With This Ring: To Have and To Hold Duet Book One

by Knight, Natasha

  “And if he were to walk onto the island to take her, I’d have the opportunity of a lifetime. But we both know he’s too much of a pussy to do that.”

  “He’s not going to be walking onto the island, Cristiano,” he says, dropping the subject of Scarlett. At least for now.

  “What do you mean? Did you find him?”

  He looks around, gestures to the SUV. “Get in. We’ll talk on the way to my office. You won’t be late to your meeting.”

  I do, and he follows. I look out of the bullet proof window, glance at the row of SUVs trailing us. My uncle doesn’t like to take any chances with his life. It’s funny to see how much he values it, in a way. He wants to live. He has a passion for life. Or a healthy fear of death. Two things in which we are on opposite ends of the spectrum.

  “Here.” He hands me a folder out of his briefcase. He’s old-school. Leave no electronic trail. Ever. It’s probably what’s kept him out of prison.

  I open the folder and the first thing I see is a grainy photo of the man who orchestrated my family’s massacre.

  The younger Marcus Rinaldi.

  I flip through the photos, look at the vast, empty land around him. I look at the men in their pickup trucks, the porch of the house he’s stepping into. The bigger house I recognize.

  “He’s in Mexico?”

  My uncle nods. “Making an alliance between the De La Cruz Cartel, which he considers himself the head of since he is engaged to Scarlett—”

  “He can consider himself the fucking king of England for all I care. It makes no difference to me. Like I said, he’s no longer engaged to Scarlett. She told me she’d rather kill herself than fuck him.”

  “Well, that’ll be news to him then.”

  “Go on. I recognize the De La Cruz house. But what’s this one? With whom is he forging this alliance?”

  “Felix Pérez. Jacob’s son-in-law. He’s back in the picture and has some support within the Cartel. I don’t think he’s very powerful yet but if they joined forces, it could damage us considering our situation with the other families.”

  “I’m about to resolve that situation.” I close the folder. “And I have no intention of letting them damage us. Were these taken with a drone or do we have men there?”

  “No men. Too dangerous. He’s untouchable as long as he’s on Mexican soil.”

  “No one is untouchable. Ever.” I look straight ahead, my mind working.

  “What about the old man. You can take care of him. Maybe it’ll lure Marcus back.”

  “I already told you, we’re not killing a man who is in a fucking coma. That’s cowardice.”

  He studies me for a beat. “You can’t go after him in Mexico, Cristiano. They’ll kill you on sight.”

  I look over at him. Does he see how little I care about that? As long as I kill Marcus first, I don’t care if I walk out of there or not. I just have to be the one to end that motherfucker’s life before I die. That’s all I care about. “You said you have names.”

  He nods, takes out another folder from inside his briefcase where I see stacks more.

  “George and Stella Normandy.”

  “Not Italian names.”

  “No, but she’s Italian. George is American. Married about thirty years ago. They’re heavily invested in the flesh trade. They run a couple of clubs, for lack of a better word, where patrons pay top dollar for use of the product—”

  “They’re people, Uncle.” Product. It bothers me that he calls the women that.

  He pauses, looks irritated for a moment before continuing.

  “As I was saying, patrons pay top dollar for use of the women. For anywhere from a single night to several years.”

  “Then I guess business has been bad lately.” We intercepted the last shipment, and my men are still working on repatriating the girls and women to their countries, their families. It’s harder than you’d think. Some have been slaves for years. Some don’t want to go back home out of shame. And some of them, well, their families don’t want them back. Dirtied goods. As if being kidnapped and sold was their choice.

  “You could say that.”

  “How did you find out about them?”

  “You know I have my contacts.”

  “And you won’t say.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Fine.” My uncle has a lot of contacts. We pull onto the street where his office is. “Anything else?”

  He looks out the front window. “You should have what you need and the couple in question has been…contained.”

  I nod as we come to a stop in front of his building. “Have a good day, Uncle.”

  “Let’s have dinner. We can talk about Rinaldi. Make a plan.”

  “Another night.”

  “Soon.”

  “Soon.”

  He opens the door and has one leg out but stops, turns back to me with a strange smile on his face. “Leave a mess Cristiano.”

  I study him. For not actually wanting to have his hands in the bloodier side of things, he’s more macabre than I’d guess he’d be.

  “Always do, Uncle.”

  11

  Cristiano

  Charlie and Dante are standing outside of the restaurant a little out of town talking.

  They’re both dressed impeccably in dark suits and looking, for all intents and purposes, like legitimate businessmen. Dante’s twenty-six now. My one remaining brother. Our bond is strong, but he can be a pain in the ass, too. Although Charlie’s the same age as my uncle David, he looks younger.

  Five SUVs are parked in the lot and several soldiers are loitering by their vehicles.

  I climb out, adjust my cuffs, very aware of the eyes on me.

  “Everyone’s here,” Charlie says.

  “How many soldiers?”

  “About two dozen. No firepower inside.”

  I nod and turn to my brother. “Have a good night?” I don’t like the nights he spends off the island, but I understand.

  “Okay. How about you?”

  I snort.

  He smirks. “What’s the matter, Brother, don’t tell me you didn’t get any.” He clucks his tongue.

  “Fuck off.”

  He puts an arm over my shoulders and leans in close. “I can find you a girl who looks like the De La Cruz girl if that’s your—”

  “I said fuck off.” I shove his arm off me.

  “Getting laid might help you relax a little.”

  I grunt.

  “Hey.” Dante moves to stand in front of me. He adjusts the collar of my jacket then rests his hands on my shoulders. “You okay?”

  Am I okay? No. I’m not okay. I don’t remember the last time I was okay. But I nod. “We should get this done.”

  “You’re not doing it alone, you know. I’m right there beside you. We take it back together. We destroy the motherfuckers who tried to destroy us together.”

  I study him, smile, mess up his hair. “Thanks for the pep talk but it’s all good. Let’s go.”

  He smiles. I know he’s got my back and I’ve got his even if we don’t agree on everything.

  We walk into the building. For as bright as it is outside, it’s dark inside. It’s a dinner club, not a breakfast club, with dark walls and curtains, tinted windows and elegance all around.

  “Gentlemen,” I say, taking inventory.

  Dante does the same, moving to stand at the opposite end of the room.

  A single representative from each of the five families in Italy sits at the table. I haven’t seen them in ten years. I tell myself that’s why I don’t recognize them. Not because of my missing memory.

  “Cristiano,” Matteo Gribaldi says, standing to shake my hand. I only know it’s Matteo because I studied the photos, the histories.

  “Matteo.”

  “It’s good to see you. We’d thought…well, we’d believed the worst.”

  I smile but it’s just a stretching of my lips. I feel nothing.

  He resumes his seat and each of the others gre
ets me in turn. These men have been working with Rinaldi in the ten years I’ve been gone. They’ve participated in and gotten richer off the one thing that was forbidden to them. They’re greedy, all of them. But it’s not their greed that bothers me. It’s their duplicity and their weakness I despise. Because only after I attacked Rinaldi did they have a change of heart.

  I take my seat at the head of the table, noting the soldiers standing around the room.

  “You are here because you agreed many years ago, some when your fathers were in command, to the rules my father set. The one activity we will not deal in. The Rinaldi family is finished. The De La Cruz Cartel has been dealt with. And now that I’m back, I resume my place at the head of this table.” I pause. “My father made your fathers rich. My grandfather made your grandfathers rich. And we did it without trafficking in human flesh.”

  “Cristiano, Marcus was the cancer that ate his family from the inside out. Without your family to unite us, we became divided. We agreed to things we should not have agreed to. But we are not all as honorable as your father,” one of the men says. It doesn’t matter who. They’ll parrot one another to save their lives.

  “Honor killed my father,” I say, shifting my gaze around the room. “I will avenge my family. You’re here because you did not have a hand in the massacre. You’re here because I believe we can return to the original pact. Am I correct to believe this?”

  “Cristiano,” one of the representatives, an older man with whom my family shares the most history starts. Lorenzo Ricci.

  I raise my eyebrows.

  “They killed my father, too, because he stood in their way.” He stands dramatically. “The Ricci family is with you.”

  “Rinaldi is still alive. Both father and son,” one of the others says.

  “I have rendered them powerless.”

  “If the cartel chooses to work with Marcus—”

  “They won’t.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  “I’m sure.” I don’t mention Scarlett or Noah. The less they know the better.

  His eyebrows rise up.

  “Are you with us?” I ask. I could give a fuck about anything else.

  He nods.

  “You’ve risen from the dead, Cristiano,” another says. “I stand with you and your brother.”

  All eyes fall on the final two. They look around the room and together, they nod.

  I stand, button my jacket. “I’m glad to see we’re once again aligned. Gentlemen.” They remain seated as I turn to the door, Dante flanking me.

  “They’ll turn on us in a heartbeat,” Dante says when we’re outside.

  “I know. I don’t trust them, but I’ve already made the example. They will obey me because I am mightier than them.” Mightier than Rinaldi or any other family. The instant they see weakness, they will pounce. I have no doubt. Even those with the more impassioned pledges.

  Not too long ago I found a letter my father had written to my mom. The letter itself had to have been thirty years old. It had been tucked inside the pages of a photo album. In it, he’d told her how he’d grown up with stories his mother had told that his family were descended from angels. He told her he knew better, even as a kid, but knew she needed for him and his brother to believe they were the good kind of angels.

  He’d said in his letter that his family, and he in particular, was here to watch over the rest of this criminal underworld. Try to keep some control over it. To rein in the evil we do.

  My mom didn’t come from a mafia family and I get the feeling he was trying to reassure her, to win her over. He told her in that same letter he’d fallen in love with her the instant he’d seen her. She’d been working for my uncle at the time as one of his secretaries. She wasn’t even Italian. I know he was supposed to have married the eldest Ricci daughter and I know the turmoil it caused within the families when he eloped with my mother instead.

  Charlie told me how it cost our family, but my father was in love. And that was all there was to it.

  It’s a fairy tale.

  And the task I have embarked on is a hellish tale.

  What that letter left out was how the Grigori angels hated the humans they watched over. Just as I hate every one of the men at that table. Just as I hate myself.

  12

  Scarlett

  I’m sitting in the kitchen flipping through an old Italian cookbook, my hand absently petting Cerberus when I hear the sound of the chopper. I look at the clock. It’s a little after nine at night.

  Lenore, who has been sitting across from me making a shopping list, gets up and puts the espresso pot on the stove.

  “He’ll want coffee,” she says to me.

  Alec glances out the window. He’s been my shadow today and if it wasn’t for Lenore telling him I could walk out to the greenhouse to collect fresh vegetables, I’m pretty sure I’d have been locked up inside all day.

  At least I got to see Noah. He told me that Alec had brought down the entirety of the cake last night.

  I wonder if I should go up to my room. Well, his room. Will he really make me kneel to apologize to him? And if so, would he make me do it in front of Lenore? I feel my face burn just thinking about it.

  But he does deserve an apology. I do know that. What I said, what I accused him of, it wasn’t right especially knowing what I know. What my brothers allowed to happen to his mother.

  “I’ll go upstairs,” I tell Lenore, just getting to my feet when the kitchen door opens, and Cristiano walks inside. I’m surprised because I guess I expected him to use the front door. This seems so domestic.

  I take a moment to look him over. I can’t help it. His hair is ruffled from wind, the tip of his nose red with cold, and the scent of whiskey lingers on the wind that blows in with him.

  His eyes land on me and stay there even as Cerberus rushes to him.

  “Where is your jacket?” Lenore asks him, going to close the door. The temperature was nice during the day in the sun, but it’s cooled off a lot since.

  Cristiano shifts his gaze to the cookbook on the table. Even though I’m standing, I’m still holding a page open. It’s the one with the recipe for the Crème Caramel Lenore made. I had a taste, and it was amazing.

  He finally turns to Lenore, giving me space to breathe again.

  “It’s fine. I’m fine.”

  I decide that’s a good moment to slip away and take a step to the door.

  “Scarlett.” The way he says my name is nothing short of a command.

  I stop but I don’t turn back.

  “Sit.”

  Lenore clears her throat and I hear her rustling around behind me.

  “I said sit,” Cristiano repeats when I don’t move. “Get her a plate.”

  I turn around, not sure who he was instructing, but see Lenore set the Crème Caramel at the center of the table before producing two espresso cups, two dishes, and finally the pot.

  “I’ll take it from here,” Cristiano says, and Lenore nods, unties her apron.

  “Alec, you’re dismissed too.”

  They exit the kitchen together, leaving us alone in the dimly lit room. Cristiano takes a few moments to pet Cerberus, giving him all his attention. It’s strange to see him when he does it. How warm and relaxed his expression becomes.

  Once he’s finished, he tells Cerberus to go to his bed in the opposite corner of the kitchen. He then returns all his attention to me, eyes sharp as daggers on me.

  I clear my throat and avert my gaze slightly, very aware of how hard my heart is beating.

  “Dress fit okay?”

  I nod, bite my lip.

  “You have anything to say?”

  Get it over with. Maybe he’ll forget the part about kneeling. “I shouldn’t have said what I said.”

  “Which was?”

  “I shouldn’t have accused you of…taking advantage of me.”

  “Of taking something you don’t give,” I say the words slowly. They’ve repeated in my mind all day.
>
  “I’m sorry I—”

  “Here. Say them here.” He points to the floor beside him.

  I draw a deep breath in, then out and in again. I’m not going to be able to do it. I just can’t. Maybe it’s that I know it’s not Noah he’ll punish but me, but I can’t.

  “Are you serious?” I ask him.

  “As a gunshot to the head.”

  “That’s in poor taste, don’t you think?”

  “I told you what I’d expect of you. You’ve had the whole day to come to terms with the fact.”

  “You want me to kneel. You want to see me degrade myself.”

  “Degrade is a big word but yes, I want you to kneel. I want to know that you understand your mistake. Your insult.”

  I’m on the verge of tears, I feel it, and I can’t tell if they’re angry tears or sad tears or I’m fucked and I’m going to have to kneel to this man tears, but they’re just a few blinks away.

  I push the chair back loudly and stand gripping the edge of the table for strength.

  “I’ve told you I’m sorry and I mean it. I shouldn’t have said it. But I won’t kneel, Cristiano. I’ll take whatever punishment you want to dish out, but I won’t kneel. I swore it to myself with Marcus. With my brothers. And I won’t kneel for you. Not of my own free will.”

  My heart is beating so fast I swear it’s going to leap out of my chest. When he pushes his chair back and stands, instinct tells me to make a run for it even while reason tells me what a mistake that will be.

  I whirl to run but he’s on me before I’ve even reached the door. He’s fast. So fast. And so much stronger than me. He spins me around, big hand in the middle of my chest pushing me against the wall.

  I shove him, but he takes my wrists and drags them behind my back. With one hand he grips my wrists and winding the other one into my hair, he makes a fist of it, forcing my head back painfully.

  “You won’t kneel of your own free will? But that’s what I want, Little Kitten,” he says, words furious and menacing and spoken with precision. With control. He leans in close trapping me.

  Danger. This man is dangerous.