Mated to the wrong brother

Every three years, the families would come together in glittering ballrooms and fortified villas with walls so thick you couldn't hear the gunshots from the other side, and this was called the Tri-Annual Gathering.

I was seven the first time I attended. I wore silver shoes that hurt my toes and a dress that made me feel like a porcelain doll someone forgot to love. I clung to my sister's hand and watched men with eyes like stone kiss her cheeks and compliment my father's loyalty and servitude.

Now, I am seventeen. Still wearing dresses and pretending I belong to a world that wants to mount me like a statue. Except this time, I wasn't clinging to my sister's hand. I was waiting for him.

Dominic.

Just the thought of his name made warmth climb up my ribs and settle behind my throat. He wasn't like the others or even polished like the famous Vincenzo. He wasn't carved from ice like the other trained heirs we were paraded in front of. Dominic was the only one who ever looked like he wanted to run, and the only one who ever asked if I wanted to, too.

"Shh," a voice breathed into my face like he'd been running, while his strong hands clapped over my mouth during a blackout behind a chapel. "Look at me."

My giggling was muffled, and he sighed exasperatedly, letting his fingers travel to my jawline.

"You broke his nose, Rosa."

"He deserved it."

He laughed once, then leaned closer and made me swear I'd never let them turn me into a statue, and then proceeded to kiss my ears with things I'd never repeat – not even in my sleep because some things were too sacred to risk.

"Do you want me to kill him?" A glint of mischief danced in his eyes, and I shook my head quickly, my brows pulling together.

I should've been scared. My father had warned me about the De Laurentiis a thousand times. He called them, "charming until they don't need you."

Nevertheless, I wasn't.

Dom wasn't mine yet. But he swore he'd find a way.

"Wait for me by the fountain after the gun works."

I swallowed. "Okay."

The gun works was one of those twisted rituals that made outsiders think we were playing dress-up. Men fired antique pistols loaded with blanks and ceremonial rifles into the air in synchronized bursts, a display of fake peace between families.

The louder the shots, the more bullshit they were trying to bury.

My stomach still churned every time I heard it. However, it made anticipation twirl inside me because that sound meant he was coming.

Even though I'd been to D.C. four times before, it never stopped feeling like a world apart from ours in San Francisco. I was raised in sunlight, school life, and cafe parties. Here, this life always felt fictional to me, like pages from a book my father never let me finish. No wonder he never let us stay for too long. That was changing now, though, at least for my sister.

The sky turned orange and gold as the ceremonial gunfire thundered in the distance. Even muffled by walls and space, my breath shook.

A gust of cold wind pushed through the hedges, and I pulled my shawl tighter. The air was crispy and stingy in the garden just the way he and I always liked it.

It was tucked behind the ballroom, past the ivy-covered wall and through a maintenance door most people ever noticed. Dominic found it first, of course. Said it was too perfectly hidden not to be his grandfather's idea. It was our hideaway. We'd sneak off every few years when the families met for mergers and strategic alliances, and tonight should've been the same.

Except it wasn't.

Because he was late.

I checked the time. 12:04 a.m. My back pressed against the marble edge of the fountain that was old and chipped, within the courtyard in the estate where the Gathering was held that year. It smelled like stone and moss and roses. I flattened my palms to the cold rim, watching the surface ripple beneath the moonlight.