Page 6 of When She Tempts (The Fallen)
“How are you?” he asks in accented English. I guess my brother must have told him at some point that my Italian isn’t that great. I can understand just fine, but my vocabulary is basic. Dem and I moved to Ibiza when I was just a little kid, and I’ve done all of my schooling here in Spanish and English.
“Fine, thank you.”
“Are you ready to leave?”
If I’m being honest, no. My brother broke the news that he was sending me away less than twenty-four hours ago, and in my current state, I’m a bit slow on the uptake. My brain’s not processing things the way it normally would. Despite my fascination with Giorgio, when Dem told me I’d be living with him for the foreseeable future, I didn’t feel a thing.
Now, with him right in front of me…
I swallow. “Yes.”
“She’s as ready as she can be, given she doesn’t know where you’re taking her,” Vale pipes in from somewhere behind me. A second later, I feel her palm press against the center of my back.
My sister-in-law is formidable. Vale was dealt a rough hand by her family when they forced her to marry Lazaro, a man who can only be described as a psychopath, but she was strong enough to run away from him and rescue me in the process. She came to Ibiza with nothing, and through sheer stubbornness, she managed to convince my brother to give her a job. The rest is history. I glance at Dem, only to see his eyes sparkle with proud fondness as he watches his new wife.
Vale’s taller than me by a few inches, but she still has to crane her neck to meet Giorgio’s eyes. “Are you going to treat her well?”
Something that looks like mild amusement passes over his expression. “I was wondering when it was coming.”
“What?”
“The interview. Strange to do it after I already got the job, don’t you think?”
Vale tosses her hair over her shoulder and gives him a glare. “My husband trusts you, so you have that going for you, but that doesn’t mean I’m not worried. You didn’t answer the question.”
“Rest assured, Martina will be well cared for.”
The serious way he says it makes a pit appear in my stomach. What does that mean? How is Giorgio going to care for me? I’ve spent zero time pondering what living with him is going to be like, but my immediate assumption is that I’m not going to see much of him. He has his own life, his own responsibilities. He’ll probably lock me up someplace far from civilization and check in every few days, right?
Giorgio and Dem step aside to exchange a few words, and Vale watches them suspiciously for a few seconds before turning back to me. Her frown softens. “Mari, I’m sorry you have to leave. I wish Dem wasn’t insisting on it, but I understand why he thinks it’s necessary. He won’t be able to handle it if anything happens to you again.”
Or maybe my brother has finally realized what a liability I am. I got Imogen killed, and I nearly did the same to Vale, the woman he loves.
“Don’t be sorry. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
Her lips tremble before she clamps them into a tight line. “Neither did you.”
But I did. In fact, it seems I can’t do anything right.
“Maybe I should go with you,” she whispers, her fingers tightening around my shoulders. “I don’t want to leave Dem, but—”
“You have to stay with him,” I interrupt. “He needs you.”
Dem’s been scarce on the details of his plan to take over as don, but everyone knows what he has to do in order to ensure the transition of power is done according to the all-important Casalesi custom. He’ll have to kill the current don by strangling him with his bare hands. It’s how our father lost his power.
I wish he could just have one of his men do it for him, but I know that’s not an option. If anyone other than Dem does the killing, the clan won’t recognize his claim—a recipe for chaos.
Dem’s killed people before, but I’ve never gotten the sense he enjoys doing it. With Sal, though? I wouldn’t be surprised if he was looking forward to it. Sal is the reason we lost our parents. Dem also said Sal was the one who set Lazaro on Imogen and me. I guess the don thought that if he managed to capture me, my brother would be his lapdog. That didn’t happen. In fact, the New York fiasco is what finally pushed Dem into this war. He’s going to make Sal pay dearly for all the ways he’s wronged us.
While vengeance might soothe my brother’s soul, it rings hollow to me.
No amount of vengeance will bring Imogen back.
Vale pulls me into her and wraps her arms around me. “When you return, everything will be better.”
“Yeah.”
The other conversation in the room stops, and Vale lets go of me hesitantly.
