8. Daniela

“Challenging me and spying on my private conversations wasn’t enough?” he sneers. “What gives you the right to storm in here and tell me how to conduct my business?”

I’m seated, and he’s looming above me in a tirade. We’ve been here before, and I’m not backing down this time, either. I glance at the muscle pulsing in his jaw. Although I do need to be smart.

Not that he’d hurt me. I’m not worried about that. But when he’s like this, he doesn’t listen to anyone, or anything, and I need him to hear me out. If I overheard correctly, the stakes are enormous. Which is why he’s in such a rage.

This is Antonio’s way of not buckling under the pressure. It’s predictable, but vile. We’ll discuss it another time. For now, I need to help him see reason.

I peer into his stormy eyes and keep my voice low. “I’m your wife. The woman who loves you. The woman you sleep beside at night—unguarded. The woman who wants only the best for you—always. The woman you love. That’s what gives me the right.”

He’s still seething, but I’ve taken some of the steam out of it. Hopefully enough so he’ll listen.

“Who has Cristiano?” I ask as though we discuss this sort of thing all the time. “The Bratva or the oligarchs?”

Antonio glances at me from several feet away. The last question surprised him, but he recovers quickly. “What makes you think that either faction has him?”

“You asked if I wanted Lucas or Santi to deliver me to the Russians.”

He averts his gaze, but he doesn’t have the good grace to cringe, or God forbid, apologize.

“Once you brought them up, it wasn’t hard to figure out. The Bratva and the oligarchs were causing problems even when my father was alive.”

He swivels, fully facing me, with his head tipped to one side. “Did your father ever have a problem with either?”

My father didn’t trust them, especially the oligarchs, but I don’t remember any specific incident. “If he did, it’s not something he shared with me. But I’m sure he would have mentioned it to you at some point.”

“I would have thought so, too. But he left out other important details that would have been good to know,” he grumbles under his breath.

Pesky details like that your father murdered my mother, and that I was raped by your cousin and had a child. I don’t say any of it. There’s no point. It’s not going to help my cause, and Antonio doesn’t need any more stress.

“Tell me what’s going on. And before you say it doesn’t concern me, remember that we’re partners.”

“We’re not business partners,” he replies curtly. “And this is a business matter.”

“Not good enough, Antonio.”

“I decide what’s good enough. Not you.”

“If you sacrifice Cristiano without doing everything in your power to save him, every time you look at me, you’ll remember your friend with great sorrow. You’ll wonder if you could have done something different. It’ll eat away at you—at us—until there’s nothing left.”

“Cristiano might be a traitor.”

I blink a few times before dismissing the allegation out of hand.

Antonio just leveled the gravest indictment without an ounce of oomph. I don’t believe it, and the way he’s gauging my reaction, neither does he. But it certainly explains his mood.

The impatience vibrates off him as he awaits my response. My thoughts. My opinion. Something. Ultimately, he might dismiss what I say without consideration, but he’s interested in what I think. Baby steps.

I keep my body still and weigh my words carefully before I meet his gaze. “I don’t know what happened with Alvarez, although I can buy that he’s a traitor. But Cristiano?” I shake my head. “Not a chance. The evidence would have to be overwhelming and irrefutable to convince me otherwise. And it’s not. If it were, you wouldn’t have said he might be a traitor.”

His focus is razor-sharp. He hasn’t as much as blinked since I began talking.

“I don’t believe it,” I continue without hesitation. “And you don’t believe it, either.”

“I don’t know what I believe,” he murmurs, turning his back so I can’t see his turmoil. His humanity.

My heart breaks for the man who is left with an unfathomable choice. His wife or his brother. The decision becomes easier if Cristiano is a traitor, but he knows it’s not true.

I go to him—to where he’s staring into the abyss—and rest my hand on his back.

“No,” he shouts, jerking away like my palm is slathered in poison.

He rejects the attempt to soothe him—rejects my love—with a visceral reaction that seems almost instinctive. It leaves my insides trembling. A slap in the face would have stung far less.

Without another word, I lower my arm and turn to leave.

“An oligarch has him,” Antonio says quietly, as I reach the partition.

It’s an olive branch. I don’t move, in case there’s more.

“The package at the dock was from Dimitri Fedorov, the Pakhan of the European Bratva. It contained a message from Cristiano that at face value made him out to be a traitor. But it turned out to be a cryptic warning. Fedorov can rescue Cristiano, but he wants to have dinner with you in exchange.”

Fedorov can rescue Cristiano, but he wants to have dinner with you in exchange.What the hell, Antonio? You’re so damn possessive, no one’s allowed to see how I chew? I don’t understand.

“Dinner? That’s it? And you’re not considering it?”

“It could be dinner. It could be a trap.”

Of course.I didn’t think of it. “Would you be there, too?”

He nods.

I realize there’s some element of risk, but to do nothing is unconscionable. We can’t just let Cristiano remain a prisoner—or worse.He must realize this, too.

“We have to do it.” I step closer to him. “Antonio, you have to agree to it.”

He doesn’t say anything for a long moment. I’m not sure he even breathes. His expression tightens before he speaks.

“I intend to. It’s eating me alive, but I’ll agree to the terms. Because if I don’t, Fedorov will know exactly how important you are to me. As my wife, you’re always at some risk, but the risk will become infinitely greater. I have no fucking choice.” With a swipe of his arm, he knocks over a metal cart, and the medical supplies scatter across the floor.

I have no fucking choice. Could there be a less tenable position for a man who craves control?

The most efficient way to destroy a man is to take his women. His mother, sisters, daughters—wife. Any one of them will do.

There’s an element of possessiveness involved, and I have no empathy in that regard. But this is so much more. It’s a challenge to his power, his honor, complete with the searing shame of not being able to protect me. This is how they got to my father.

Even if a simple dinner is where it begins and ends, Fedorov took one step toward the jugular. And like a cornered animal, Antonio is lashing out.

There must be something I can do to make this easier.

The chasm between us widens, as I stare at a wad of cotton near the exam table, while trying to come up with something helpful. Everything I think of seems patronizing or dismissive. I’m at a total loss when he, finally, speaks.

“You’ve weakened me.”

The accusation twists in the blistering silence, the sharp edges slicing without mercy. My knees wobble, and I grab onto the nearest surface to steady myself.

As I absorb the pain, I close my eyes and brace for more. But there’s nothing else. Maybe there doesn’t have to be. The wound is already bloody and gaping. It might even be a deadly blow.

You’ve weakened me.I have.

I never wanted this. Yet I gave him my love and encouraged him to give me his in return. It was inevitable.

I gnaw on the inside of my cheek so that I don’t cry. There’s nothing more I can do or say right now that will change anything.

“I’m going to go see if the girls have moved into a new room. Let me know what you need from me regarding the dinner.”

Antonio doesn’t say anything. Nothing. I’m not surprised. You’ve weakened me stands on its own. He’s going to push me away and bury the emotion, the feelings, until I’m nothing more than a responsibility, like feeding the vineyard workers during the harvest, or tithing the church.

As I walk around the partition to leave, Antonio grabs me from behind and pins me against the wall, with my hands above my head.

“Do you know how much I want to hurt you, Princesa?”