Chapter 4 - Miss America, in all her glory.

Rino

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The dinning table stretched long enough to host a war. Polished glassware, hand-calligraphed name cards, centerpieces that looked like they belonged in a cathedral. Everything was perfect.

Boringly perfect.

I lounged back in my chair, one arm slung across the back of it, nursing a glass of Amarone that was definitely not meant for someone my age though no one in this house was ever going to stop me.

Fabio leaned toward me, “She’s really coming?”

“She has to,” I said, sipping slow. “Mama would drag her here by the hair if she had to.”

Gerardo snorted, “You mean the girl who slapped you?”

“Same one,” I said, grinning wide.

“Didn’t think you liked ‘em violent,” Fabio added, cocking a brow.

“I like ‘em angry,” I corrected, “Angry girls fall harder.”

Fabio’s little sister Valeria was across the table, fiddling with her necklace like she wanted to strangle herself with it. She was wearing some tight, sparkly thing she had no business wearing at sixteen and trying very, very hard to make eye contact with me.

I didn’t like her. She was my best friend's twin sister, too sweet and too predictable. The kind of girl who’d write poetry if I kissed her and sob into her pillow if I didn’t text back.

I didn’t want sweet tonight.

I wanted claws.

I wanted fire in eyes.

I wanted the girl who slapped me so hard my ears rang.

Valeria smiled at me, lips glossed up and shiny like candy. “You look very handsome tonight, Rino.”

I didn’t bother looking at her. I looked at the doors.

“She’s late,” I muttered.

“Maybe she’s not coming,” Gerardo joked. “Maybe she ran off.”

I smirked, “She’s not running.”

“You gonna make her pay for the slap?”

“Already did,” I said, flashing teeth. “Bit her hard enough to leave a mark. She threw a heel at me after.”

Fabio nearly choked on his wine. “You bit her?”

“Hard,” I said, I was proud. “Right on the shoulder. She tasted like rage and Chanel.”

“Jesus Christ,” Gerardo laughed.

“Relax, she liked it.”

“She threw a shoe at your head.”

“That’s just foreplay.”

Valeria stood and walked slowly toward our end of the table, “Rino,” she said sweetly, placing a hand on the back of my chair. “Have you tried the canapés? They’re delicious.”

I glanced up at her with a lazy smirk. “You know what’s really delicious?”

Valeria lit up instantly, eyes wide, lips parted, practically holding her breath like she thought I was about to say her.

“What?”

I didn’t bother answering her because the doors opened. And in walked Alessia fucking Capone.

Wearing red.

Blood red... the kind that made men stupid and girls jealous. Her lips matched the dress. Hair curled like she belonged on the cover of a magazine.

My grin curled slowly, because finally, I was starving and dinner had just strutted in.

I nodded toward her, “Now that,” I said loud enough for the table to hear, “is delicious.”

Valeria’s face crumpled like wet tissue.

I didn’t look at her. I didn’t care. I simply watched Alessia Capone cross the room like every step was a sentence and I was the executioner waiting at the end of it.

Her mother was glued to her side, hissing orders into her ear between those tight, society smiles. Alessia’s chin stayed high, shoulders stiff, like she was bracing for a bullet.

She didn’t look at me.

Which, frankly, made it so much sweeter.

Marcella Capone gave my mother a nod, and I swear I felt the temperature drop when Mamma turned toward Alessia like she was ready to inspect livestock. With the same expression she reserved for flawed diamonds and disappointing servants.

“Stop fidgeting,” she snapped. “You look nervous, and nervous brides are an insult.”

Alessia froze.

“Sit,” she said, gesturing to the empty chair next to mine. “And face your fiancé properly. Try to look grateful you were chosen.”

Alessia’s jaw clenched and then she sat, right next to me. The chair didn’t even creak under her, that’s how still she was. I could feel the heat rolling off her skin, could smell her perfume and pride mingling with the wine.

Marcella gave her a gentle push on the shoulder. “Go on.”

She swallowed, then turned toward me, her voice perfectly sweet and completely fake.

“I’m sorry I slapped you, Rino,” she said, loud enough for the table to hear. “It was uncalled for.”

I turned just slightly toward her, draped my arm along the back of her chair. She flinched like I was a flame getting a little too close.

“I forgive you,” I said, “Slaps happen.”

“Good,” my mother said crisply, “Now we can spend the rest of the evening like civilized families.”

She sat ramrod straight, hands folded in her lap, face polite and pale but her knee kept bouncing. And every so often, her gaze flicked to my wine glass like she was wondering if she could drown in it without making a scene.

I leaned in, murmuring just low enough for only her to hear.

“You looked prettier when you were wet.”

Her nostrils flared but she smiled at me.

This was going to be fun.

When our mothers were finally satisfied with her performance, they peeled off to join their husbands, where all the real deals were made. And the second we were left alone, everything about Alessia changed.

It was like someone flipped a switch.

She turned her head toward me, eyes locked on me and that fake little dinner party smile was gone.

“I take it back,” she said under her breath, “The apology.”

I raised a brow, “Yeah?”

“Every word,” she hissed. “You deserved that slap. And the shoe I threw at your head. And honestly, I should’ve broken your nose while I had the chance.”

God, I grinned.

There she was.

I leaned back in my chair, lazy and wide, one leg slung over the other like her anger was a song I’d been waiting all night to hear.

“There she is,” I murmured, “Miss America, in all her glory.”

Her eyes narrowed instantly. “Don’t call me that.”

My grin deepened.

Which meant I absolutely would.

I watched her lips wrap around the rim of my glass, right where mine had been. The heat that shot through me was immediate.

I tilted my head, pretending to think. “You know, it’s a shame.”

She didn’t look at me. “What is?”

“That you’re being wasted on me.”

She blinked, thrown but only for a second.

“I mean, look at you,” I continued, “All dressed up in a red dress. That slit. Those lips. You could have your pick of men. And yet...” I dragged my gaze down her body, unapologetically. “You’re mine.”

“You think I’m yours?” she asked.

I didn’t blink. “I know you are.”

Her smile was cold, “Don’t call me that. We’re not even officially engaged yet.”

I leaned in just enough for her to feel my presence all around her.

“Engagements can be broken,” she added.

I chuckled, “Not this one.”

She pursed her lips, “You’re delusional.”

“No,” I murmured. “I’m inevitable.”

She set the wineglass down, slowly, “Keep talking like that, and I’ll stab you with the dessert fork.”

I smirked, “What’s the matter, tesoro? Not used to being claimed?”

“You can’t claim a person.”

I grinned wider, “You’d be surprised what I can do when I want something.”

She leaned in just a breath, lips curling into the cruelest little smile I’d seen all night. “Then go want something else.”

And I swear to God, I’d never wanted someone more.

I rested my elbow on the back of her chair again, fingers barely grazing the silk at her shoulder. I let my fingers trail lower, down the side of her arm. Her skin went tight beneath my fingertips.

“Don’t touch me,” she said, lips barely moving.

“Don’t sit next to me in a dress like that if you don’t want to be touched.”

“I'm not joking when I say I’ll stab you.”

My fingers drifted lower, skimming the side seam of her thigh, right at the slit. She grabbed my wrist under the table, her nails dug in.

“Touch me again,” she whispered, “and I’ll twist your balls until you cry in front of your little friends.”

Fuck, I wanted to kiss her.

I leaned back slowly, dragging my hand away like I was doing her a favor, “See?” I said, smirking wide. “This is why they’re marrying us. We’re already perfect together. You keep threatening me. I keep not giving a fuck.”

I picked up my wineglass, the one she drank from and brought it to my lips. I made sure to place my mouth exactly where hers had been.

Then I smirked over the rim, eyes locked on her.

“That’s what they call chemistry, baby.”

She didn’t look at me again after that.

To ignore me harder, she turned to my cousin Laura across the table, all polite smiles and nods, pretending she cared about whatever boring shit Laura was saying.

So, naturally, I couldn’t help myself.

I let my hand drift beneath the linen again, sliding across the edge of her chair until I found her thigh, right where the slit parted.

Her voice didn’t change at all when I wrapped my finger around her little skinny thigh, slender enough to fit perfectly in my hand, delicate enough to bruise if I squeezed harder.

And still, she didn’t give me a reaction which only made me grip harder.

“Oh, Chicago is beautiful this time of year,” she said sweetly to Laura.

I pressed a little harder, letting my hand move slowly up and down the inside of her thigh but she didn't react.

Instead, she reached for her dessert fork with the same elegance she’d use to lift a glass of champagne.

“And the summers in Liguria,” she said to Laura, still smiling, “are so much gentler than Chicago’s. It’s the sea air, I think. It softens everything.”

She didn’t even look down as she stabbed the fork into my thigh.

Pain punched into me, fast and hot. My leg jerked under the table. My wine nearly tipped and she just kept smiling.

“I especially love the breeze in the late afternoons,” she added, twirling the fork that still embedded in my leg just enough to make me see stars. “Don’t you?”

I grit my teeth, sucking in a sharp breath through my nose, grinning like I wasn’t about to bleed through a twenty thousand-dollar suit.

Laura nodded, “The ocean air here’s unbeatable.”

“Oh, absolutely,” Alessia chirped, the picture of polite, Capone-bred elegance.

Holy. Fucking. Hell.

She yanked the fork out with one clean flick like she was plucking an olive from an hors d'oeuvre plate, set it delicately beside her dessert, and lifted her wineglass like a proper lady.

My thigh was on fire.

I bit my tongue hard enough to taste blood, just to stop myself from laughing like a lunatic.

Finally, she turned to me, her eyes were cold and her smirk colder.

“I told you not to touch me,” she whispered.

And for the first time all night, I didn’t have a single thing to say.

I was too busy bleeding.

And falling.

Fast.

Hard.

Headfirst into something I didn’t know how to stop

And then I heard chairs scrape back.

My father, Don Arturo Lombardi, and her father, Don Vittorio Capone stood up, the room fell silent in an instant. Every capo, every underboss, every wife and mistress and soldier turned their heads.

A knife tapped the edge of a wine glass and the room quieted.

“Famiglia,” Papà said, as he looked down the long table, pausing on each face, “Tonight, we break bread not as acquaintances, not as allies. But as blood.”

“Our two families,” Don Vittorio Capone continued, rising to stand beside him, “have shared respect across oceans, across decades. Honor, loyalty, history.”

“But tonight,” Arturo said, lifting his crystal glass, “we bind that respect in something stronger. Something that will outlive us.”

There it was.

Marriage.

The word wasn’t said, not outright.

It didn’t have to be.

This was the old world. The tradition. Old-school. Coded. Every man in the room knew what it meant.

“Her name will tie the Lombardis to Chicago,” Vittorio said, “And his name will root us deeper into Italy. Together, they will carry our blood forward.”

His daughter.

Me.

I looked at Alessia and fuck me, she looked like she was going to vomit.

Vittorio nodded toward us, “The Capones give their daughter, Alessia, in bond and in trust to the Lombardis.”

Don Arturo smiled beside him, the kind of smile that meant signatures were already drying on invisible contracts. “And the Lombardis receive that bond with honor. Rino will court her in the old tradition. And when the time comes, he will marry her as is written, as is right.”

Someone poured more wine. The room broke into applause. To our future. To the union. To the alliance.

To the deal.

I rose to my feet first, blood still warm in my leg, soaking into the dark fabric of my slacks. I reached down and offered her my hand, the picture of a well-bred heir playing the role of doting fiancé.

She didn’t take it.

So I leaned in and whispered, “Get up, tesoro. Everyone’s watching. You wouldn’t want to embarrass your family again, would you?”

She looked up at me with pure loathing. The kind that burned hotter than the blood I was still losing but she stood because she was a Capone.

I wrapped my arm around her waist and pulled her into my side. She was cold in my grip like marble.

I leaned down and murmured right in her ear, low enough for only her to hear, “My claim over you is written in blood now, tesoro. Fitting, no?”

The room around us roared with applause. Wine glasses clinked. Laughter bounced off the frescoed walls. Salute! Auguri! The men shouted like they were toasting a football win, and the women watched us with soft smiles, pretending this wasn’t the most beautiful hostage exchange they’d ever seen.

I smiled wider, because I was winning. And nothing looked better on me than victory.

"To Rino and Alessia!" someone yelled.

Perfect.

I turned to her slowly, theatrically, because we were center stage and kissed her right on the cheek. A kiss meant for cameras and power plays. She flinched, her jaw tight under my lips.

I pulled back just an inch, just enough to breathe against her skin and whisper, “Smile, sposa. Or I’ll kiss you somewhere worse.”

Her head turned. I felt her eyes burn through me. But when she faced the crowd again, her mouth stretched into a smile.

Perfect. Elegant. Poisoned at the root.

It was the fakest fucking thing I’d ever seen.

And the most beautiful.