Chapter 3
The words hung in the bright, sunlit air of the salon like a toxic cloud. That woman.
Marciano remained perfectly still, a towering monument of restrained, catastrophic violence. He slowly turned his angular, handsome face toward Dorothea. His jawline tightened so hard the muscles leaped beneath his fair skin. The matriarch of the Pierce family swallowed heavily, her pearl necklace rattling against her collarbone as she took a panicked step backward.
“The boy is confused,” Dorothea stammered, her voice pitching an octave higher as she desperately tried to salvage the situation. “He has an overactive imagination. Elisa, tell your brother that the child is simply tired.”
“Do not speak to my sister,” Marciano whispered. The controlled, deadly cadence of his voice forced the surrounding guests to hold their breath. He took a single, measured step toward the shattered glass.
Before Marciano could reach out to help his sister up, the heavy double doors at the far end of the corridor swung open.
Harlan Pierce swaggered into the room. At thirty-nine, Elisa’s husband was a wealthy, arrogant Mafia associate. He wore an expensive tailored suit, his luxury wristwatch gleaming under the skylights. He carried himself with the unearned confidence of a man who believed his marital ties to the D’Angelo family made him untouchable.
“What the hell is going on in here?” Harlan demanded, his American accent loud and abrasive. He looked at the broken glass, the crying child, and his wife kneeling on the floor. “Elisa, get up. You’re making a scene in front of the capos.”
Elisa slowly stood up, keeping Luca tucked safely behind her legs. She looked at the man she had married. And then, her breath caught in her throat.
The bright, cinematic lighting of the room was entirely unforgiving. It perfectly illuminated the fair, rosy skin of Harlan’s neck, just above the crisp white collar of his dress shirt.
Stamped clearly against his skin was a fresh, vibrant, unmistakable smudge of dark red lipstick.
Elisa stared at it, her blue eyes widening as the ultimate, humiliating betrayal locked into place. The tears she had been fighting back finally spilled over her cheeks.
“Harlan,” Elisa breathed, her voice breaking. “Your neck.”
Marciano’s cold, intimidating eyes shifted instantly from his sister’s devastated face to his brother-in-law’s neck. He saw the lipstick mark. He saw the guilt flash wildly across Harlan’s eyes. The puzzle of Luca’s tearful confession was instantly, brutally solved.
“It’s nothing,” Harlan snapped defensively, his hand flying up to furiously rub the lipstick smear into his skin. He stepped aggressively toward Elisa. “Stop looking at me like that, Elisa. I was in a meeting.”
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“A meeting,” Marciano repeated. His voice was a low, guttural rumble that seemed to vibrate through the hardwood floor.
Marciano stepped smoothly between his sister and Harlan, interposing his broad, deeply masculine frame to shield Elisa entirely.
