Page 95 of Made for Sinners

DANTE

If the gala was a battlefield, Emilia was winning.

Crystal chandeliers glittered overhead, casting fractured light across the marble floors. The air buzzed with the low hum of polite conversation, the clinking of champagne flutes, and the quiet, calculated laughter of people who wore civility like a mask and violence like a second skin. Everyone here was someone—old money, new power, or dangerous enough to fake both.

I’d been to hundreds of these events over the years. They were all the same—smiles sharp as knives, handshakes that meant nothing, and deals whispered between courses. I usually endured them with the same detached indifference I reserved for funerals.

But tonight was different.

Tonight, I had Emilia.

And I couldn’t take my fucking eyes off her.

She moved through the crowd like she owned it—head high, shoulders back, that midnight blue dress hugging her body like it had been stitched onto her skin. The slit up her thigh wasa calculated threat, and the way she walked in those heels? A goddamn declaration of war.

She was magnetic. Every man in the room noticed her. I saw the way their eyes followed her, the way their gazes lingered too long. I saw it, and I didn’t care how expensive their suits were or how many zeroes followed their names—I’d break every single one of their fingers if they touched her.

She was mine.

And tonight, she looked like she knew it.

I stood near the bar, a glass of bourbon in hand, watching her from across the room. She was laughing at something Adrianna said, her head tilted back slightly, the curve of her neck exposed and glowing under the soft lighting. Her smile was real—sharp, amused, just a little dangerous.

God, she was beautiful.

Not just in the way that made men stupid. Not just in the way that made women want to hate her. But in the way that made you want to burn the world down just to keep her warm.

“Jesus,” Luca muttered beside me, nursing his drink. “You’re staring at her like she’s the last woman on earth.”

“She might as well be,” I said without looking away.

Rafe let out a low whistle. “You’re really in it, huh?”

I glanced at them, both standing there without dates, dressed to the nines and still somehow managing to look like they’d rather be anywhere else.

“No dates tonight?” I asked, arching a brow.

Luca smirked. “Didn’t want to upstage you and the wife.”

Rafe shrugged. “Didn’t feel like pretending to care about someone for three hours.”

I grunted, sipping my bourbon. “Cowards.”

Luca laughed. “Says the man who married the one woman who can actually hold her own in a room like this.”

He wasn’t wrong.

Emilia wasn’t just surviving this world—she was thriving in it. She didn’t flinch at the power plays, didn’t shrink under the weight of the stares. She met them head-on, chin tilted, eyes sharp. She was dangerous in a way no one expected.

And I loved that about her.

I finished my drink and handed the glass to a passing server before pushing off the bar. “I’m going to check on her.”

“Try not to drool,” Luca called after me.

I didn’t bother responding. I was already walking.

She was standing near the silent auction tables, her fingers trailing lightly over the edge of a clipboard as she read through the items. Her expression was thoughtful, focused, but there was a spark of mischief in her eyes that told me she was up to something.

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