“After the other night? No, I didn’t fucking consider it.” He steps back and looks over the water. “Fuck!” Back to me, as if cursing at the orange giants got his head together. “Look. We’re not getting anything out of Lucari. There’s no gem of information that’s going to get our women back. That’s a card I can’t play. He’s leading us on. He’s going to drip information through you and, day by day, he’s going to draw you in. And then one day, you’re going to do something. I don’t know what and I’m not giving you any suggestions. But he’s manipulating you and you’re going to put me in a position to have to punish you. I don’t want to do that. You’ve been punished enough.”

His observation of my punishments has no compassion. It’s just a fact.

“So you’re going to annul us because you can.”

“Because you love him and people are starting to notice.”

The cold wind bites my cheeks and crawls under my coat cuffs. I am convinced I’ll never be warm again.

“I can’t do more to hide it.”

“I know. He’s dangerous. And he’s hard to get rid of if he’s married to you. So that is what it is.”

The conversation is over, but it can’t be. I am not a tool for my brother to use and put away when he sees fit. I need to use him for my own ends the way he’s using me, and that means taking the focus off Dario to uncover my brother’s deeper longings.

“And that means the first promise is valid,” I ask. “I’m Sergio’s.”

“If he wants you. If he doesn’t…” The sentence gets lost in the wind.

“He does and you know it. It strengthens his claim. Dario’s the only thing keeping Sergio out of Daddy’s chair.”

“And I can’t get rid of him until he marries you, because he’s an Agosti. Once he’s one of us and he makes a claim, I can take him out without starting a war. You won’t be with him too long.”

“Unless he kills you first. Then he’s fucking me forever.”

He holds up his palms to shut me up. I cross my arms. He doesn’t want to think about that part of it, but if he makes me marry Sergio, I intend to make him think of little else.