It’s an impossible question and I think he knows it. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for my brothers, for the empire we’re trying to build. We came from nothing, and now we rule half the city? I obviously take pride in all we’ve accomplished…But it feels hollow. The only person I really want to celebrate my achievements with is the one person who’s no longer here. Things between Zandra and me were never supposed to happen the way they did, but what we found was better than I ever could have hoped.“In an ideal world,” I answer, “I’d have both. But if I had to choose… I’d pick her.”I see no judgment in his eyes, no cause to be defensive. Leo simply nods, opens the door, and steps aside to let someone enter. A woman. One with flowing red hair and startling blue eyes. I’m either seeing a ghost, or I’m looking right at—“Cassandra?” I breathe. “What are you doing here?”“I don’t have a lot of time,” she says quickly. “If Dad finds out I’m here, I might as well just shoot myself.” “What’s
“Come along, dear,” Mom says to Xander, ignoring Dad outright. “Would you care for a pot of tea? Maybe a soda?”“A glass of water would be great.”“Wait a damn minute!” Dad exclaims. Mom waves a hand dismissively. “You can wait, Lion. Calm down a bit before you join us, okay?”In moments like these, I remember how cool my mother can be. Dad may be a hard, cold, badass where the Mafia is concerned, but it takes one hell of a woman to tame him.With a shaky breath, I take Xander’s hand and guide him in. Here goes nothing.In the entire history of awkward family dinners, I’m pretty sure this one takes the cake.Dad has his gun on the dining table in clear view, a threat. Cassandra and Alessandro sit on either side of Xander and me, glancing at each other uncomfortably like they’re both waiting for the shooting to start. Mom serves dinner with a small, reserved smile, doing her best to move things along. Bless her for trying, but it’s really not working.I’m not sure who’s angrier at who
Zandra Franco POVI never wanted a big wedding. Growing up, I wasn’t the type of girl who dreamed about flowing white dresses, enough flowers to open a florist shop or exorbitantly expensive multi-tier cakes. I’m perfectly content with what I have—my family in attendance and my man standing proudly at the altar.We’re in a small chapel, tucked away in one of the city's quieter, more peaceful corners. I’m dressed in the same wedding dress Mom wore when she married Dad, the very same veil on my head. There are no words to describe how honored I am to wear it. I hope one day, I get to pass it on to my own daughter to wear at her wedding, and perhaps even my granddaughter after her. Little things like these, full of sentiment and love, are how traditions are born.Dad and I stand just in front of the main entrance to the chapel. Everyone’s taken their seats, and the music is beginning to swell. I know he had his reservations when I first agreed to marry Andrei, but instead of bitterness,
Zandra and Xander's Daughter - Anya “So you’re saying sex with two men is better than one? Just want to be clear I’m hearing my sister, the strait-laced school teacher correctly.”Anya Franco Mancini pressed her lips together in an attempt to smother a laugh. With her cell phone balanced between her shoulder and chin, it proved to be a challenge to wipe leftover food off tables, gather empty plates left behind by the lunch hour crowd, and convince her younger sister she wasn’t as uptight as she wanted to make her out to be.“I’m just saying. Maybe if you were to come up and find a handsome man or two of your own you could see what I’m talking about.” Not that she’d had a lot of time on her hands outside of teaching and working part-time as a waitress to help her sister through med school. As it was, school loans would be haunting them for the next decade, if not longer.“Sounds like an adventure, for sure.” Restlessness strung across the wires and Anya did everything not to sigh too
Baguio City, PhilippinesSpecial? Sometimes she had to stop and wonder too. Anya Mancini pressed the phone close to her mouth and whispered, “I swear there’s something in the water. The men here are well-hung, well-built, and fuck like they are made to pleasure women twenty-four/seven. Which by my experience, they are, and if you want to know how I know all the men are well endowed, two words: Risky Whiskey.”Silence fed through the line before a string of bubbly laughter met her ear.Snickers and a few sputtered laughs sounded from a few tables down. She dared a look over her shoulder. Heat climbed the back of her neck as Damon Castillo shot her a quizzical look from across the bar with a smirk on his face as if sensing the Blue Mountain Ridge crew was being talked about.Lord help her, that Castillo smirk as she liked to call it. Every single one of the Castillo siblings had it and used it like a weapon of mass destruction on the poor female population of Castillo Ridge.Whether tou
Daniel’s father took up the space of two men and stood a good head and a half taller than her five-five height. He aimed her way, pushing through chairs and tables, empty or not, wild, furious, eyes landed on hers as the double doors to the diner swung shut behind the man who carried the same face as her lover, only a few years older. Handsome, with a streak of silver through his sideburns and a thick beard trimmed close to the chin.The man never held a kind word for her, but today he seemed riled up more than usual. As soon as he’d learned about her, Damon, and Daniel, he’d been angry and the crinkled skin at the corners of his eyes only grew deeper. If wrath had a color she would say it matched the same stormy blue clouds swirling a nasty tempest in his irises. His mouth pulled back in a fierce grimace making him appear ten years older and meaner than a hell-bound priest.Anya’s back went straight and her eyebrows inched up at the wall of muscle plowing toward her.He tossed people
Tarzan brushed Desmond’s warning aside as if a pesky fly buzzed in his ear. That didn’t bode well for the older man. “Because of you, I’ll be lucky if he comes home at all. When are you going to listen? You’re bad for him. Bad. I’ve said it from the beginning.” He pressed on, turning his wrath away from her and pinning Desmond with a steely-eyed glare.His words cut deep, but she had learned the hard way that verbal wounds healed. If something happened to Daniel? Nothing would ever be okay again. She raised her gaze, locked eyes with a man she should fear, and demanded an answer.“Tell me where Daniel and Damon are right now and don’t you dare give me some pompous, high-handed bullshit, old man. I want answers.”Tarzan swiveled his scowl back her way, a beefy hand poised to give her a taste of his knuckles.She narrowed her eyes.God, don’t let Daniel walk in now. He’d end up killing his father.She braced for impact and dared him with a glare to go through with it. It would hurt, but
Anya looked up at the sound of Daniel’s voice and edged closer to Desmond. All the remaining patrons now surrounded the bar too, shoulder-to-shoulder support for one of their own.“You ever do any bull riding?” Damon called over the radio, a smile in place more for her benefit than anything else, she bet.“A time or two. Might have been half-drunk on some moonshine at the time, but yeah. Let’s do this.”“You can have some moonshine if you get your ass back here in one piece, you hear me, bro?”“Gonna need it from the sound of it. This will hurt like a bitch, won’t it?”“If Desmond can handle it, you can.”That was Damon.The TV station crew glued their cameras on the chopper, and she looked on as Damon was prepared to rappel again at a moment’s notice.“Fuck. Hey, Desmond, man, turn the TV off in case this shit goes sideways.”If they did what she thought they were talking about, the maneuver meant to save Daniel’s life could smash him against the rocks instead. She didn’t need to be