3. Tristan
TRISTAN
T en or so minutes after Konstantin takes my wife-to-be off to speak to him in her father’s office, I’ve gotten impatient.
“I’m going to go see what they’re discussing.” I step away from my father’s chair toward the door, and my father clears his throat.
“Better to wait for them to come back, son.”
“He’s been in there with my fiancée long enough.” I stride toward the doorway, and Damian Kutnezsov steps in my way.
“Konstantin said to stay here.”
“He doesn’t tell me what to do. I’m going to be his business partner, not his subordinate.” I see Damian’s hand twitch toward his gun, and I smirk. “Go ahead, shoot me. I’m going to find them.”
I’ve never been here before, so I don’t know which way the late Russo patriarch’s office actually is.
But the sound of raised voices enables me to find my way there soon enough.
I walk in just in time to see Simone standing ramrod straight next to the bookshelf, her face white as paper, staring at Konstantin with a look of shock and disbelief.
I close the door behind me with a click , and her attention snaps to me.
She’s startlingly beautiful. I thought so from the minute I walked into her living room and saw her, regal as a queen despite her circumstances.
Every inch of her was made to make a man want her, from her thick, dark hair that begs for hands to tangle in it, to her perfectly delicate face, her full mouth, her exquisite body.
Long legs to wrap around a man’s hips, a narrow waist— fuck , I can’t wait to have her in my bed.
She’s uptight and elegant now, but I bet I can make her scream for me.
There’s never been a woman yet who could resist me.
And I find this one more intriguing than most. She’s all alone in the world, from what I know, an orphan now, without any recourse but to marry someone who can hold her father’s territory for her.
And yet, she behaves as if she’s the one in charge.
She talked to those men as if she owned their lives, not the other way around.
Not as if any one of them could claim her and her father’s estate with a word from a priest, making her subservient to them in every way that matters.
I don’t see a submissive bone in Simone Russo’s body. All the same, I think as I meet her gaze with my own, I can’t wait to see her on her knees.
Her gaze whips back to Konstantin. “You won’t kill me,” she says flatly, but the tremor in her voice says she doesn’t believe her own words. He meets her eyes impassively.
“I don’t want to,” he replies calmly. “Believe me, Simone, I don’t. But you will marry Tristan, or you will die. Those are your options.”
Her body is tense, stiff as she looks at him, clearly searching for some chink in the armor, some way out of this.
Her eyes flash with defiance, every line of her body screaming stubbornness, and I find it oddly arousing.
I should see her and think that she’s going to be trouble, that controlling her is going to be a pain in my ass, and it undoubtedly is.
But it’s a challenge that makes my blood spark, my cock twitch at the thought of fighting Simone Russo. Of bending her to my will.
I’m used to women who are compliant. Easy.
Falling all over themselves to try to seduce me.
At thirty-two and a bachelor, there’s no shortage of women trying to make themselves the next Mrs. O’Malley, especially with my brother already wed.
Those who didn’t manage to seduce the heir are happy to try to slide down the ladder a rung and claim me instead.
Except I’ve had no interest in being tied down.
I’ve always enjoyed the freedom that being the second son grants me—the freedom to shoulder less responsibility, the freedom to spend more recklessly, to fuck who I please without ever thinking about marriage or heirs. But I have always craved more power.
When Konstantin reached out to my father and offered this to me, I couldn’t say no.
It will mean more responsibility, yes. More to worry about, more politics, more business, more weight on my shoulders. But it also means that power that I’ve craved. It means carving out a part of this world for myself, making it mine.
And I’m more than fine with marrying this woman, if that’s what I get. If I get all that money, all that territory, all that power, and her.
It’s a pretty fucking good deal.
Simone’s attention snaps back to me. “Why would you want to marry someone who’s being forced into it?” she hisses. “Don’t you want to marry a wife who actually wants you?”
I chuckle. I like her fire. I’ll enjoy finding out how long I can play with her before she lashes out and burns me. “You’ll want me,” I tell her with utter confidence. “I’ve never met a woman who doesn’t.”
“Well now you have,” she snaps back, her gaze turning the slightest bit uncertain, as if she doesn’t know whether to continue attacking me or turn her attention back to Konstantin.
I doubt that, very much. It’s clear that she hates me, and I can’t blame her for that.
But I saw the way her gaze slid over me earlier, taking me in.
I’ve seen the slight hitch in her breath when she looks at me, the way her throat moves, and her eyes change when I speak to her, when we spar.
She doesn’t want to be, but some part of her is aroused by me.
I intend to exploit that part to its fullest.
“Besides,” I continue, a smirk at the corners of my mouth. “It doesn’t matter if I want you, Simone. I want your territory. I intend to claim your father’s territory as mine. You’re simply the necessary key. A little insertion, and—” I wink at her, and she looks like she wants to spit in my face.
“For your allegory to be the euphemism you want it to be, I’d have to be the lock and you the key,” she spits out, and I laugh.
“Then you agree, I’ll be inside you before too much longer.”
She lets out a hiss of breath, like a cat that’s been pissed off, and looks back at Konstantin. “There’s got to be something else. You can’t expect me to?—”
Konstantin sighs. “I’ll give you twenty-four hours to decide, Simone.
I’ll leave you to it. If you don’t agree to sign the papers to marry Tristan by this time tomorrow evening, I’ll be forced to end your life and claim the territory through other means.
” His voice is flat, even, and I wonder if he really means it, or if he’s bluffing.
I know Konstantin to be a man who hates bloodshed and would balk at killing a woman, but maybe Giovanni Russo’s machinations changed him.
Maybe he’s just tired of all of this and intends to finish it, one way or another.
Regardless, I’m well aware that I need to be careful with my new ally. Konstantin is a dangerous man, and I have no desire to cross him.
“Tristan.” Konstantin looks at me. “Let’s leave Miss Russo to her thoughts, and go talk to your father.”
Truthfully, I don’t want to leave. I want to stay here and talk to Simone, to throw her barbs back at her, feel my blood heat every time she snaps back at me. I want to stalk across the room and back her against that bookshelf, to see the way the look in her eyes changes when I’m that close to her.
I don’t want her to need twenty-four hours to decide. I want her to say that she’s mine now , to hear that word out of that pretty, full mouth.
Instead, I follow Konstantin out of the office. I didn’t get this far by not knowing how to pick my battles. And I’m more interested in the war—the one that I’m sure I’ll be waging with Simone, very soon.
I can’t wait to trade verbal blows with her again.
My father is still waiting in the living room when we return. I see him look at Konstantin, as if calculating how angry Konstantin is at my interruption, and I see his shoulders soften slightly when he realizes that things are fine. “She agreed?” he asks, and Konstantin shakes his head.
“I gave her a twenty-four-hour ultimatum. Marriage or death.”
Finnegan’s eyebrows rise. “You’ll go through with it?”
Konstantin lets out a heavy breath, the only concession I’ve seen, so far, to the fact that I know he doesn’t want to kill Simone. “If I have to, yes. But she’ll cave,” he says flatly. “Marriage isn’t a fate worse than death.”
“She might think differently,” I cut in. “I want her, Konstantin. She will say yes to me.”
Konstantin nods, but I see my father’s gaze cut in my direction.
“The woman isn’t what you should be focusing on, Tristan. Focus on the empire that comes with her. Money. Territory. Power. We should be discussing how to handle all of that?—”
Finnegan O'Malley is a hard man, forged by decades of violence and betrayal in Boston's underworld.
He built our family's empire from nothing, clawed his way to the top of the Irish mob through intelligence and brutality in equal measure.
He's taught me everything I know about power, about control, about what it takes to survive in our world.
He’d never let desire for a woman take precedence over the lust for money. And I don’t intend to, either.
But I also don’t intend to take the Russo empire without the Russo daughter. Now that I’ve seen her, I’m convinced I need her to be mine.
"She's a means to an end, son," Finnegan says, looking at me sternly. "A beautiful means, I'll give you that, but still just a tool to get what we want."
"What we want," I repeat. "Of course.” What I want. I wanted power, and it’s being handed to me as we speak. “I’m part of that we . And I want her. As my wife.”
"Your wife, yes. But that doesn't mean you have to actually care about her. Marriage in our world is business, Tristan. Don't forget that."