Chapter 20 Emilio
Emilio squeezed the shoulder of the teen he’d been teaching and stepped away. He’d had the kids set up their easels in the park outside the warehouse Marco was letting Cal and Luca use. The wildlife and plants created plenty of views for them to capture with whatever medium they’d chosen. The boy he’d been helping was working in charcoal. His deft, bold lines showed he spent every spare moment he could on his art, although probably more commonly with a spray can on a wall given his style.
Emilio could understand the drive to create as an outlet. It was what had led him to Europe to study instead of staying with his pack and taking up the family business as everyone expected. Not that he’d left the darker parts of his heritage behind when he’d left New Trinity, the City of Demons.
Now he was back. Not by choice, but because Marco had called him home. His family needed him, and after the way his father had disgraced them, Emilio would do anything to make it up to his Alpha. Even marry a man he’d never met. A witch he’d never met. Especially if it kept Luca’s new mate safe .
He wasn’t all that worried about what he had to do. Marriage as a concept was meaningless to him. It was nothing compared to the kind of bonds Angelo and Luca had formed with their mates, and it didn’t bother him at all to fake a wedding. It’s not like he couldn’t hold his own with whatever biker asshole the MC saddled him with, and he had every intention of being a widower within a year.
If the marriage had been all there was to Marco’s need for him, Emilio might’ve put up some resistance. He was fiercely independent. He liked the life he’d made for himself overseas—the edgy street art he created that gave him life and the jobs he took in the darkness that ended it.
But there was more at stake here than even the delicate balance of power between the three crime families his sham of a wedding would smooth over. Marco’s enforcers still hadn’t managed to track down the source of the silver shrapnel bomb that had taken out The Sapphire nightclub and more illegal weapons were entering the city outside of their control.
Emilio knew from the network of contacts he’d built as a contract assassin overseas that word was getting out that the Lunetti Pack was losing its hold on the arms trade in the city. He couldn’t allow that. No one would make his Alpha out to be weak on his watch. He would use every favour owed him to find the rat sneaking weapons into their territory while he was back in the city. And then he’d end them.
A shout nearby had him tensing, poised for violence before he recognised it as one of the teen shifters. Cal had moved his self-defence class outside today as well, taking advantage of the unseasonably warm weather to teach the increasingly large group of supernatural youth who came to them. The sunshine felt like an insult with the dark weight of his father’s betrayal weighing him down.
As he watched, Luca stepped outside, waving at him briefly before jogging over to Cal and wrapping his arms around the larger man, kissing him on the claiming mark he’d left on his neck. Luca was the closest thing to a brother he had. He’d bought Emilio his first ever cans of spray paint. Driven him to the airport when he’d snuck out of the house to move away. Emilio didn’t know how his cousin could ever forgive him for his father’s actions. The rest of the pack sure hadn’t. Loyalty and pack were everything to wolf shifters, and the betrayal had shaken the core of their psyche.
A roar of engines in the distance had him straightening where he stood, and he moved toward the parking area, placing himself between the potential threat and the teens in the park. The familiar predatory focus sank over him as he drew on the darker, deadlier part of his nature than the one he’d shown to his students.
Three Harley-Davidsons pulled up, and Cal and Luca flanked him a moment later. As the bikers took their helmets off, Emilio recognised two of the three men—Blaze, the fire witch who was the President of the Elemental Mayhem MC, and Storm, a water witch, and his second-in-command.
The third was a blisteringly hot unknown. Emilio forced his eyes off the man and back on the bigger threat of his boss, resisting the urge to adjust his jeans that were feeling suddenly snug.
“Cal,” Blaze said in greeting, his gaze taking in everything, including the teens who’d stopped what they were doing to watch.
“What brings the MC out our way?” Cal asked.
Blaze’s eyes flicked to the third man in silent question, and the guy nodded, before turning back to Emilio.
“Tell your Alpha we accept his offer,” Blaze said.
“Tell him yourself,” Cal said, moving closer to Emilio and placing a hand on his shoulder .
Emilio shrugged him off. His cousin might enjoy Cal’s protectiveness, but it wasn’t something he’d ever needed. He was a predator through and through—totally in tune with his wolf. He’d killed more men than he could count.
“It’s your life in the balance and it’s his life you’re giving away, so I’m telling you,” Blaze said, gesturing toward Emilio.
“Plus, I wanted to approve what was on offer,” the third man said, and it was all Emilio could do not to snarl at the smug look on the witch’s face as he ran his eyes down Emilio’s body, taking everything in.
The witch may be hotter than sin, but Emilio wasn’t a damn piece of meat. He was a predator. If this guy thought he was going to roll over and offer it up just because his voice sounded like sex and he was built like an MMA fighter, he had another thing coming.
Cal growled and moved in front of Emilio, blocking him from view. “You can’t be serious, Phoenix. Rocco’s an asshole. Does he even like men?”
Emilio smirked at Cal’s refusal to use the President’s road name, Blaze, and wondered what clichéd nickname this Rocco went by.
“I’m not fussy,” Rocco said.
A phantom touch stroked down the shell of Emilio’s ear, making him suck in a breath and sending a shiver of want through him. Air witch. Interesting .
The wind chose that moment to change direction, and his wolf howled with pleasure inside him at the mouth-watering scent coming from the owner of the magic still touching him— MATE .
Well, fuck.
That was going to complicate things. He’d just have to make sure Rocco never figured out the potential for a mating bond between them or there was no telling how the witch would use it against him. Emilio had zero interest in settling down. Especially with a witch who screamed controlling arrogance.
This didn’t change the plan—a year. Tops. His wolf huffed in complaint at the thought, and his gums ached where his fangs would descend from. He ignored them.
Blue light flared around Cal and the stroking sensation cut off as if it had never been there. “You don’t fucking touch him without consent. Especially with your magic,” Cal snapped.
“Relax, Calder. I barely brushed him. If we’re going to be married, I’ll be touching him plenty more than that.”
“It’s a marriage in name only. You keep your hands, and your power, to yourself,” Luca snarled, his heart rate racing.
Fuck . In all the stress and chaos, Emilio had forgotten how triggering this arrangement would be for his cousin. All the more reason not to let on about the potential mating bond to his pack. Grabbing onto Luca’s arm before he could lunge at Rocco, Emilio breathed deep and slow, showing his cousin how unbothered he was by the posturing.
Blaze stepped right into Luca’s space and spoke low and fast, keeping his voice quiet enough that the kids nearby wouldn’t have a chance of hearing, even the shifter ones.
“The only way the Cruor Coven is going to let us get away with this is if they think it’s a love match Marco and I were forced to agree to. I don’t care what they do behind closed doors, but in public, this marriage is real,” Blaze said.
The witch had a point. The whole reason for this marriage was to rectify the power imbalance created between them when Cal was turned into a shifter. But if the Cruor Coven thought the two families were forming an alliance against them, it would quickly turn to war. They needed to fly under the radar until their vampire ally, Darius, made his move to take over the Coven from Kyan .
Luca and Cal opened their mouths to argue, but Emilio pushed past them before they could. His Alpha was relying on him to keep the peace between the Lunetti Pack and the Elemental Mayhem MC. He wouldn’t let Marco down.
“It’s okay, Luca. I’m fine. At least he makes good eye candy,” Emilio said, adopting a bored expression as he stared down his soon-to-be husband.
“No time like the present to start convincing folks while we have an audience,” Rocco murmured. Something told him Rocco enjoyed an audience.
Stepping forward with a grin, Rocco reached out to cup Emilio’s neck, stroking his thumb down the same spot on his ear that his magic had teased before. It was all Emilio could do to keep his snarl locked in despite the fact his wolf was ecstatic at the contact. He would’ve let a lover or his pack touch him like that, but never a stranger. Throats were vulnerable. Intimate. Letting Rocco get away with what he was doing was too close to submission.
“We gonna have some fun, gorgeous?” Rocco asked, voice a low rumble that went straight to Emilio’s cock as the witch leaned in and brushed a kiss to his cheek.
Between that and the touch on his neck, Rocco had just scent-marked him like a shifter would. The witch’s cocky grin said he knew exactly what he’d done—staked a very public claim.
What the fuck had Emilio signed up for? And how was he going to arrange an unfortunate accident for his husband-to-be with his wolf whining about forever in his ear?
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