Chapter 55 Lev
LEV
She’s danced with the three other Capos of the Five Families—two middle-aged men, and an elderly one who looked past his bedtime. Some seemed bored, while others engaged with her.
Finally, the current song ends and the last one backs away from her. I’m up and out of my seat, avoiding my sister’s feeble attempt to yank me back into the chair. She narrowly misses me as I dart for the dance floor.
Across the room, Alessio’s also watching. His eyes narrow when he spots me approaching, but he doesn’t end his conversation to fight me on this.
I appear in front of her, hand up. “My turn with the bride?”
I don’t dance. At all. Ever. No matter what Bratva party I’ve been dragged to, it doesn’t happen. Anastasia and Vanessa make a game of trying to break my streak. It never happens. It’s everything I despise wrapped up into one action: music, touching, being around others, being social.
I’ll be damned if this day passes without Serafina in my arms, to reassure myself she’s alive and with me—for as long as I can keep her.
Her taste still taints my tongue from before the ceremony, a flavour I never want to fade. At least until the next time I get between her legs.
“Lev,” she breathes my name like it’s oxygen, like it’s the knife to slice through the binds tying her down. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
With a happy sigh, she falls into my arms, adopting the same position she’s held for her last few dances. Respectable and appropriate, even if my hand on her back dips to the curve of her hip and presses her closer.
Her hand, the one with the fucking stupid rock, rests on my shoulder. Better than being the one I have to hold, so I accept it, though ‘better’ would be to see that ring tossed down a toilet.
“You were busy.”
“Not willingly, believe me.” Her nails graze the back of my neck, and I shiver in pleasure.
“How are you? All things considered.”
“Terrified.”
Lowering my head, my whisper coasts into her ear. “You’ll make it through this, Fina. I vow it.”
I don’t exactly know how yet exactly, but it’s a vow I’ll uphold until my dying breath. I failed in my promise that Serafina wouldn’t walk down the aisle to Vitale, but I won’t make the same mistake with this one.
Her expression plummets, painted lips pouting.
She steps closer, leaning into my arm and urging me to redirect us to the edge of the dance floor.
Once away from others, her mouth parts, and somehow, I know what she’s about to say even before she does, what she attempted to before the ceremony but couldn’t when I didn’t allow it.
So why does she believe now is a better time?
“Lev, I need to say it. Just in case—”
She can’t.
“Don’t.” The propriety of maintaining distance between our bodies isn’t a consideration as I yank her against me, needing her to feel in my heart for herself why she can’t do this to us. “Don’t say that. There is no ‘just in case.’ Nothing will happen to you, Fina. Nothing.”
“Lev,” she pleads, digging her nails into my neck. “I won’t be able to leave without telling you.”
“And I won’t be able to watch you go. Do not do this to me.”
She can’t say it. Her earlier hints were enough to destroy my sanity. I don’t know what to do, how to feel, how to react. That emotion isn’t for me, someone shaped by their father’s choices. That emotion—bred from her—her emotion—is meant for someone whose life is different.
Even if I feel the same.
“I’m sorry. I have to say this, to give me something to return to, no matter how tonight goes. I didn’t mean to fall in love with you…but I did. Lev, I love you.”
I love you too.
The thought, the feeling, the fact rushes out of me, admitted for the first time ever, even to myself. It’s as true as the zeros and ones that make up my network.
I love Ana because she’s blood, and unlike our other flesh and blood—our papa—I care for my sister.
I feel for Vanessa, a relationship based on trust and allegiance.
My time with Serafina has been a fraction of what I’ve spent with them, yet there isn’t any more required. She’s dug herself beneath my skin, into the confused fragments of my heart and broken mind, and ensured she’ll never leave.
I’d kill for Vanessa out of loyalty and my vows.
I’d kill for Anastasia because she’s my sister.
Killing is a fraction of what I’d do for Serafina. I’d die for her, betray anyone for her. I’d give up my vows, my life, my home, my sanity, all to keep her safe.
Life hasn’t given me an example of what love, particularly the romantic kind, can be like, but a short couple months with Serafina Mancini has defined the emotion.
Her.
It looks exactly like my Fina. My printessa.
I should say it back. The words are caught in my throat because saying them is exactly what I stated before: I won’t be able to let her walk away from me. Not this time. I’ll bring war down on the entire Cosa Nostra right here and now when Vitale comes to drag her away.
As though the podonok was called, he appears beside us, his hand coming down heavy and threatening on my shoulder—threatening while still maintaining peace in front of so many.
“Song’s over. It’s time you say your goodbyes, Petrov. For good. Consider this the end to your friendship.”
My grip tightens around hers. I don’t glance his way, even when her wide eyes dart around, lips parting with panic.
I pull her in tighter, my head both racing and slowing.
My thoughts are chaotic and struggling, a buzz that isn’t slowing or dying.
There are no tapping or numbers that’ll get me through this.
It’s an emotion that will be the end of his life if he breathes one more fucking time.
“Lev,” Serafina whispers. Just the single syllable—my name—breaks my trance, enough to look at her, really look at her, and spot the fear clouding her sky-shaded eyes.
Fear for me, Vitale beside us and the crowd beyond, some of whom watch curiously as I, a guest, refuse to hand the bride back to her groom.
He’ll never be hers.
“Lev,” my sister’s smooth voice cuts through the tenseness right before her arm dislodges me from Serafina. “It’s time for that dance you owe me.”
I’m stiff as she drags me away from the duo, Serafina staring for a beat before plastering on a fake smile for Vitale. She takes his arm and leads him towards their table to continue mollifying the situation.
Anastasia adopts the proper dance position and starts leading me, her natural abilities making her body fluid. “Can you be more obvious? I saved your ass there. You’re welcome, by the way.”
“She loves me. She told me.”
Anastasia’s eyes roll back in her head. “Obviously. Anyone with half a brain cell could tell you that. And you, dear brother, hate-every-emotion-out-there-because-you-don’t-understand-them, love her too.
You’ll deny it, of course, which I expect, but nonetheless, it’s a feeling you have, and one I can’t wait for you to admit to yourself. ”
“Da. I love her too.”
She jolts in my arms. “Damn, just like that…” She casts a look at Vitale and Serafina at their table. He’s saying something to her while she feigns contentment and sips from a champagne glass. “Does she know?”
“He interrupted us.”
Anastasia makes a sucking noise with her teeth that she knows annoys the hell out of me and circles us back to our table. She drops into her seat and mutters, “It’s nine. They’ll be leaving soon.”
Sure enough, people go up to the couple to wish them well. Some return to the party while others leave—lucky fuckers. It’s as though a switch has been flicked on in the room, and now, people are settling in for a night of celebrating on someone else’s euro.
At the exact strike of ten, Vitale stands and holds out his hand for Serafina, who takes it, pulling that massive dress behind her.
People cheer, shouting lewd comments that make me want to gut every single one of them.
My hands fist beneath the table, trying to rein in my control the tiniest degree before I completely snap.
Vanessa notices, frowning, and Anastasia reaches over to cover my hands with her own for a quick, reassuring squeeze. Beneath her hold, I tap my finger against my knee.
I count to ten.
And tap.
And count.
None of it’s working.
My head vibrates.
My body knows its medicine is being unwillingly dragged away.
And there’s nothing I can do about it. Even tracking her will be useless, since she’s right here, in this hotel.
By the door, Vitale pauses and, much to the gleeful shouts of everyone else, Serafina’s dignity gets stolen when he hauls her in for a messy kiss that makes everything inside me curl. He pulls away, cheering along with the drunken idiots, but winks at me from across the room.
Rage unfurls, paving the way from me to them. One punch to the throat is all it’ll take.
Serafina meets my eyes, her own wide and frightened and nothing that should exist within the stormy blues I’ve fallen so fucking hard for. Her arm is yanked, and the door shuts behind them.
I move to stand.
Anastasia presses down harder on my knee. “Sit the fuck down,” she grits between clenched teeth. “We have to stay for a bit. It’ll look obvious otherwise.”
Across the table, Zeno catches my eye. “I’m going to speak with the other Capos again, make it look a bit less obvious than if we follow them out right now.” He breathes through his teeth, scanning us all with a low curse in Italian. “She’ll be alright. She has to be. She’ll come back to us.”
He speaks that final statement directly at me before disappearing into the crowd.
Minutes pass.
My aggravation grows.
Time ticks away.
Serafina’s life hangs in the balance.
She could be hurt.
He could be on her.
He could be—
I rip my sister’s hand off, darting out of my seat before anyone dares stop me.