Breakfast on Tuesday

17. Warned girl

What was it with these two wanting to protect people? Dante wanted to protect Annabella from me, and she wanted to protect me from him.

I blinked, realization kicking in. Dante was a bad guy, wasn't he? He used to be in the mafia, and the mafia equaled bad. So why did I want to run toward him, toward chaos and toxicity?

And danger.

None of this made sense. I was a sensible girl - normally - but today, any sense I had must have gone through the window the second Dante bent me over the ledge in front of the window in his bedroom.

Dante was danger exemplified. It was in his eyes and the way he carried himself like he was always in control. He smelled like sin and talked like a pirate. Fucked like the devil. And he didn't seem to care about much at all. His emotions were strongly guarded behind his hard as steel facade.

Was it even a facade?

I could only answer that with a hard sounding no. He had choked me with ease when he thought I wasn't who I said I was. He wasn't the kind of man I wanted to cross.

Annabella said she wasn't the enemy, the same words I had told Dante upstairs in his bedroom, but for some reason, I didn't believe her. Something about her didn't sit well with me.

"What happened to him?" I don't know why that was the first question I asked when a thousand others would have been better suited for the situation.

Questions like: Are you trying to protect me from him because he was going to break my heart? Lie to me? Torture me? Corrupt me? Murder me? Fuck me up good? Betray me? Use me?

Annabella pulled me behind the bar, out of sight from my friends. "Something happened with his ex and he's never been the same."

"What happened?"

I remembered his cousin Mateo mentioning something about heartbreak.

"He never talks about it. Not even with me or Mateo, his best friend. We moved out here to start over and whatever you have going on with him is the opposite of that."

I stared into her mysterious eyes. "We don't have anything. He's made that clear already."

"Good. Now leave him alone. I won't warn you again." She moved from behind the wall and carried on making the drinks for my friends as if she didn't just tell me to stay away from her brother like he was some kind of criminal.

He is a criminal! Just because he got out of the mafia before he got caught doesn't change the kind of man he is.

I followed Annabella, needing to know more. "If you're going to warn me about something, at least do it properly. Tell me what's going on."

Annabella placed the drinks on a tray. After lifting the tray, she glared at me as she balanced it in one hand. "There's nothing I can say that will make you change your mind. He told you to fuck off and you're still here. You should value yourself more. If there's one thing I know about my brother, it's that once he fucks a girl, she's done for. And you, a virgin? You don't stand a fucking chance. Now get out of my way. I have work to do."

Her words had me frozen in my spot. But only for a second. I looked at my friends who were laughing and smiling when they received their drinks, Eli striking a conversation with Annabella, who graciously entertained him.

Swallowing the pit of shame I felt burning in my stomach, I turned and entered the kitchen to go find the man I couldn't seem to get enough of even after his sister warned me to stay away. After she told me to value myself more.

Dante lifted his head from whatever he was making, the sharp angle of his jaw gleaming in the light.

I sucked in a breath when his hazel eyes cut me deep like a sword. A crease appeared between his brow as I slowly approached him. He was a feral tiger in the wilderness and I was clueless little red riding hood, awestruck by the power I felt exuding off of him in waves.