Devil’s Lily: A Dark Mafia Romance (Nightshades Book 1)

Three days later…

“When are the girls getting transported back to Japan?” Rafael asks absently as he types something on his phone.

I glance briefly down at my own phone where Marco’s text glares back at me: Elira’s on her way to your office. Great. I barely keep the grin off my face as I answer Rafael, “Yuto’s jet is landing tomorrow evening.” The words are barely out when the door bursts open.

And there she is—my wife, standing in the doorway with her arms crossed and a storm brewing in her pretty hazel eyes.

‘You’ve been avoiding me,” she announces, loud enough to draw every eye on the video conference to my face.

I can’t help the smirk that plays across my lips as I wave her over. She narrows her eyes on me and stomps over, face scrunched up in an adorable scowl that makes her nose wrinkle. Christ, it shouldn’t be this endearing.

I push my chair back, silently inviting her in, and just like she did three days ago, she easily slips into my lap. But this time I spin her around, positioning her back against my chest so she can face the screen. The startled gasp when she spots my brothers makes her whole body tense in my arms.

“Ahh, bella, good to see your pretty face amongst these ugly mugs.” Romero leans forward in his seat, green eyes sparkling mischievously. Elira chuckles, a little of her tension slipping.

“Hi, Romero.” She smiles at him, then nods at Michael and Rafael.

The latter’s glare is a dagger aimed right at me, which I meet with one of my own, daring him to say something. “I think we’ve covered everything. I’ll let you all know if I find any new clues. Goodbye.” I exit the meeting before anyone can protest.

Elira bites her lip, glancing up nervously. “I didn’t mean to interrupt. You should’ve told me to come back if you were busy.”

I smile faintly. “It’s fine. The meeting was already winding down before you came in.” I turn her around on my lap so she’s straddling me, her legs dangling on either side of me. “Now, what’s this about, dolcezza?”

“You’ve been avoiding me… because of what happened the other day?” She drops her eyes to my throat and starts drawing lazy patterns on my chest with her finger. Shit. She’s bothered by that.

“No, of course not. I’ve just been really busy,” I say firmly, though it’s only half true. Yes, I’ve been busy, but I’ve also been deliberately keeping my distance. The more we interact, the more I want to push past her boundaries and kiss the hell out of her until she forgets why she didn’t even want me to in the first place.

The more I think about it, the more afraid I am that I’ll just do it without her permission. One impulsive move like that might set me back on any progress I’ve made with her. She has finally stopped looking at me as her captor, and I don’t want to jeopardize that.

“Prove it,” she says, finally meeting my eyes. Her hazel eyes swirl with bronze and emerald. “Prove you’re not avoiding me by spending time with me. Today. Now.”

I chuckle. “What?” But my amusement fades as her chin juts out stubbornly. She’s serious. Of course, she is. “Elira, I have mountains of work I need to get through. I don’t have the time to frolic with you.”

Hurt flashes in her eyes, and her hand drops from my chest. She starts to scramble off my lap, but I secure my arms around her waist, holding her to me. My heart constricts watching her turn her face away.

“Elira.”

Her voice, when it comes, is like a knife to the gut—low, broken, and stripped of all defenses. “Am I going to be just another prisoner here?”

My jaw tightens, but I force myself to stay still, to let her keep going. Her gaze drifts somewhere over my shoulder. “I’ve been locked up in Atë’s compound since I was eleven, Maximo. That day… I begged Mama to take me to the beach playground. It was sunny, hot. Perfect. She loved the beach too much to say no to me.”

Her voice cracks, but she pushes through. “We were laughing, playing, and then… they came. Atë’s enemies ambushed us. And my mom she–she—” She swallows, blinking rapidly, but a single tear falls down her face regardless.

“Dolcezza.” I lift my hand, using my thumb to wipe that single tear away. A brick lodges itself in my lungs, my heart, making it painful to breathe as I watch the torment etched into her face. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“Wasn’t it?” Those eyes lock onto mine again, glistening with unshed tears. “Atë didn’t talk to me for over a week, and when he finally did, it was only to tell me I wasn’t allowed to go out anymore. Ever. I accepted it as my punishment, and I also knew he did it to protect me. But it was suffocating. The longer the years went by without any change in sight, I felt like I was going crazy. Then on my 21st birthday, I’d had enough and was ready to get into a fight with my father to let me go out. But I didn’t need to. I guess I have you to thank for that.”

“Me?” I frown.

She smiles faintly, the tears thankfully drying in her eyes. “Yes, you. I overheard him talking with his right-hand man, and he was cursing your name. You must have done something to him because he was so distracted, he let me go out without argument.”

My frown deepens as I think back. Then the memory clicks. “Ahh.” That was when I intercepted his weapon shipment. So that’s what did it.

“Why am I even telling you all this?” Elira sighs and tries to get out of my arms again, but I don’t let her.

“I don’t know, Elira. Why are you telling me?”

She scowls down at me. “The point,” she snaps, jabbing a finger at my chest, “is that I’ve been a prisoner all my life, and if this—” She waves her hand wildly between us, “—is going to be my new life, I refuse to spend it as a prisoner again. So I’m going out. Right now. With or without you. And don’t you dare smile, Maximo!”

I school my face into place, but my chest warms with amusement. She’s so adorable trying to threaten me. “I’m not smiling. Fine,” I surrender. “Where do you want to go?”

The transformation is instant—her entire face lights up, so bright it steals the breath from my lungs. She grabs my neck, practically bouncing in my lap. “Really? Really, really?”

Christ. I chuckle, nuzzling her cheek. “Yes, really, really.” Standing, I hoist her up, and she squeals, clinging to me like an excited monkey.

I carry her out of the study, ignoring the shock on my men’s faces as we walk past them up the stairs. Let them stare. Elira doesn’t care, and neither do I.

“Wait!” she says, tugging on my shirt as we go down the hallway to our room. “Take me to my room first. My clothes are in there.”

I narrow my eyes but quietly change course, already making a mental note to have Bianca, my housekeeper, move all the clothes in Elira’s closet to mine. This separate room bullshit has gone on long enough.

When I finally set her down, it takes all my restraint not to pull her back immediately. Not that I could—she bolts into her walk-in closet and quickly takes some clothes out like she’s scared I might change my mind any second. I lean against the doorframe, watching her with an indulgent smile as she slips out of my shirt into a pair of form-fitting slacks and top. Effortlessly stunning, as always.

“Do you have a specific place you’d like to go? Or should I surprise you?” I ask her as I take my phone out to text Macro that we’re going out and to get the cars and the men ready.

“Actually…”

Her hesitation makes me glance up. “What?”

“I’d like to go to a gun range.”

I freeze, my fingers pausing mid-text. Sweet, sunshine-smile Elira wants to what now? A gun range?

“It’s just one of the things I’ve always wanted to do. Roan tried to teach me at home a few times—how to shoot and a bunch of other things that interested me—but we had to sneak around so Atë wouldn’t find out, and it’s been years since I really shot a gun,” she blurts out in a rush.

Now it makes sense. I remember watching the footage of the night her father and brother attempted their foolish rescue, and the way she picked up that pistol from the floor without hesitation. That wasn’t a fluke.

I walk up to her slowly and pull her into me. “Are you trying to refine your shooting skills as a warning to me?” I tease, slipping my hand beneath her top, enjoying the way her breath hitches.

“N–no. Of course not,” she gasps, her head falling back when I palm her tits through her lace bra. I press a kiss to her throat, then step back abruptly, leaving her flushed and wide-eyed.

“Fine. Let’s do it. But we’re going to my gun range where the men practice. It’s private, so we’ll have more than enough privacy,” I tell her, and she gives me a smile so wide, it warms my heart.

The drive down to the small enclosed park I own is short, but Elira spends it bouncing on her seat like an over-caffeinated kid on Christmas morning. I’ve never seen her so excited. Damn it, I should have done this sooner. A mistake I’ll fix. I make a mental note to try to do stuff with her outside the house at least twice a week going forward.

The tall gates swing open as our car approaches, and Elira practically has her face pressed to the window. I chuckle, but it doesn’t even faze her. Her awe is so genuine, that by the time we pull into the sprawling concrete parking lot behind the square main building, I’m already thinking of what else I can show her next.

Inside, the man at the front desk jumps up at the sight of me. “Mr Leonotti, I–”

I wave him down. “It’s fine, I know my way around.” Turning to Marco and the rest of the men who came with us, I nod towards the waiting area. “You guys can wait here.”

Elira’s vibrating as I guide her to the gear room. When she enters, her gasp of delight is everything. “This looks just like the room in your panic room,” she says, eyes wide while taking in the arsenal, “except… bigger. And with way more weapons.”

I smirk, pulling down a pair of earmuffs and handing them to her. She takes them with a frown. “What about you?”

“I’m good,” I answer as I pick up the gloves none of my men use and hold them out.

She eyes them with suspicion. “Really?”

“You’re going to gear up correctly, or this is not going to happen.”

She scowls but drags them on with exaggerated annoyance. The goggles come next, and this time, she doesn’t argue. I step back, giving her a quick once-over. Satisfied, I gesture towards the wall. “Alright, which one can you shoot?”

“Almost all of them,” she answers without hesitation.

I watch, intrigued, as she scans the options before settling on a 9mm. A smart, reliable choice. But just as I’m nodding in approval, she returns it, and—oh, hell no—picks up one of the assault rifles.

An AK 47.

I gape at her. “Babe, I don’t think you can handle that. Your first choice was perfect.”

She throws me a look that could melt steel. “I handle you alright, don’t I?”

Fuck, I can’t even argue with that logic.

“Fine,” I grumble, grabbing the 9mm she discarded, just in case. If she’s dead set on trying, who am I to stop her? But I’m keeping backup close.

As we step outside, a surprised gasp cuts through the open air, the wonder in her expression impossible to miss as her eyes dance across the outdoor range with its scattered targets placed haphazardly at varying distances.

“Ready?” I ask, my own excitement building as I watch her.

Her grin is all teeth and fire. “I was born ready.”

I’m floored when she walks forward, holding the gun up against her shoulder like some expert mercenary, her hips swaying seductively. I swallow my groan as I adjust my hardening cock in my pants and follow her.

She kneels gracefully, then lies on her belly, squinting through the scope as she chooses a low target and aligns her rifle. My lips curl up in amusement as I take in her every movement.

The target she chose is farther away—a glass bottle blending almost perfectly with the grass—rather than the easier paper mannequins set up for beginners. I’m sure she’ll miss it, but I leave her to do her thing.

Part of the fun, after all, is missing.

She fiddles with the weapon, glances back to give me a saucy wink, then focuses on the target again. My smirk grows. Cute.

The gunshot cracks through the air, startling a flock of birds from the nearby trees. When the smoke clears, my jaw drops.

The glass bottle is gone.

Shattered into a hundred glittering shards.

She turns to me, smug as hell, and winks again. “Didn’t expect that, did you? My brother was thorough when he taught me things that would’ve given my father a heart attack if he’d found out.”

My semi turns into a full-blown erection, and a growl rips from my throat as I stalk towards her. She jumps to her feet with a squeal, throwing her hands up as she backs away from me.

“I know that look, Maximo. Stop it—we’re in public! And I’m not done yet. Don’t try to distract me.”

I narrow my eyes but force myself to stop, muttering a curse as I rearrange my cock again. This is going to be a long-ass day.