All Chapters of Blood Wedding: A Mafia Romance: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

DANTEMarco's office smelled like stale coffee and something else I couldn't quite place. Stress-related stench maybe. He was sitting at his desk when I walked in, looking like he'd aged a lot since Rafael's funeral. The man who'd always been solid, unshakeable, the person my father trusted most in the world, looked like he was barely holding himself together."You wanted to see me?" I asked, closing the door behind me."Yeah. Sit." He gestured to the chair across from his desk but didn't look up from whatever paperwork he was sorting through. His hands were shaking slightly. I'd never seen Marco's hands shake before.I sat and waited. Let him work through whatever he needed to work through before starting this conversation. That's how you dealt with Marco. You gave him space to get his thoughts in order.Finally he looked up. His eyes were bloodshot like he hadn't slept in days. "I need to talk to you about something. And I need you to not react like Dante Torrisi. I need you to reac

THALIAThe room I'd claimed as a studio wasn't really a studio at all. It was some kind of unused sitting room on the second floor that nobody seemed to care about, which made it perfect for me. Large windows that let in good light, enough space to set up my easel without feeling cramped, and most importantly it was far enough from the main living areas that I could disappear here for hours without anyone noticing or caring.I'd been painting since early afternoon and the light was starting to shift into that golden quality that made everything look softer than it actually was. My canvas was maybe halfway done, the rough shapes and colors blocked in but nothing detailed yet. I was working on the garden from my father's house in Boston, the walled garden behind the east wing where my mother used to grow roses before she died.It was the only place in that house where I'd ever felt like I could breathe. The walls were high enough that you couldn't see the guards patrolling, couldn't see

THALIAThe kitchen was dark when I walked in around two in the morning. I'd been staring at my ceiling for the past hour thinking about Salvatore's words, about expensive perfume and trembling hands and how he'd asked if I was happy like it was a simple question with a simple answer.I turned on the light over the stove. Just enough to see by. Found a glass in the cabinet and filled it with water, the sound of it running from the tap too loud in all this silence.I was leaning against the counter when footsteps echoed down the hallway. My whole body went tense until Dante appeared in the doorway.We both stopped. Looked at each other. He was in sweatpants and a t-shirt, hair messy like he'd been running his hands through it for the past hour. He looked exhausted. Worse than exhausted."Sorry," I said. "Couldn't sleep. I'll just...""Don't." He moved into the kitchen, went straight for the glasses. "Can't sleep either."So this was becoming a thing. Both of us wandering down here at un

THALIARosa found me in the garden two days after the kitchen incident with Dante. I'd been avoiding him successfully, which wasn't hard since he seemed to be avoiding me just as much. We'd become experts at not being in the same room at the same time."Thalia, dear." Rosa was carrying something wrapped in a soft cloth. "I was going through some of Rafael's things and I found this. Thought you might want it."She handed me the bundle and I unwrapped it carefully to find a phone, it was an older model that Rafael must have used before the wedding."I wasn't sure if you'd want his things," Rosa continued, her voice soft and careful like she was worried about upsetting me. "But the phone might have photos or messages you'd like to see, memories of him before… before."My throat got tight. "Thank you."Rosa squeezed my shoulder gently and left me alone on the garden bench with Rafael's phone in my hands. I stared at it for a long minute, not sure if I actually wanted to go through a dead

DANTEThe security office was empty when I walked in around midnight. I'd waited until Tommy had gone home for the night because I didn't want anyone watching over my shoulder while I went through this. I didn't trust anyone else to look at it properly, to see what I was seeing or not see what I needed them to miss.The override code that had disabled the cameras on the wedding night had been bothering me for weeks. Tommy had pulled the logs, had shown me the code that was used, but something about it felt off and I couldn't figure out what until I'd started digging deeper into the system myself.I pulled up the access logs and started going through them line by line, checking timestamps and authorization levels and all the tedious shit that came with maintaining a security system this complex. The compound had been upgraded three years ago, new cameras, new software, new codes for everyone who needed access. But the old system was still in there somewhere, buried in the code like a g