Page 70 of Savage Bratva King

I don’t answer.

“Stop being such a cold-hearted moron, Leonid. Admit it. You’re in love with her.”

“I got her a puppy.”

“Of course you did.” Victoria releases a heavy sigh. “And I bet you’ve never experienced a feeling like it when you saw her reaction.”

I smile and I know how goofy I’d look right now if I could see my reflection in a mirror.

“You spoke about trapping Xander Amory in a tunnel earlier. I get it now. The refuge will block him in at one end when the commissioner’s wife tells him what upstanding citizens we are. But if you were to marry his sister-in-law, there’d be no way out for him.”

Andrej joked about me marrying her at our last meeting, but Victoria is serious.

“When I get married, I don’t want it to be a strategic move to take down my enemy.”

“It won’t be. You’re looking at this totally the wrong way.”

“But you just said?—”

“Jeez, Leonid. You’ve got it bad. Did you not hear me when I said that you have feelings for this woman? You’re in love, my silly little brother. You might end a war, but you’ll get to spend the rest of your life with someone you care about. If she’ll have you.”

If she’ll have me?

That’s the million-dollar question.

* * *

Gianna is playing with the dogs in the garden when I get back to the house.

I stand on the decking and watch her for a while. When she’s with the dogs, she loses the strained air of a prisoner who doesn’t know when she’ll be released, and instead, becomes the Gianna Sedric she would be if her life choices were hers to make.

She wears no makeup. Her hair has been fashioned into a messy bun on top of her head without the use of clips or bobby pins, stray curls framing her flushed cheeks and broad smile. She’s wearing denim cut-offs, a plain black T-shirt, and her feet are bare. She’s comfortable in her own skin without the pressures of the family she was born into, and I try to convince myself that this was my gift to her. By holding her hostage, I unwittingly gave her the freedom to exist outside of family constraints.

But marriage is a whole different ball game.

She wants me. Her desire and passion for me is as violent and powerful as mine is for her. I’m no expert on love, but now that Victoria has spoken the words out loud and opened my eyes to my feelings, I know that a world without Gianna Sedric in it will be a world without sunshine.

Sweat beads on my forehead and trickles down my spine as I crick my neck from side to side. I feel like my world is teetering on the edge of a precipice. If I’m not totally deluded, and Gianna agrees to be my wife, my life will land on an even plain, one that I’ll have to learn to navigate with her by my side, but it will have a bright dawn on the horizon, and a glorious sunset to match. But if she refuses…

I might as well walk naked into Amory territory with a target on my exposed back and ask him to shoot me with my own weapon.

And I haven’t even considered what my parents will say about it.

At least I have Victoria on my side. Her love for Aleksei may not set off fireworks whenever she looks at him, but there is no jealousy or bitterness in her heart; she still wishes happiness on her siblings.

“Leo?” Gianna smiles at me as the dogs come bounding my way, and heat spreads through my chest. “You’re back.” She studies my face closely, her eyes filled with concern.

“I-I have something to discuss.”

She chews her bottom lip. “Is it my family?”

Her eyes drift to the back of the house as if her sister might suddenly appear in the doorway, arms open wide to welcome her back into the fold. Is this the best parting gift I could give her: a reunion with her family?

Suddenly, I feel way off track here.

Maybe this, us, our nights of unrivaled passion, has just been a learning curve to her.

Her parting gift to me:Thanks for the ride, Leo, it was fun while it lasted.

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