Chapter 7: *****

"I am not sleeping in that bed," I said, my voice cutting through the quiet room.

Damiano didn't even look back at me as he walked toward the bathroom door. "Suit yourself, Valentina. But the floor gets incredibly cold by two in the morning."

"I'd rather freeze on the floor than touch anything that belongs to you," I shot back, crossing my arms tightly over my chest.

He didn't reply. The heavy bathroom door clicked shut behind him, followed by the sudden, steady hiss of running water.

I whirled around and scanned the room, looking for any possible exit. The bedroom was massive, dominated by a king-sized bed with dark silk sheets that looked like a trap. The walls were lined with dark wood paneling, and a massive set of floor-to-ceiling glass windows looked out over the pitch-black grounds of the estate. I hurried over to the windows, my fingers desperately searching the frame for a latch, a lock, anything.

Nothing. They were completely sealed, solid panes of heavy glass that wouldn't budge an inch.

"Damn it," I whispered, slamming my fist lightly against the frame.

Giving up on the windows, I dragged a heavy, high-backed wooden chair from the corner of the room and placed it right beside the glass. I sat down rigidly, keeping my boots firmly planted on the floor, my hands balled into fists in my lap. I wasn't going to take off the black silk dress. I wasn't going to let my guard down. I was going to stay awake, watch the doors, and wait for daylight.

Ten minutes later, the bathroom door swung open.

A thick cloud of steam rolled into the bedroom, carrying the sharp scent of cedar and expensive soap. I braced myself, expecting him to walk out in another tailored suit, but the sight that met my eyes made the words catch instantly in my throat.

Damiano stepped out wearing nothing but a pair of low-slung, dark gray sweatpants. His hair was damp, a few stray dark strands falling over his forehead, and water droplets were still tracking paths down his skin. He didn't have a shirt on. His chest and shoulders were broad, carved with heavy, functional muscles that looked like they belonged to an athlete, not just a businessman sitting behind a desk.

But it wasn't the muscles that drew my eyes. It was the skin itself.

Traced across his ribs and abdomen were several jagged, pale silver entry marks—bullet scars. One particularly deep, circular scar sat just inches above his heart, a violent reminder of the world he lived in.

I tried to snap my eyes away, forcing myself to look out the dark window, but my gaze betrayed me for a split second too long.

"See something you like, Valentina?" Damiano asked, his deep baritone cutting through the silence. He didn't sound angry; there was a faint, mocking edge to his voice.

"I see exactly what you are," I snapped, keeping my face turned toward the glass, though I could see his reflection moving behind me. "A target. You’ve been shot more times than a firing range wall."

"In my world, scars mean you survived the mistake," Damiano said, his footsteps completely silent as he walked across the plush carpet toward me. "The men who gave them to me didn't survive theirs."

"Is that supposed to scare me?" I asked, forcing my chin up as his shadow fell over my chair.

"It's supposed to educate you," he said.

Before I could move, Damiano leaned down over my chair. He placed his hands firmly on the wooden armrests on either side of my thighs, completely trapping me between his arms. He didn't touch me, but he was so close I could feel the direct heat radiating off his bare chest. The clean scent of his soap mixed with the natural warmth of his skin, crowding my senses until the air in my lungs felt tight.

"Get out of my face," I hissed, leaning as far back into the wooden frame of the chair as I could go.

"You're shaking, Valentina," he murmured, his dark eyes scanning my face, checking my expression with a terrifying level of focus.

"I am not shaking because I'm scared of you," I lied, my heart hammering against my ribs so loudly I was certain he could hear it. "I'm shaking because I want to rip that smug look right off your face again."

A tiny, dangerous smile tugged at the corner of his lips. "You already had your turn on the stage. You won't get a second one. Go to the bed. Get some sleep."

"I told you, I am stay right here."

"The wedding is at eight o'clock tomorrow morning," Damiano said, his voice dropping into a rough, serious whisper that brushed against my cheek. He leaned in a fraction closer, his eyes locked entirely onto mine. "My world eats weak people alive, Valentina. If you walk into that chapel looking like a ghost, they will see it as a vulnerability. I don't tolerate vulnerability."

"Then let me go!" I demanded, my hands coming up to press against his bare shoulders to shove him away. His skin was hot, the muscles underneath feeling like solid rock under my palms. "If I'm such a liability, throw me back into the street! Let me take my dad and leave!"

"You're not a liability, you're my wife in less than nine hours," Damiano growled, his grip on the armrests tightening until the wood creaked under his palms. "Now get in the—"

The words were instantly torn away by a deafening, explosive boom that shattered the silence of the night.

The floor-to-ceiling glass window right beside my head disintegrated into a million tiny, lethal shards. A heavy, violent spray of glass swept into the room like a wave.

"Get down!" Damiano roared.

Before I could even register the sound, his massive weight slammed into my front. He tackled me right out of the chair, his arms wrapping tightly around my waist as we went flying onto the hard carpeted floor.

A heavy, deafening spray of automatic gunfire tore through the darkness. High-caliber bullets ripped through the air exactly where my head had been a second ago, chewing the wooden chair to splinters and shredding the silk curtains into rags. Plaster exploded from the walls, raining white dust down on us as the gunfire continued to blast through the shattered window frame without stopping.

Damiano covered my body entirely with his own, his chest pressing me flat against the floor, his large hands protecting the back of my head as the glass and bullets rained down around us.