Page 65 of Isle of Seduction
“Let's get you cleaned up and fed, sweetheart.”
I scoop her up bridal style and enter the shower in her bedroom, depositing her carefully on the cold tiles before heating the water and lathering her hair with shampoo to massage her scalp. I’m sure her legs feel like mine, jelly instead of flesh and bones, melting under the weight of what we just shared.
She lets out a sigh and relaxes under my hands and the pride I feel is too big for the fucking small organ in my chest.
* * *
It’s late when we sit on the sofa, but despite the hours of sleep I got earlier today, I’m still bone tired, a deep sense of failure and dread filling every crevice of my being. If it weren’t for the woman occupying my space right now, I’d be going on a murder spree and take Addams from his bed to bleed him like a pig in front of his wife.
Nico enters the living room.
“Hey, fratellino,” I greet him.
He doesn’t stop his advancing march, and his intention is clear on his severe face. I stand and he wraps me in his arms, squeezing me to his chest. I didn’t know I needed my brother’s love as much as I needed Giulia’s. The fierce protectiveness my brother shows me always presents itself in his actions, in his capacity to obey orders, get his hands dirty and keep a cool head no matter the situation.
I take a step back and observe him. Right now, his control hangs on by a thread. I don’t know if he wants to embrace me again or punch me in the face. Maybe both. He needs blood, and I’ll have to provide it if I want to keep his demons in check. His eyes are wild with hunger and his fists clench at his side.
Giulia must feel it too, because she comes to him and places a hand on his shoulders. “Let’s talk, fratellu.”
Nico visibly relaxes and quirks a brow at the endearment. She called him “brother” in the language of Kalliste. It’s close enough to Italian that we don’t need a translator, but it’s the first time she acknowledges we are a family. My brother looks between my wife and I, and nods to himself with a tip of his lips. His own smile. His own acceptance of our new reality.
“Don’t fucking say a thing,” I tell him. He’s gonna tease me about it. He never does with words, but he has a way of expressing every single emotion with his eyes that’s uncanny and irritates the shit out of me.
“I never do.”
“Boys, when you’re done being boys, maybe we can start?”
I turn a heated gaze to my wife. She looks freshly fucked, frizzy hair flying around her face and wearing flannel pyjamas that make her look so at ease in our home. I’d take another bite if my bastard brother wasn’t in the room with us.
There’s always later.
Right now, someone’s after me and mine.
“I haven’t got to read the news yet. Hit me up,” I tell them, bracing for the worst.
Giulia clears her throat and shifts on the couch, placing her feet underneath her. I recognise the defence mechanism for what it is.
“Right now, you’re in a press shit storm. Your name and your face are on every news channel and, well, we were busy today, so I didn’t get to call on the many favours I’m owed to do damage control.”
“What about the lawyers? What can they do? Can’t they call for defamation?”
“They’re working on clearing the charges,” Nico says. “The evidence against you is flimsy.”
I raise a brow, waiting for an explanation.
“Your fingerprints were on the scene of Mia’s murder, but she was strangled, like the previous body and your prints were not on her neck. Clarke and DeRossi can argue you fucked her, or…”
“No.” I cut him off, my word final. “I won’t have the press paint me as a cheater.”
“Better than a murderer,” Giulia grumbles.
I take her hand in mine. “I’m not getting your name into this mess. Don’t even say a thing if you don’t want to be tied to our bed and edged until you fucking pass out, guerrieritta.”
“Madre di Dio,” Nico swears, but I ignore him. If he thinks I don’t know the club he goes to when he’s in London, he’s mistaken. Edging Giulia is the least I will do if she fights me on this. I’m not budging.
“We need to control your image,” she argues.
“Don’t fucking bother. By now, I have no chance of winning those fucking elections. Let everyone believe I’m the wolf who’ll kill their entire family if they cross me. That’s who I’ve always been, anyway.”