Page 180 of Anti-Heroes in Love Duet
My heart pounded slow and hard in my chest, each pulse heavy with awe and fear. I’d never had so much to lose and never been so unwilling to lose any of it.
“I missed you this morning,” she whispered in my ear after accepting my kiss. The words made her blush, but she powered through. “I ached for you.”
I kissed the top of her head and then coaxed her to get out of her chair so I could take her place then bring her down onto my lap. She allowed me to maneuver her and settled naturally in my lap. Something on the table caught my eye, fresh cuts in the wood beside the muted tone of my carved initials ‘EDD.’ I leaned forward, taking her with me, to peer at the table and then swallowed thickly at what had been newly cut into the wood.
EDDS+ECL
Edward Dante Davenport Salvatore had been joined by Elena Caprice Lombardi.
Emotion threatened to strangulate me.
When I looked up, my gaze snared on Tore’s golden eyes, his expression suffused with tender happiness. He liked this for me. Elena for me.
My heart burned.
“I hope you don’t mind,” Elena said, showing me the knife in her hand, her lips curled on one side in a little smile. “I didn’t like the look of it alone.”
“No,” I agreed gruffly. “This is better.”
“I have to talk to you,” I told her, leaning in to press a kiss to the hickey still purpling a spot on her neck. “Will you go for a walk in the grove with me?”
She frowned slightly, running a hand in the back of my hair in a way that made me want to fucking purr. She didn’t realize it because she thought she was cold, but the way she offered me comfort was automatic and beautiful.
“Of course.” She stood, dropped the knife, and wiped her hands on a dish towel. “Tore, I’ll finish the chopping for thezitiwhen we get back.”
“No ti preoccupare,” he said,no worries.
We shared a look over her shoulder as I stood and took her hand to usher her away from the house. His face smoothed out and turned to stone, his eyes alive with fire.
He knew what had happened to Marco.
He was just the best actor I’d ever known and had unwittingly passed that trait on to his son, Sebastian, who didn’t even know that was where he got the talent from.
So many fucking secrets.
“What’s happened?” Lena asked me, her eyes sharp on the side of my face as we padded across the sloping lawn to the rows of lemons trees.
Their scent was thick in the warm air, sweet and tangy enough to make my mouth water.
“Dante?” she asked, tugging on my hand so that I would look at her.
She was so beautiful there among the yellow fruit, her classically beautiful features made striking by her remarkable red hair and pale gold skin, by the heavy-lidded eyes that made her gaze unbelievably sultry. For a brief irrational moment, I just wanted to lay her down under theSfusato Amalfitanolemons and fuck her into the dirt. I wanted to bury my sorrow and fear in her sweet body and forget about the weight of so many worlds on my shoulders.
“Marco was shot,” I told her instead, telling it to her straight as I took her face in my hands. “He’s in the hospital, but it doesn’t look good.”
“No,” she breathed, the word an expulsion of air from a popped balloon.
I nodded. “The di Carlos got him outside one of our pizzerias. The same one I first met Marco at years ago. We have a mole in the outfit, and this fucking reeks of his work.”
“A mole?” Her eyes were wide, dark, and textured as wet concrete.
“Mason Matlock told me a few months ago, but I haven’t been able to discover who it is,” I admitted.
“Mason Matlock has been missing for months…He’s presumed dead,” she said slowly, that keen mind working.
I shrugged. “We didn’t kill him. We gave him back to his family when we were done with him.”
“…But at that point, he would be more of a liability than he was worth,” she surmised. When I didn’t say anything, she cursed softly. “This world of yours is savage.”
