maintaining. The future I have been groomed for since before I could walk.
And I am not afraid.
That is the part that surprises me most. I expected fear. Expected doubt. Expected some part of me to balk at throwing away everything I was raised to value.
