Chapter 12 Vincenzo
Vincenzo
I’ve made it a point not to look at him all week.
I’ve taken other routes between classes.
Sat on the opposite end of the war table.
Ignored the way his name keeps falling from the mouths of other heirs—Dragovich this, Nikolaj that, did you see what he did to that Romanian heir on the third floor?
I let the noise build around me like smoke, but I didn’t breathe it in.
Every glance he throws my way, I’ve treated like an insult I don’t need to acknowledge. Every smirk, every casually unbuttoned shirt, every comment laced with innuendo and mockery—I’ve dismissed with silence.
I haven’t risen to it, I haven’t snapped, and I haven’t touched him. But I’ve fucked four women in six nights.
All of them willing. All of them beautiful. All of them forgettable.
I’d touch their hair, their thighs, push them down on the silk sheets, and watch them arch for me.
I’d kiss their throats, grip their hips, and do all the things I’ve been trained to do to keep up appearances.
Every time one of them moaned my name, I let myself think maybe this would be the one that silenced the noise.
It never was.
No matter how many warm bodies I bury myself in, no matter how many soft thighs, open mouths, and vacant eyes I lose myself behind, he always finds a way back into my bloodstream.
He’s poison that doesn’t kill. A toxin that lies dormant until I close my eyes, until I’m wound tight with sweat and need and silence, and then it hits me in a wave so raw it burns.
It’s been a week since the fight. Since I watched him drop five men like a goddamn hurricane wrapped in sweat and muscle.
One of them was my cousin. Family. Blood.
My blood. And yet, even as I stood there watching him crumple to the ground, all I could think about was how good Nikolaj looked in motion.
How he moved as though violence was the only language that ever taught him anything useful.
Now Matteo’s still unconscious, hooked up to machines in the private clinic off-campus, and the whispers in the hallways don’t ask what happened—they ask how the fuck Dragovich is still walking around like he’s untouchable. They ask why I haven’t retaliated, and I don’t answer.
The truth is, I don’t know anymore. I’m supposed to be composed. A Vieri doesn’t break for enemies. He doesn’t watch the boy who put his cousin in a coma walk down the halls with blood still crusted on his boots and feel anything but calculation.
But I’m not composed, and it’s starting to show.
I’m at the open gym, sprawled on the bleachers with a towel slung over my neck and my gloves sitting untouched beside me.
My workout was supposed to burn it out. Forty minutes of bag work, a ten-minute sprint, then a cold shower.
But none of it worked because the second I walked into the space, the scent of sweat and chalk and blood hit me—and so did the sound of his laugh.
I glance down toward the ring.
Nikolaj Dragovich. Prince of the North Wing. Bratva’s favorite bastard—covered in blood and smiling.
He’s sparring with Lev, one of the other Russian heirs—an older, bulkier bastard with hands like bricks and the speed of a freight train.
They’re laughing as they throw fists and dodge blows like this is foreplay, not combat.
Every time Nikolaj lands a hit, he grins wider.
Every time Lev knocks him back, Nikolaj spits blood and laughs louder.
He’s wearing a black tank top that clings to his frame, soaked through, with the arm holes so low that I catch the flash of silver just below the edge of the fabric.
His nipples are now pierced. He doesn’t hide them; of course he doesn’t. Dragovich doesn’t hide anything unless it’s a weapon.
The chain he’s always wearing bounces lightly against his collarbone with every step. His joggers—gray and clinging—are soaked at the waistband and thighs. The fabric rides low enough that the material hiding the curve of his pelvis is more suggestion than coverage.
He’s a fucking spectacle, and I can’t stop watching him.
I force myself to look away. My jaw is clenched so hard my molars ache, and my hands curl into fists without thought.
I’ve ignored every one of his provocations.
I’ve pretended not to notice when he walked too close in the corridor, or when he laughed with his head thrown back just outside my door.
I’ve held onto every inch of the control drilled into me since birth.
And it’s unraveling.
Even now, as I look down at him again and try to focus on the sparring match, my eyes trace the curve of his stomach.
The twitch of his throat when he grins. The way his joggers cling too tight, too low, damp with effort.
The silver glint of those piercings, fucking teasing me, taunting me with the knowledge that he’d let me put my mouth there if I just stopped pretending.
But I can’t.
He’s chaos personified and reckless. He put my cousin in a coma and walked away smiling. Worse—he knows he’s in my head.
He looks up right then, mid-swing, mid-laugh, and looks straight at me. Not at the crowd or even at his opponent.
At me.
His eyes are wild and bright, pale blue, iced-over fire… and he grins. Blood on his teeth, sweat on his jaw. Pierced. Scarred. Filthy.
Perfect.
He doesn’t say a word, just raises his hands in a lazy guard and throws another punch.
If I stand right now, I’ll go to him. And if I go to him, I’ll destroy everything. My legacy. My name. My kingdom.
Myself.
I don’t notice the pain until I realize my fingernails have dug crescents into my palms.
I should leave.
Lev comes at him again, and this time, Nikolaj grabs the back of his neck, drives him down to the mat, and straddles his chest in one fluid motion.
Blood drips from the corner of his mouth.
His tank top clings to him like a second skin.
His thighs flex under the weight of the hold, and his grin deepens as he leans over the pinned heir and murmurs something too low to hear.
Lev groans—maybe in pain, maybe in something else—then Nikolaj lets him up after another beat. He stands, breathless but glowing, and when he rolls his neck, his eyes land on me again—longer this time.
I clench my jaw, hard enough my teeth grind. This isn’t about the fight, not anymore. It never was. This is for me. This is him reminding me how free he is, how unbothered, how unapologetically obscene he can be in a room full of killers and still walk out untouched.
Because he knows I can’t be like him. I was raised to be a crown in a storm, not the storm itself. Raised to fold desire into neat, private boxes. Raised to think shame was weakness and want was a disease.
And right now, watching him drenched in sweat and blood and sin, I want.
I want to pin him down and erase that grin. I want to see what he looks like when he breaks. I want to leave marks where no one else can see them. I want to hear him say my name like it’s a goddamn prayer and not just another taunt on his tongue.
He tilts his head at me, smirks, then runs a hand through his hair, tugging it back from his face in a motion so smug I could knock his teeth in for it.
I stand abruptly. It’s not a choice, it’s instinct.
I grab my bottle, turn away, and head for the locker rooms without a word, without a glance, and without anything that tells the truth.
But my fists are clenched, my throat is dry, and the ghost of his grin is branded behind my eyes.