Milan #3
Still, I wasn’t sure I minded at that moment; Brenno Fera held the space around him as someone who thought they deserved it, and that was a dangerous ego for a man to have.
“Thank you,” I heard myself say. “And you are?”
Men like Brenno didn’t like to be made to feel unknown.
In their minds, it translated to ‘I wasn’t brutal enough’ or ‘I didn’t sully this earth with my presence enough.
’ It wasn’t a good idea to aggravate a man who held so much unsteady space, yet there was strength in being protected by Milan, even if he hadn’t done anything except hold onto me.
I felt safe. I felt as if nobody could touch me, because if he could touch me, even though he’d made it evidently clear that he hated being around me, keeping me safe meant something to him.
Brenno smirked as he shared a look with his brother, the middle one, Cesare. It wasn’t indecipherable—in fact, all of their surprise and distaste decorated the air like sticky glitter, and I felt the urge to slap them both in one swoop as hard as I could.
Milan didn’t need protecting, but that look on his face, the one that hinted there was something about this conversation he didn’t like, that there was something about his brothers’ presence that was wrong, made me want to find out what else could pull the emotion out of him.
“Wow.” I sighed slowly to fill the silence. “That’s a great name. How about you?” I turned to the youngest one, Ezio, who, despite his height, looked more like a boy in his blue eyes than a man.
“Ezio,” he said, extending his hand. “It’s lovely to meet you, Sicily.”
He was genuine; I could tell from the way he took my hand, earnest and strong, but hesitant and held back. He was trying to be gentle. Perhaps Ezio hadn’t been corrupted by his brothers yet.
Milan’s grip tightened on my hip as Ezio let me go.
I wanted to ask him what was wrong, but I doubted he would appreciate that in front of them, so I lifted my eyes to his, giving him a look that asked, Are you okay?
but he merely frowned in confusion, his brow furrowing as he searched my face for the answer he was supposed to give.
Brenno cleared his throat, and my husband blinked back into the conversation. “Sicily, these are my brothers, Brenno, Cesare, and Ezio. They live in Philadelphia.”
“Brothers.” Brenno huffed a laugh.
Cesare exhaled through his nose, his eyes finding mine as he said, “We’re aware of why you’ve invited us here, Milan, and it has nothing to do with being your relatives.”
Milan’s jaw tensed. “I was unaware that being Philly’s lawyer qualified you to read minds.”
A laugh bubbled out of me before I could stop it. That was funny, really funny, but nobody else thought so, not even Milan.
I was beginning to believe that these issues people spoke of were actually true.
I’d married a sociopath, and his crazy-ass brothers were psychopaths.
What the hell had I done to deserve this?
“Not minds,” Cesare continued with a smirk.
“Behavior. Just like you. I think we’d find that if we studied your actions over the last few weeks, we’d see that you desire to be some kind of leader and are attempting to seduce everyone under your rule.
” He stepped closer— just one foot, and though Milan didn’t move or cower, the arm that held me shifted me behind him, just slightly.
“We are not so easily bought. Not anymore. Philadelphia will not be yours.”
“Philadelphia would be a counterintuitive desire. It is nonessential, chaotic, and lacks focus. I doubt many would want to touch it,” Milan answered, raising a brow.
I wanted to give my husband a high five, but I didn’t think it was really his thing, so I stayed silent until Brenno shrugged. “You did touch it, though. Do you remember? Ten years ago. I remember, Cesare remembers, Ezio probably remembers too.”
Milan’s body froze, his limbs tensing as if he’d been struck.
I didn’t know what had happened or what Milan had done in his lifetime, but I knew sociopaths didn’t react like that. I waited for him to say something, anything, to defend himself against whatever they were claiming had happened, but he was utterly frozen, not cardboard but pure ice.
He was the man who had taken me away from my life, and I certainly did not want to be around him, but the small quivers in his blank mask made him seem vulnerable, and it stirred something in me, perhaps the same girl who had spent her life defending her little sister.
“Fuck you,” I spat at my new brother-in-law, surprising even myself. It just came out, the fiery, hot need to defend him when he probably didn’t want or need it, but I couldn’t help it. “Go back to Philly and enjoy your nonessential chaos!”
Milan’s body became unstuck at that, and he growled my name, but I didn’t hear him, or rather, I didn’t hear it as the warning to stop that I should’ve.
“Did you fucking enjoy that?” I shouted next. “Being assholes, because—”
I didn’t get to finish my tirade. Milan snatched my wrist and dragged me through the cathedral, up the carpeted red staircase, and into the cold, open air of the upstairs balcony.