WARNING: This story contains content that may not be suitable for some readers, including strong language and depictions of violence. Reader discretion is advised.
VALENTINA
Fairytales don't come true for girls in the Cosa Nostra.
Val knew this. She'd been preparing for it since girlhood, when she watched her mother's cousin marry a man twice her age for the sake of building bridges across famiglias. She knew that, when an advantageous match became available, her father wouldn't hesitate to use her in the same way.
Of course, Val never imagined her father would choose to sell her hand to an outsider. She never thought her father, the infamous Hollowman, could be bought by the likes of Henry and Ezra McLeod, pharmaceutical gods and multi-billionaires who wanted in on the Cosa Nostra's lucrative businesses.
Some saw Leonardo Romano's actions as distasteful. Val regarded them as disgraceful.
And yet, somehow, in the span of a few hours, Val became the disgrace. She never thought that she would be the one to sign her name on the marriage contract.
She'd planned to struggle. She'd planned to fight, tooth and nail, to prevent her engagement to Ezra McLeod.
But desperate times called for desperate measures, and Val had never felt more desperate than when her father announced the upcoming arrival of her little brother. The true Romano heir, come to save the famiglia from Val and her father's promise to name her his successor.
She'd allowed these thoughts to fuel her– to guide and steady her hand– as she signed her name on the dotted line. Just beneath Ezra's cursive ink.
Beneath the iron-tight clauses and stipulations that Val's father had drafted alongside Henry and Ezra McLeod himself. Before he knew that he would be blessed with a male heir.
Before he knew the lengths that Val would go to secure her place in the future of the Romano famiglia.
***
One Week Later
"I'm serious! When my mother and I saw the news that Ezra McLeod was engaged, we could hardly believe our eyes!" Olivia Vandergriff, self-proclaimed childhood best friend of Val's new fiance, prattled. "Of course, we always thought he'd end up with a Kennedy or Rockefeller."
The blonde's voice made Val want to stick pins in her ears, but she somehow managed to plaster a too-sweet smirk on her lips.
Dio, she wanted to leave. Her feet throbbed from her heels, and her cheeks hurt from the fake smile she'd been wearing all evening. But how could a blushing bride prematurely leave her own engagement party?
From beside her, Ezra laughed, a posh, fake sound that she'd undoubtedly hear in her nightmares that night. "It's true. I received more than a handful of texts asking who the hell Valentina Romano was!"
If Val actually gave a shit about her blonde, tanned betrothed, his careless words might have hurt her feelings. As it was, she forced a short laugh from her own throat and clutched her champagne glass a bit more tightly.
"I don't know what possessed Ezra to accept little old me," she teased, squeezing the words out between clenched teeth.
"Oh, isn't it obvious?" Olivia cooed, blinking her bright blue eyes in delight. "It's no secret that he's been trying to enter your family's... business for years."
Her friend, a tall brunette with sharp features, lowered her voice as if afraid that someone might hear them. "The Cosa Nostra is a notoriously difficult nut to crack."
Ezra slid a hand along Val's lower back, tucking her closer into his side. In her heels, they were roughly the same height. "I believe this union will be mutually advantageous for our families."
Right. Val almost rolled her eyes. You give my family access to your bank account, shipping warehouses and pharmaceutical factories, and government connections, and we'll whet your appetite with a little taste of danger.
In the week since their engagement became final, Val realized soon enough that the McLeods didn't need her famiglia. Not really. Ezra simply wanted to gain more power than any McLeod in the past. He thought aligning with the mafia would help him achieve that. Val didn't care about any of that. She only cared that Ezra remain wealthy and powerful enough that breaking their marriage contract would spell ruin for her father.
"Valentina," the brunette chirped. "You must come over for brunch when we return to the city this fall. We want to hear about what it was like to grow up in the underworld." Again, she whispered the last word like it was a forbidden curse.
"Of course," Val replied, batting her lashes in feigned excitement. "And you both should come over to my famiglia's estate. I can show you our weapon's arsenal and the room in the basement where my papá enjoys torturing his enemies!"
Both women's eyes widened in simultaneous alarm and disgust before they bid a hasty farewell to Ezra and scurried away. For the first time that evening, a genuine laugh bubbled inside of Val.
Her triumph, however, was short-lived. Ezra's smooth hand pressed firm into her hip, scrunching the fabric of Val's black, floor-length dress. A quiet warning.
"That was not very becoming," Ezra muttered only for Val to hear. Somehow, despite his evident disdain, he managed to maintain a polished smile for the cameras and press attending their engagement event.
"No?" Val whispered, mirroring his pleasant facade. "It would have really been unbecoming if I ordered one of my men to cut her tongue out for speaking about the Cosa Nostra at all."
For the briefest moment, Ezra's icy blue eyes flashed. A healthy dose of unease crossed his features, then disappeared. "Olivia and Rachel are harmless."
Val resisted the urge to roll her eyes and instead noted her fiancé's concern for these women. Perhaps they were more than childhood best-friends. She tucked that information away for later and sipped on her champagne.
"Harmless women shouldn't stick their noses into the snake pit," she drawled.
Ezra hardened, and his hand pressed more firmly into her side. "When we signed that marriage contract, our worlds merged. I expect you to learn how to play nicely in high society, Valentina."
His words held a warning that left a bitter taste in Val's mouth, and her fingers curled into a fist around the stem of her champagne flute. If she hadn't agreed in their contract to uphold the McLeod image with grace and dignity at all social events, she would've thrown the rest of the bubbly liquid in his face, washing the bronzer right off of his too-high cheekbones. Instead, she turned to face him directly and smoothed away a fleck of lint on his jacket.
"You, Ezra, will be the one hobnobbing with high society," she whispered, leaning in to brush her red-painted lips against his cheek. A ghost of a touch, but cameras shuttered nearby, and Val knew that the press caught the image.
She stepped closer, her lips brushing the shell of his ear. To any onlooker, she simply whispered a sweet nothing in the ear of her fiancé. Only Ezra knew the truth.
Val continued. "And I will be leading the famiglia."
More cameras flashed from nearby, catching the rare moment of intimacy between New York's newest couple. When Val finally stepped back, Ezra wore a feline grin, and Val had an ominous feeling that their war for power would not be so easily won.
"I thought Cosa Nostra bitches were trained to be docile," Ezra mused, that too-pleasant smirk never leaving his lips. "Perhaps I chose to align myself with the wrong family in this game?"
It was a poorly veiled threat, but an effective one. He knew that Val needed this marriage to maintain power and status in the famiglia. He knew that, without binding herself to his power and influence, Val would be replaced by the little boy growing in Lara's womb. He could easily replace her with the daughter of some other don.
She needed him far more than he needed her, and Val hated him for it.
Even so, the thought of bowing to his misogynistic ideals made her sick. Somehow, she swallowed her bile and flashed a tight smile. "Excuse me, I need another drink, beloved fiancé."
Ezra's eyes sparkled like he knew he'd won that battle, and he released his hold on Val's waist. She immediately stepped away from the deplorable man and spun toward the refreshments table. Dozens of eyes followed her movements, but Val didn't acknowledge anyone.
The McLeods held the engagement celebration in their summer home in the Hamptons, inviting every prominent family in the northeast to the extravagant affair. Senators and business tycoons, heirs and heiresses, foreign dignitaries and American royalty. And, sprinkled throughout the grand estate's halls, a few members of the Cosa Nostra lurked amongst the flashy elite.
But Val couldn't seek refuge among her people.
Relations with her father had been strained, to say the least, since she told him that she'd signed the marriage contract without his knowledge. She'd pretended to be ignorant of the consequences of her actions, claiming that she thought he'd be happy that she finally heeded his wishes regarding the engagement.
Adriano hadn't made the trip to the Hamptons for the engagement party. Apparently, his own new marriage needed his attention far more than Val did. Lara stayed home, as well, since Leonardo would not risk her safety now that she carried a son.
And Matteo...
Well, Val had scarcely spoken to the hitman since the night of Adriano's wedding. Since the night that he told her to step aside and allow her father to replace her as heir. Since he told her to give up.
She still felt Matteo's betrayal like a crack in her chest.
She knew he was at the engagement party. Although she'd requested a new guard from her father more than once in the past week, Matteo still followed her like a damned shadow. Silent and dark constant. And, Dio, she wished that her heart didn't palpate everytime she sensed his whiskey brown eyes watching over her.
Even now, as she stalked past the beverage table and speared toward the hallway that led to a restroom, Val knew that he watched her. She only hoped that she could make it to the powder room before he caught up.
Val stormed past the inquisitive eyes of New York's elite and into the unfamiliar hallway. In a mansion this large, she figured she'd run into a restroom eventually. Soon, she'd covered enough ground that the party's music faded and only the sound of her heels clicking echoed across the walls.
Then, she heard it.
A second pair of footsteps joined her own. Heavier, boasting of long, confident strides and growing closer by the second.
Fuck. Val picked up her pace, clutching at the skirt of her floor-length gown to ease her own gait. She knew she couldn't outrun him. The Hollowman's Enforcer. The Angelo della Morte. Matteo Costa.
But she sure as hell wouldn't let him catch her without a fight. He already deemed her too weak for the Cosa Nostra.
Val rounded a corner at the end of the hallway and pressed her back up against the wall. His footsteps thundered like the blood in her ears. She reached for the skirt slit that extended up her thigh and wrapped her hand around the knife she'd hidden in a holster between her legs. She'd learned her lesson at the last McLeod event never to get caught weaponless in the dark.
Val ground her teeth. She didn't need anyone to protect her from their dangerous world. Val belonged in the Cosa Nostra, and Matteo needed to understand that.
Moments before the footsteps reached the corner, Val lifted the dagger and spun.