Chapter 74: Together
Twilight bled into the Texas sky, washing the world in bruised purples and deep golds. Inside, the ranch house was a vault of quiet; Marco had retreated to the guest wing with a bottle of bourbon, and the security team’s hushed reports over the comms were just a soft hum beneath the silence.Beth couldn’t settle. The conversation with Sophia coiled in her stomach, a cold, living thing. She slipped through the sliding glass doors onto the second-floor balcony, the scent of night-blooming jasmine and dry earth hitting her instantly. She lit a cigarette, the flare of the match a tiny, violent sunrise in the dusk. She rarely smoked anymore—bad for the brand, worse for the lungs—but some nerves demanded a specific poison.
She heard his approach, not by sound, but by the shift in the air. A presence, solid and familiar, filling the space behind her.She didn’t turn.
His arms came around her waist, his body a wall of heat against the evening’s growing chill. He rested his chin on her shoulder, his face buried in the curve of her neck. For a long moment, he just held her, his breath warm on her skin. Then his lips pressed against the sensitive spot just below her ear, a kiss that was more confession than greeting.“Amore,” he murmured, the word vibrating through her. “You’ve been quiet since lunch. What’s wrong?”
She took a slow drag, watching the ember glow.His embrace was both a comfort and a cage. “Your mother called.”
His hands stilled on her abdomen.“Sophia.” He said the name flatly. “Again. She has a talent for timing, I’ll give her that.”
“Claire’s engagement party. I’ve been cordially invited.”
Damien’s exhale was a soft laugh against her neck, devoid of humor. “Of course you have.” His hands tightened slightly, possessive.“It’s not an olive branch, Beth. It’s a recall notice.”
“I know.” Her voice was calm, almost detached.She tapped ash over the railing. “She wants her golden boy home. Back in New York, back under the family chandelier, far away from the… what did she used to call me? The ‘headstrong Texan diversion.’ The engagement party is just a convenient excuse.”
There was a time, long ago, when Beth had craved the approval of the Rossis. The young bride she’d been had studied their traditions, learned which fork to use, modulated her accent in their drawing room. She’d wanted to slot neatly into their dynasty, an extension of their legacy. Sophia had always made her feel perpetually uncultured, a stain on the linen. Claire, young and spoiled, had simply assumed Damien would get bored. Vittorio’s silent, assessing gaze had never stopped asking the same question: What does she want from us?She doubted Sophia cared whether she attended or not. The goal was simpler: so long as Damien came.
“She doesn’t get to recall me,” Damien said, his voice low and certain. His lips traveled the line of her shoulder, a counterpoint to the steel in his words. “I’m not one of their assets to be redeployed.”
“Aren’t you?” Beth turned slightly within his grasp, enough to see his profile in the fading light.The stubborn set of his jaw, the shadowed intensity of his eyes. “The heir.The crown prince.Your father’s been… managing things, you said. For how long?A week?Two? How long before managing becomes reclaiming?”
He didn’t answer. The distant thrum of the security helicopter patrolling the perimeter underlined the silence, a mechanical dragonfly guarding its queen. He took the cigarette gently from her fingers, brought it to his own lips, and took a drag. He exhaled a plume of smoke that dissolved into the darkening sky. “What did you tell her?”
“That I’d see if my schedule permitted.”
Damien snorted.“Brutal.” A faint smile touched his mouth. “She must have loved that.”
“She ended the call rather quickly.” Beth leaned back against him, a concession to the weariness seeping into her bones. The warmth of him was a tangible truth against the abstract chill of New York politics. “She said it would send a powerful message if I came.”
“She’s not wrong.” He crushed the cigarette out on the stone balustrade. His hands returned to her, one splayed across her stomach, the other lifting to trace the line of her collarbone.“Imagine it.You walking into that ballroom on my arm. A decade later.More beautiful, more powerful, utterly untouchable. It would be a declaration of war.”
“Or a surrender.” Beth closed her eyes.“Walking back into the den. Playing the part of the reconciled ex.The prodigal daughter-in-law. It would be on their terms, in their world.”
His touch stilled.“Is that what you think? That if you went, it would be for them?” He turned her slowly but firmly in his arms until she faced him.The last of the sunset caught in his green eyes, turning them opaque, dangerous. “If you walked in there, cara mia, it wouldn’t be on their terms. It would be on yours. You’d be the most dangerous person in the room, and everyone, especially my mother, would know it.”
She searched his face. The charm was gone, stripped away by the gravity of the moment. What remained was raw, predatory, and utterly fixated on her.“And what would you be?” she asked softly.
“Yours.” The word was absolute, final.“Publicly, privately.In that ballroom or on this balcony. Trying to win you back was never a secret, Beth. But showing them you’re already won?” He shook his head, a slow, deliberate movement.“That changes everything.For them. For us.”
The implication hung between them, immense and terrifying. It wasn’t just about an old flame rekindling.It was about alliances.Power blocks. Presenting a united front to an empire that had once rejected her. He was offering her a seat at a table far darker than any corporate boardroom, not as a supplicant, but as an equal.A co-ruler.
She thought of the cold precision in Sophia’s voice.The silent judgment of Vittorio. The whispers that would follow them.She thought of the sheer, audacious spectacle of it.
A slow, wicked smile began to curve her lips, one she didn’t try to suppress.Damien saw it. His own expression shifted, answering hers with a spark of ferocious hope. He leaned in, his forehead resting against hers. “What are you thinking?”
Beth brought her hands up, framing his face.Her thumbs traced the high line of his cheekbones. “I’m thinking,” she said, her voice a whisper against his mouth, “about what to wear.”