9. Matteo
CHAPTER NINE
MATTEO
T here was one thing I’d known for certain since I was eight years old. Arianna Carter Morrelli was my girl. My woman. Mine.
There was an aura about her, so overpowering that it magnified her physical presence. I saw it that evening all those years ago, when I kissed her beneath the stars, and I saw it again today.
I’d put an off-limits mark on her with all of the guys at D’Arc while we were growing up, unbeknownst to Ari, but I couldn’t have eyes on her at all times.
Occasionally, guys would take Ari out beyond the gates of D’Arc, but I put an end to that shit really fast. Every man who got close enough to kiss her on their date—first and last, if I may add—ended up getting a taste of my wrath. So it didn’t take long for rumors to start surrounding her.
Arianna è solo mia. She was mine and mine alone.
Like my nonno used to warn me, the startling realization came hard and fast. Just like it had with him and Nonna. Just like it had with my parents. Fuck, I missed him. Old age had caught up to him, but he’d never be forgotten.
Dio mio, Arianna è la donna più bella del mondo. The most beautiful woman in the world.
Arianna could break my nose a hundred times, and like a love-stricken puppy, I’d always find my way back to her.
And God help me, I was so tempted to kiss her again tonight. To taste her. But it would be an asshole move to take advantage of her in such a vulnerable state.
Besides, I meant what I said. Our next kiss would be initiated by her.
After changing into dry clothes, I made my way out of my bedroom and sought out my father. I found him in his office, perched on a chair occupied by my mom, his arm wrapped around her possessively. She was gazing up at him, her expression filled with boundless love.
But their beginning had been neither simple nor easy—a story my sibling and I were subjected to constantly but secretly reveled in. It didn’t take long to learn that theirs was the type of love people searched high and low for.
I cleared my throat and they turned my way, Mom’s face lighting up with a smile.
“Matteo!” she cried. “I thought you’d be asleep by now.”
“Not yet.”
“It’s been a hard day,” she reprimanded softly. “You need to rest.”
I shrugged, striding into the office with long steps, then leaning against the executive desk from which my papa ruled his empire. Money laundering. Drug shipments. Weapons. You name it, the Vitales had a handle on it.
And one day, that would be my legacy too.
“You should be asleep too,” I remarked, noting the strain of fatigue on her face.
Mom chuckled. “We must be getting old if our son’s telling us we need to go to bed.”
“You’ll never get old.” It was true. She was the epitome of forever young .
“That’s right. You’re just as beautiful, if not more, than the day I met you,” Pa murmured, kissing her forehead. She smiled, her eyes sliding over his face longingly. It had always been like this with them, for as long as I could remember.
“Pa, can I talk to you?”
He raised an eyebrow in my direction. “Everything okay?”
Mom’s face immediately tensed, and Pa stroked her shoulder.
“Everything’s fine,” I answered quickly. “It’s… business.” Kind of.
Mom laughed. “Since when have I been excluded from business?”
Pa tilted his head, looking at me. He must have seen something on my face, because he lowered his head and whispered something into Mom’s ear that had her rising from the chair.
“Don’t stay up too late, you two.” Ma walked up to me and raised her hand. I lowered my tall frame so her palm could come to rest on my cheek. “I love you, Matteo.”
“Love you too.”
Once her light footsteps were out of earshot, my papa said, “Now, what’s troubling you, son?”
I took a deep breath before I uttered the words I’d been playing around with for hours— years . “I want you to talk to Nico Morrelli and arrange a marriage contract.”