Chapter 24 Evi
EVI
After nearly a month of gruelingly long days and late nights, the house is finally starting to resemble something alive again.
The hallways don’t echo so emptily anymore, now that rugs have been laid down and the scent of fresh paint and cleaning solutions hang in the air instead of smoke and mildew.
Every day there’s a new layer of life—a repaired window, a cleaned chandelier, the muffled hum of staff moving between rooms. Even the east wing, the part that had been blackened by fire and rain, is starting to show promise.
Contractors have finally stabilized the walls, and this morning they assured me that the scaffolding will go up by next week.
We still have a ways to go before it will be ready for Raf’s ascension ceremony, but it’s coming along. Over the past month, I’ve learned how to manage foremen, negotiate pricing, and direct crews of men twice my size who now treat me with the same deference and respect they give Sandro and Raf.
It feels good to be useful.
But it’s also been a long, lonely month.
Most days, I see Sandro only at night, when he comes home with bruised knuckles and blood staining his collar. Sometimes he’s talking with Raf when they arrive—other times, he’s quiet, simmering with the kind of energy that makes everyone else step back.
I’ve stopped asking where he goes. I already know. The underground fighting pits, where men bet on blood.
He says it’s business. That it’s a way of showing strength to the Irish, that Raf is making contacts while Sandro “proves their worth.” I want to believe that’s all it is, but the thought of him stepping into a ring to be pummeled half to death night after night makes my stomach twist.
Tonight, I’m standing in the ballroom that will soon host the loyalty ceremony.
The walls are patched flawlessly, the cracked marble tiles replaced and the floor scrubbed clean.
Fresh candles flicker in the ornate sconces, and for the first time, I can almost picture it the way it must have been when the Chiaroscuro family was at its height.
I run a hand over one of the long tables that will hold the ceremonial feast, checking for dust, when the sound of footsteps reaches me. Sandro. Even without looking, I know it’s him. The steady, grounded rhythm of his walk is so familiar now, it’s like a second heartbeat.
When he steps into the room, my chest tightens. His shirt is soaked through with sweat, and his cheek is split beneath the southern tip of his nautical star, still bleeding sluggishly. There’s blood on his knuckles, too, and I can’t tell how much of it is his.
I cross the room before I even think about it. “Sandro—”
He gives me that lopsided smirk, the one that says don’t fuss over me, and shrugs out of his jacket. “Don’t look at me like that. I’ve looked worse.”
“That doesn’t make it okay,” I say softly, reaching for his hand. It’s already swelling, the knuckles scraped raw.
He doesn’t pull away. “The guy had surprisingly hard teeth. But his nose broke just the same.”
I exhale, torn between exasperation and relief that he’s even still standing. “How long are you going to keep doing this?”
His gaze darkens, the humor fading. “As long as it takes.”
There’s finality in his voice, and something about it scares me. I look up at him, trying to find the man who teases me beneath the covers, who holds me at night when I can’t sleep. “I just—please, Sandro. Be careful. I don’t want to lose you.”
For a long moment, he studies me. Then his expression softens, and he lifts his uninjured hand to cup my face. His thumb brushes my cheekbone. “You’re not gonna lose me, Evi.”
His tone is quiet but certain, the kind of confidence that feels unshakable.
“I mean it,” I whisper. “You think you’re invincible, but—”
He chuckles under his breath, the sound low and rough. “Are you questioning me, raggio di sole?”
I blink, startled by the dark edge in his voice, and my stomach tightens with anticipation. “Maybe I am.”
That earns me a dangerous smile. “Careful. You know what happens when you challenge me.”
My pulse stutters. “And what’s that?”
He leans closer, his breath warm against my ear. “I make sure you remember who’s in charge.”
My throat goes dry. “You’re wicked.”
“Maybe,” he murmurs, lips brushing the shell of my ear, “but you like me this way.”
I hate how right he is.
He smells like cigarette smoke and whiskey and something coppery from the blood he hasn’t yet washed off, but when his hand slides to the back of my neck, my whole body responds. I can’t help it—he has this gravity that pulls me in every time.
Still, I try to hold onto the moment, to the concern that’s clawing at my chest. “Sandro, I’m serious. You come home hurt every night—”
“Every night, I come home,” he interrupts gently. “That’s what matters.”
I start to argue, but his thumb traces my lower lip, silencing me. The touch makes my pulse skip a beat.
“I’ve told you before,” he says quietly, “a little blood never bothered me.”
It’s the same line he used weeks ago, when he found me crying in the bathroom. Somehow, it still hits me like a spark to dry tinder.
His gaze lingers on my face, dark and unreadable, then he dips his head, capturing my mouth in a kiss that’s nowhere near gentle. It’s hungry, claiming, like he’s proving something.
The taste of salt and metal from his split lip that he never gives enough time to heal mixes with my own breath, and my hands find his shoulders, the muscle beneath his shirt tense and hot.
He presses me back against the edge of the table, his palm splayed at my hip. The movement is slow, deliberate, but there’s tension in it, a coiled restraint I’ve come to recognize. This is how Sandro says what he can’t with words.
I pull back enough to whisper, “You’re hurt.”
He smiles faintly, eyes glinting. “You keep saying that like it matters.”
“It does matter.”
“Then fix me after,” he says. “You always do.”
My breath catches. I should protest again—he’s bleeding, exhausted—but he’s already kissing me, and the world narrows to the feel of his mouth and the solid weight of his body.
It’s not that I don’t want him. I always want him. But there’s something different tonight, a heat that feels edged with fear and longing. Because I love him. I love this dangerous, brooding man who walked into my life and turned everything upside down.
It still terrifies me, because I’m keeping a secret that could destroy everything between us.
When he finds out the truth—that I can’t give him a family—he’ll never look at me this way again.
And it’s agony to know this moment is fleeting.
A brief glimpse of heaven that I will have to lock into my memory and cherish after the day he lets me go.
I push the thought down, bury it under the heat of his kiss.
His hands slide to my waist, and I feel the bruises along his knuckles, rough and raw against my skin. I reach up, curling my fingers around his wrists. “You’re going to ruin your hands,” I murmur.
“They’ll heal.”
“You say that every time.”
He grins. “Have I been wrong?”
That wicked smile does something strange to me—it softens the dark edges of him, makes me see the man underneath the fighter. The one who, despite everything, still cares.
“I hate that you do this to yourself,” I say quietly.
He brushes a strand of hair from my face. “And I hate that you worry so much.”
“Someone has to.”
“Then keep doing it,” he murmurs, his voice dropping. “I like that you care.”
I swallow hard, heart pounding as his hand slides up my back, guiding me closer. The air between us changes, thickening until I can barely breathe.
“Sandro—”
“Shh.” His lips find mine again, softer this time, coaxing rather than demanding. “No more arguing, Sunshine. Or I’ll have to punish you.”
My breath catches, my pulse quickening at the dark promise in his words, and a shiver races down my spine as a bold excitement coils in my stomach.
Where I once dreaded the thought, I’ve come to anticipate my punishments now, crave them even.
Because in the weeks since Sandro first spanked me, I’ve learned just how good pain can feel.
And still, now, despite his words, his touch is careful, his bruised hands moving over me like I’m something fragile. For a man who spends his nights in cages, fighting until he bleeds, that kind of gentleness feels almost sacred.
He lifts me onto the table, and I let out a soft gasp as his mouth finds the curve of my throat, his breath warm against my skin. I tilt my head back, the ceiling spinning above us, the scent of old wood and candle smoke wrapping around me.
For a heartbeat, I imagine a future where he comes home whole. Where the house is rebuilt, and the ghosts are gone, and I can tell him the truth without watching his expression break.
But the thought slips away when his lips trace my jaw, when his hands slide to my hips.
“Still worried?” he asks, voice rough.
“Always,” I whisper.
He chuckles low in his throat. “Then I’ll just have to distract you.”
My pulse jumps. “You think you can?”
His grin is sinful. “You know I can.”
I laugh softly despite myself. He’s impossible. Impossible and infuriating and everything I didn’t know I needed.
When his mouth captures mine again, the laughter fades. There’s nothing but the sound of our breathing, the faint creak of the table beneath us as he leans into me, and the steady rhythm of his heartbeat against mine.
He kisses me like it’s the only language he’s fluent in, all hunger and heat and reverence rolled into one. And as he deepens the kiss, I stop fighting the truth that’s been building inside me since the day we married.
I love him. Completely. Hopelessly. And I’ll love him to my dying breath.
The rest of the world fades into the background until there’s only this, his hands on me, his voice low and rough as he tells me I’m beautiful, his breath against my ear when he says my name like a prayer.
And when he lifts me into his arms, carrying me toward the bedroom, my body melts against his.