Page 13 of Savage Proposal

“Wait,” Cristian said, and I looked at him. “I won’t hear your confession today until you agree to tell her.”

“Really?”You can take the boy out of the Cosa Nostra, I thought. “Isn’t extortion a sin?”

“Deciding not to hear your confession isn’t extortion,” I said. “We aren’t going to make a mockery of contrition. You’re not truly remorseful.”

We sat, glaring at one another; the tension became a near-touchable thing between us. “If you eventhinkabout telling her.”

Cristian raised an eyebrow in question. “Are youreallythreatening me, Enzo?” he asked. “Your confessor?”

“You aren’t my confessor if you won’ttakemy confession,pazzo.”

“Your brother, then,” he countered. “Do you think that I’m afraid of you,fratellone?”

Even Damian and Elio, as free as they were around me, knew when to stop pushing. Only Cristian was brave enough, or stupid enough, to stare me down. “Don’t make me threaten you,” I said. It was a command and a plea all at once. Now that Sienna was gone, Cristian was my last hold on any shred of humanity that I had left. Losing him would mean giving in to the monster lurking beneath the surface, and we both knew it.

Cristian pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’m not going to say anything,” he said finally. When he looked at me again, his expression was unfriendly. “But only because I think it should come from you.”

“What about my confession?”

He shook his head. “Call Father David if you want,” he said. “I won’t give you absolution.”

More silence, more tension. “Are you staying for dinner?”

Another stretch of glaring, and then the corners of Cristian’s mouth curved upward into a grimace of a smile. “Amalia is making eggplant parm,” he said. “What do you think?”

I stood. “Good.” I motioned for him to get up. “Come spar with me before dinner. If you’re not going to play the role of the confessor today, the least you could do is let me kick your ass.”

CHAPTER 8

Isabella

“Ican’t believe you walked away from all of this,” I said. Cristian Vitali was so different from his brother that it was hard to imagine them growing up together. The younger brother was quick to smile, easy to make laugh; there was a gentleness to him that simply did not exist in Lorenzo.

Cristian hummed as he took another bite of eggplant. He was on his second helping; Amalia seemed to preen every time he reached for another piece. “My father wasn’t happy, I can tell you,” he said. His eyes cut to Lorenzo, who was glowering at his own plate. “But Enzo fought for me to be able to join the Church.”

“Did he?” I looked at Lorenzo, surprised. It wasn’t that Lorenzo didn’t seem the type to fight for his family…but his brother wantedoutof the organization that he now runs. It seemed counterintuitive.

“Only because you would have been shit as myvicecapo,” Lorenzo said in a voice that was more of a growl. He almost didn’t sound human. I didn’t know what he was mad about, butit had been like that since he and Cristian had come out of his office after lunch.

Cristian didn’t seem affected at all by his mood, though. “Keep telling yourself that,” he said. He looked at me and rolled his eyes, playful, as if Lorenzo wasn’t one of the scariest men that I had ever met in my life. “So, Isabella, you’re a nurse?”

His question was innocent, but it felt like a backhand. “Yes,” I said. “I mean, I’m a CNA, but I’m in school to get my nursing degree…or Iwasin school, anyway.” I didn’t know whether someone from the Vitalis had formally withdrawn me from school, or if I had disappeared. Either way, I had missed nearly two weeks’ worth of classes, and I would have been kicked out of the program anyway.

“I’m sure nursing is difficult,” Cristian continued as if he hadn’t knocked my world off its axis a little. I had been doing wellnotthinking about the life that I had built for myself that was all but ruined now. “What made you choose it?”

Again, there was that backhanded feeling. I tried not to curl in on myself, even as I felt my shoulders slump inward. “I don’t know. I like helping people, I suppose.” It wasn’t totally a lie, but it wasn’t the full truth either, and from the look on Cristian’s face, he knew, but he only smiled and nodded.

“I understand that,” he said. “Helping people is one of the reasons that I joined the Church. Doing charity work is one of my greatest joys. You should come down sometime and?—”

“Cris,” Lorenzo barked. “Enough.”

Cristian glared at his older brother, but he didn’t push when I thought that he might. Instead, he turned to Amalia, who was seated between her husband and Damian, and thanked her formaking his favorite meal. “Would it be too much to bother you for an espresso before I go?”

I all but jumped up. I wanted—no, needed—to get a little air. The tension was coating the inside of my throat; I felt like I was going to choke. “I’ll get it.”

I practically sprinted to the kitchen. It had taken me a few days to figure out the too-fancy coffee machine, but now I was something of an expert. It was, basically, the only thing in the kitchen that Amalia let me touch, other than the Keurig, which didn’t compare.

I was tamping down the espresso when fingers closed around my arm, tight and painful, and yanked me around. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Lorenzo had pulled me in against his chest, and for a moment, all I could focus on was the heady scent of his cologne.

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