Salvatore
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
I've watched a lot of sunrises in my life.
Most of them came after sleepless nights from strategizing, cleaning up messes, and standing over bodies that needed to disappear before dawn.
Sunrises meant the end of darkness, sure, but they also meant the start of another day filled with blood and business and the weight of an empire I was never supposed to inherit.
This sunrise, though, this one is different because for the first time, I’m waking up next to the woman who is going to be my wife. Valentina's face is peaceful in a way I've never seen when she's awake. No guarded expressions, no sharp comebacks ready on her tongue, no walls built to keep me out.
Fuck, she's stunning.
Her dark hair fans across my pillow like spilled ink. Her lips are slightly parted, still swollen from last night. One hand rests on my chest, fingers curled against my skin like she's holding on even in sleep.
I should get up.
There are a hundred things demanding my attention.
Shipments to track, calls to return, and an empire that does not pause for sentiment.
My phone has been buzzing on the nightstand for twenty minutes.
Each vibration is a reminder that Salvatore Vitale does not lie in bed watching a woman sleep like a man who has forgotten who he is.
I said I love you last night.
I said it in the middle of everything, with her beneath me and my control completely gone, and it came out in the same breath as a command.
She heard it. I watched her face change when she did, that split-second flash before the orgasm took her under.
She heard it and didn't know what to do with it.
Neither do I.
I've said those words twice in my life before last night. Once to my mother, the night before she died, when I was seventeen and standing in a hospital hallway, and finally old enough to understand that I had never said it enough. Then again, after we laid her to rest.
I have never said it to a woman.
I have been careful about that specifically. I have understood, from the time I was old enough to watch my father use my mother's love as leverage against her, that saying those words to the wrong person hands them a weapon. That a man in my position cannot afford that particular vulnerability.
And last night, in the dark, with Valentina falling apart in my arms, I said it anyway.
Not strategically. Not as a tool. Not because it served any purpose.
Because it was true, and my mouth said it before my mind could intervene.
I trace the curve of her waist with two fingers, barely touching.
She shifts in her sleep, turning into the contact without realizing she's done it, without meaning to give me what I want.
I've noticed this about her. She fights me consciously and surrenders to me instinctively, and the instinct is winning ground every week.
I wonder if she knows.
I wonder if she heard me and is going to pretend she didn't, which would be the smart play, the self-protective play.
The play I would make in her position. Or if she heard me and is going to bring it up when I least expect it, in that direct way she has, the way that strips the Don right off me and leaves the man underneath standing in the open with nowhere to hide.
Her eyelids flutter.
Those green eyes open, hazy, soft, focusing slowly on my face with the particular vulnerability of someone who has just woken up and hasn't yet built the walls back up.
There's the woman nobody else gets to see.
"Hey, gorgeous," I murmur.
Her smile is slow. Unguarded. I am going to need more than one morning to get used to this.
"Hey... handsome."
The flush crawls up her neck. My fierce, sharp-tongued Valentina, who faced me across a desk and didn't flinch, who sent me a middle finger by text message on her second day here, who told me in front of my family that I couldn't buy her with jewelry, shy.
Shy in my bed, in the morning, because something real happened last night and she doesn't know what to do with it either.
Good. I prefer us equal in this particular confusion.
"I still can't believe this is my life," she whispers, burying her face in my chest.
I wrap my arms around her and pull her in. "I can't believe it either."
She lifts her head. Her eyes search mine, and I let her look. No performance. No control. Just whatever she finds there, which is probably more than I've let anyone see in a very long time.
The question is sitting right there in her expression. Did you mean it? Last night, did you mean what you said?
She doesn't ask.
I don't answer.
But I hold her gaze for one extra beat, long enough that she knows I remember. Long enough that she knows I meant it. Long enough to make the promise without making her carry it before she's ready.
Then the knock comes.
"Mr. Vitale." Nico’s voice is clipped through the door. "We have a situation on the compound."
Of course we do.
Valentina tenses in my arms, reality crashing back into our stolen morning. I press a kiss to her forehead, letting my lips linger for just a moment.
"Duty calls.”
I climb out of bed, acutely aware of her eyes on me as I move to the closet.
I dress quickly in an all-black suit, the uniform of a man who deals in shadows.
When I turn back, she's sitting up in bed, holding the sheet up to cover her breast. I stop for a moment to look at my gorgeous woman.
“Drop the sheets,” I command. Her cheeks flush while she drops the sheets, revealing her perfect, round breasts.
"You don’t have to hide from me, Valentina. I’ll see you soon." I cross to the bed, tilting her chin up for a brief, hard kiss.
I'm out the door before I can talk myself into crawling back into that bed and telling the rest of the world to go to hell.
Elio and Nico are waiting in the hallway, their faces grim.
"What's going on, fellas?"
Elio falls into step beside me as we head toward the stairs. "We caught a rat."
"Explain."
" Vladimir." Nico's voice is flat, emotionless. "He's still been feeding information to the Volkov Family. We finally traced the leak."
The Russians. I should have known. They've been nipping at our territory for years, looking for any weakness to exploit. Not to mention, one of the families in New York tipped me off on a recent intrusion they had with a Greco.
"The shipment we lost last week?" I ask, though I already know the answer.
"Him." Elio's jaw tightens. "Two million, gone. Three of our men are in the hospital. All because this piece of shit decided to play both sides."
Rage flickers, cold and familiar. "Where is he?"
"The warehouse. Raffaele’s been... keeping him company."
We cross the compound. My mother hated violence in the main house or anywhere near it, so we built a workspace for these situations although Raffaele calls it a play place.
It’s separate at the far edge of the property, deliberately isolated from the main house.
It's where we handle the business that can't be conducted in boardrooms.
Once an enemy crosses the line and ends up on our compound, they know it’s over. Everyone knows it.
Inside, Vladimir is tied to a chair in the center of the concrete floor, his face already a mess of blood and bruises. Raffaele stands nearby, knuckles raw, expression bored.
"Boss." Raffaele nods as I approach. "He's been uncooperative."
Vladimir’s head lolls up when he hears my footsteps. His eyes widen with pure terror when he sees me.
"Mr. Vitale, please, I can explain."
"Can you?" I circle him slowly, my voice soft. That's always when I'm most dangerous, when I'm quiet. "Can you explain why you betrayed the family that fed you? Paid you? Protected you?"
"They threatened my sister’s life if I didn’t help them, you know what she’s been through, please. "
I stop in front of him, crouching down to his level. "We've had eyes on your sister. She's in Napoli, seems perfectly safe, living off the money you've been sending her from your payouts."
His face crumples. He knows he's out of options. “You should have talked to Raffaele when they approached; you know our family is strong.” I punch him in the gut, and blood gushes from his mouth. “But when you go and pull shit like this, it makes us look weak. Which makes us vulnerable. You know I’ve only run this kingdom for two years and the vultures want to see me fail. We both know that my brothers and I aren’t the sort of men who can, but as much as I don’t want to kill you, you leave me no fucking choice, you filthy fucking rat!
” I say plunging into his guy again. “Sorry,” he says but it’s barely audible.
"Sorry, doesn’t fix betrayal and it doesn't bring back two million fucking dollars.
" I stand, straightening my cuffs. "Sorry doesn't un-break Romano's ribs, or bring him back from the fucking dead.
Sorry doesn't fix the message you've sent to every other rat in our organization that betrayal is survivable. "
I turn to Raffaele, "Finish it."
"Wait, no, please!" Vladimir strains against his bonds, chair legs scraping against concrete. "Mr. Vitale, I have information! I know things about the Volkov’s, their supply routes, their safe houses."
"Information you should have shared before it came to this.
You were one of our top men, this is fucking disappointing.
" I start walking toward the door, but turn around to face Raffaele again.
"Make it clean. Dump him somewhere, the Volkov’s will find him.
Let them know what happens to people who take their money. "
"No!"
The voice comes from behind me.
I freeze.
Valentina stands in the warehouse doorway, still in last night's dress, her face pale as she takes in the scene before her. Vladimir is bloody and beaten. My men with their weapons. The unmistakable smell of violence hangs in the air.
"Valentina." My voice comes out harshly intentionally; she shouldn’t be here. "Leave!"
"No. Look, you left your phone. Look at it.”