Chapter 28 #2
“You’re tense. When was the last time you screwed?” Luciano spoke in English to ensure Harper heard his bullshit.
“None of your damn business,” Roman hissed.
Was this a new game? And if so, she’d have to quickly learn the rules.
“I can’t have you showing up at the resort so tense like this, Son.”
She caught Roman flinch at the word Son, clearly meant to piss Roman off.
“A good friend owns the hotel where we’re staying. A well-connected friend with many other important friends. You need to look like a Riviera, and a Riviera doesn’t look like he has not had a woman in months.”
You son of a bitch. She knew Carmen had her sights set on marrying the next “heir” to the empire, and if Luciano attempted to force Roman to be with that woman here and now, she’d slip out the sidearm she knew was hidden beneath Roman’s jacket and shoot Luciano herself.
It was her hands that were now in knots at her side, and she couldn’t budge from where she stood in the wide aisle.
Torturous ideas of Roman held at gunpoint and forced to have sex with Carmen filled her head and made her stomach turn.
“Antonio,” Luciano yelled out toward the second cabin, “get me a cognac. It appears Miss Brooks has forgotten how to walk.” A sly smile cut across Luciano’s lips. He may have been nearing seventy, but he acted and sounded like some young, cocky asshole.
She also hated he knew her name. He’d viewed the USB before handing it over to Roman the other day, which meant the bastard had watched her visit her parents’ graves at the cemetery, as well as heard her private conversation with her sister about wishing she’d been pregnant.
“Do you want my nephew? Do you love him?” Luciano asked, his tone deceptively soft, and then he rose and tucked his hands into his pockets to face Harper eye to eye.
Roman was on his feet in a second, prompting Finn to stand as well.
She should have felt safe and secure from Luciano with them flanking her sides, but sadly, they were outnumbered.
Besides, they needed Luciano to finalize the last-minute Hail Mary plans they’d made while Luciano’s guards had waited in the hall of the hotel to take the three of them to the “McMansion” as Finn had called it.
If they were lucky, maybe, just maybe, the Hail Mary would work.
Roman remained eerily quiet, but she knew he was seconds away from grabbing his uncle, especially if Luciano dared put a hand on Harper.
He’d forget the rules and the carefully laid-out plans.
His base instincts would take over, and something primal would kick in.
That’s what Jessica had told Harper happened to Asher when he’d faced the man who’d tortured her.
He’d snapped and killed him. And now he lived with the regret of his decisions, but she wasn’t so sure if they had a time machine and could go back to that moment if Asher would do anything differently.
“What do you really want, Senor Riviera?” Harper cut through the quiet with her question, not giving Luciano the satisfaction of answering him. Also, hoping neither Finn nor Roman would engage.
“You know my nephew will need to marry.” Luciano bumped Roman with his elbow when he folded his arms. “I know Carmen would like for it to be to her, but that feels wrong, even for someone like me.” A slight curl of his lips had Harper drawing a small breath of unease.
“He won’t be wed to you, but I do think you’d be good for our Roman.
We will keep you as his mistress in the city. ”
“You son of a bitch.” Roman whirled to face his uncle, but she grabbed hold of his arm, attempting to get him to back down. He reluctantly followed her request and faced her, and she set a hand to his chest with a plea in her eyes to remain calm.
She gave him a slight nod, then turned her attention back to Luciano.
“If you think using me to get Roman to do your bidding will work, you’re wrong.
We work together, and he cares no more for me than any other person he’d vow to protect.
Because that’s what your nephew is, a good person.
The kind of man who would jump in front of a car for a stranger, not just for me.
” She highly doubted Luciano was buying her words based on the wicked gleam in his dark eyes, but she had to try.
“So you won’t mind if Roman releases his tension with Liza, then?” Luciano crooked his finger, and the blonde appeared at his side within seconds. He cupped her chin in a gesture meant to look tender but was belied by the red marks left on her skin. “Take care of my nephew. You know what to do.”
His uncle really was the devil.
“I’m not going back to the bedroom with you,” Roman told Liza. “You can leave now.”
The woman looked to Luciano, ignoring Roman’s words. And then he waved her off with a satisfied grin.
Okay, so maybe his uncle does need to die, Harper thought, hating how morbid that sounded, but at the very least, he had to be locked up.
How had he blinded Roman for years to his true colors? Most likely, it was because Roman was never around him long enough to learn the truth. He was too smart not to see the evil in his uncle’s eyes, otherwise.
“I’ll go with him.” Carmen stood.
“Like hell you will.” No, nope. Shut up, Harper, wrong thing to blurt out.
“Let me make this clear.” Luciano pivoted to face Roman, then reached for the knot of Roman’s tie and tightened it, and wow, Roman was fuming without actually unleashing. “If Harper is of no interest to you, then I’ll find someone else who wants her. One of my guards, perhaps.”
It only took a second for Roman to reach out and clutch Luciano’s throat, his lips rolled between his teeth and white with fury as he squeezed.
And Harper could have sworn Luciano was grinning, too.
“Roman.” Finn came around to the other side of him and set his hand on his arm to try and get him to release his grip.
Luciano’s guards were on them by now, anyway. Weapons drawn and pointed on Harper and Finn.
Roman looked toward the guards, his eyes full of rage and his jaw tight, but he finally released his hold on his uncle.
Luciano smoothed the lapels of his jacket as if merely pleased by the turn of events. “So, you were saying you’re only friends?”
He’d just managed to call Harper’s bluff, effectively squashing any doubts about how Roman felt for her.
“As I suggested, she will be your mistress. I’d like to keep her close to you.
It’ll keep you honest.” Luciano maneuvered around Roman to accept his drink from Antonio, who’d recently appeared, missing all of the action.
“And I need you to look like a man who has been properly fucked, like a Riviera would, or no one will believe the story when we arrive.” He motioned with his free hand toward the bedroom at the back of the plane.
“I’m offering to allow the woman you love to stay in your life.
You should be thanking me.” Luciano sat back in his seat with a smug look.
“Talk like that about Harper again,” Roman rasped in a low, rough voice, “and there won’t be anyone in the world that will stop me from killing you.”