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20


Aaron's POV

I remained outside Isabella’s bedroom door for a long moment before she had shut the door, resisting the urge to knock once more. It hadn’t been as bad as I’d feared, the evening. Isabella had really seemed relaxed in my presence, for the first time since our nuptials, speaking freely instead of treating me with her usual polite detachment.

Even the way she’d looked at me during the syndicate meeting hadn’t escaped my notice. MY GIRL’s eyes had sparked with attraction when I’d dealt with Marcello’s vulgar remark, her cheek had turned rosy when I’d laid my hand on the small of her back. She was coming to view me as something more than the man her father had strong-armed her into marrying.

But I’d also been around Isabella long enough to realize when she was wrestling with inner demons. After dinner she had retreated again and I was pretty sure Victor was still in her thoughts.

I went to my study and poured out a glass of whiskey. Looking at my phone, I had three missed calls from Diablo and two from Mason at Renaissance Guild. Business that couldn’t wait, business even when I was trying to court my own wife.
I called Diablo first.

“Boss, we have a problem,” he declared, opening without a preamble. "Victor's been busy."

"Define busy."

“He’s been getting with delegates of the northern syndicates. Not just chit-chat — formal negotiations.”

I put my glass on the table, and tension replaced contentment in an instant. "What kind of negotiations?"

“The type to consider when they talk about redistribution of territories and liquidation of the existing leadership.”

"He's planning a coup."

"Bigger than that, Boss. He's planning a war. And from what we hear from our sources, he’s positioning himself as the alternative to your leadership.”

I massaged my temples, a headache starting to form. Victor had always been competitive, but this went beyond sibling rivalry.

"There's more," Diablo continued. “He’s been leaning on someone to give him information about your operations. Our contact didn't get any specifics but Victor's getting antsy with his… source.”

Isabella. Isabella was failing to start turning anything up and Victor was growing anxious.

"How much time do we have?"

"Hard to say. Weeks maybe, days maybe. "But Aaron, if Victor's backed by the northern syndicate, we don't know what resources he has.”

I looked out the window at the estate grounds after I hung up the phone. Everything I had fought to build, everything my family had kept up for generations, was threatened. And in the middle of it all, there was my wife, who remained in love with the man who was trying to destroy us both.

I had to quicken my timetable with Isabella. Victor would have been pressed for information, and he might do something equally dangerous and reckless that would put her in harm’s way.

The following morning, I took care to waylay Isabella when she tried heading out of her room.

“Good morning,” I said, falling into stride next to her as she descended the stairs.

"Morning," she said, but her greeting was less sunny than it had been back in the evening.

“Do you want to go to the beach during the day with me?Maybe drive out to the coast, have lunch somewhere with a view.”

"I can't today. I have... plans."

"What kind of plans?"

"Personal ones."

I looked at her face, at the way she didn't want to look at me. "Isabella, is everything alright? You seem tense."

"I'm fine."

But she wasn't fine. There was something fragile to her this morning, as if she were willing herself to stay in one piece.

“If there’s something on your mind, you can tell me.”

"Can I?" She swung around to look directly at me. "Because sometimes I feel like you're not being entirely straight with me either, Aaron.”

The charge settled between us, hung in the air for a moment. She was right, of course. I had not been entirely forthcoming with her about Victor, about the Renaissance Guild, about just how awful the danger was that surrounded us. But I was keeping her from truths that would shatter her.

“Trust is something that marriage needs,” I said cautiously. "On both sides."

"Yes," she said, "it does."

We were standing there and looking at each other and we both knew we were keeping secrets, both of us were afraid to be the first to let them go.

I don’t even have to say it, Isabella said at last. I should leave.

"Be careful," I told her. “And call if you need anything.”

When she left, I had Giuseppe tail her from a distance. I wanted to know where she was going, who she was meeting with. If Victor was pushing her, I wanted to know what the whole situation was with.

Two hours later, Giuseppe called.

“Boss, she saw Victor Romano in some coffee joint downtown. They chatted for an hour. It looked... intense.”

“Intense how?"

"She was upset. He was shoving her for most of the talk. She shook her head no, she kept doing that, making her more agitated.”

Victor was escalating the pressure. Maybe threatening her or asking her for something she couldn’t give.

"Where is she now?"

"Heading home. But Boss, there's something else. Victor hung up and made a second call after Mrs. Romano departed. I don’t know what he said, but he seemed angry.”

I was in the large salon when Isabella arrived back at the house. She appeared haggard, pale in the face, twitchy.

"How were your personal plans?" I asked gently.

"Fine."

"Isabella, you look upset."

"I said I'm fine."

But she wasn’t O.K., and we both knew it. She was torn between her loyalty to Victor and whatever she was beginning to feel for me, and it was tearing her apart.

I suggested we go to a charity gala together that evening. Isabella resisted at first with the excuse of being tired but I insisted.

“People want to see us together,” I said to her. “It comes with marrying me.”
________

I stayed at her side at the gala, my hand on her waist as we worked our way around the room, introducing her: my wife, with that unmistakable lilt of pride in my voice. Whenever other guys checked her out, I ensured my vice-like hold on her was visible.

“You’re really good at this,” Isabella said as we danced.

"At what?"

"Playing the devoted husband."

"Who says I'm playing?"

She gazed up at me, studying my face for lies. "Aaron..."

“What if I said this marriage could be real, Isabella? What if I said I wanted it to be real?

“I’d say you’re trying to play me.”

“And what if I told you I was falling in love with you?”

The first word was out before I could quash it. Isabella's eyes widened and for just a second, I saw something soft and hopeful in her gaze. Then her walls went back up.

“I would say you don’t know what love is.”

"Maybe not. But I can’t tell you what I see when I look at you.”
"And what's that?"

“As if I want to spend the rest of my life trying to please you.”
Isabella ceased to dance and withdrew from me. "Don't do this, Aaron."

"Do what?"

“Shit you don’t even mean just to play some game you think we’re playing.”

"This isn't a game to me."

"Isn't it? That’s because it seems that everyone in my life is playing games with me, and I’m the only one who wouldn’t know the rules.”

Before I could answer, my phone buzzed with a text from Diablo: "Victor with northern syndicate heads tonite. Something big is happening."

I glanced at Isabella, beautiful and confused in her evening gown, not knowing that the man she believed she loved was about to throw sweet fate to the wind.

"Isabella," I was very careful, "I want you to promise me something."

"What?"

“If anyone ever asks you to choose between being loyal to me and being loyal to someone else, choose yourself first. Your safety, your happiness — that comes first for anyone.”
Frowning, she looked confused by the odd request. “What are you talking about, Aaron?”

"Just promise me."

"I... okay. I promise."

But I could tell by the look in her eyes that she didn’t know why I was asking. She had no way of knowing that soon enough she'd face precisely that sort of decision.

Isabella was silent and reflective as we headed home from the gala. I leaned over and touched her hand, lacing our fingers together.

”Whatever happens, Isabella, I just want you to know that marrying you was the best thing I ever did.”

“When I've been churlish to you?” When it is clear I don’t want this marriage?”

"Even then."

She squeezed my hand, and for a moment I thought she might share with me what was burdening her thoughts. She instead glanced out the window.

“It’s like, sometimes I wish I was that way, but no.”

"Different how?"

"I only hope to be the wife you deserve. I only wish I could love you the way you want me to.”

"You could."

“No,” she answered, drawing her hand back. "I can't."

Because she was still in love with Victor. Because she was still devoted to helping him destroy me.

That very night, while I was pouring over intelligence reports in my study on what we knew about Victor's doings, I came to a decision. I refused to play the waiting game for Isabella to pick me over Victor. I’d have to make the decision for her this time, by giving her a closer look at Victor— for who he really was.
Even if it killed her to do it.

My phone rang -It was Mason from the Renaissance Guild.
“Aaron, we’re being patient, but we’ve got to move this along a little faster. There is a slingshot of events happening and I need for you to be in New York in about a week.”

"I can't leave right now. There’s something with my family I need to deal with.”

"The situation with your brother? We're aware of Victor's activities. Actually they could be in our favor."

"What do you mean?"

“A syndicate war makes for the perfect mask for what we do. Just let Victor believe he’s on top, and then take him and the people of the north out with one fell swoop. Clean slate."

"And my wife?"

“It’s war; there are unintended consequences, Aaron. You know that."

I didn’t answer as I hung up and rage roiled in my chest. Everyone wanted Isabella to be used: Victor wanted her as a spy, Renaissance Guild as disposable meat shield,me as his own dirty insurance policy.

Unlike the others, though, I was going to make sure she lived through it. Whatever it took.

I only hoped that whatever I was about to do to save her, she would forgive me.