Before I could intervene, Tiernan was being pulled back harshly by a massive hand and then Dante was wrapping his fingers around his neck and snarling down into his face.

“Did your mama not teach you any manners?” he demanded, rattling the other man by the throat.

I stepped forward to stop the scuffle when there was a soft snick. I’d been Dante’s wife long enough to recognize the sound of a switch blade popping open.

Tiernan blinked into the ferocious face of his attacker as if he was being lulled to sleep by the violence. In reality, his body was coiled tight as a spring about to unleash, his blade tip digging deep into Dante’s suit clad belly.

“Didn’t your father teach you to be wary of knives?” he countered blandly.

Dante was taller, broader, quilted with dense muscle visible even beneath his three-piece suit. He was as intimidated by a knife to the belly as a picnic-goer by a bumble bee in the park.

I crossed my arms, undisturbed, and watched.

A moment later, Dante moved, quicker than his bulk implied. His hand manacled Tiernan’s wrist and wrenched it backward until he dropped the knife. Leveraging his superior weight, he spun Tiernan away and wrenched him in close, twisting one hand then the other behind his back in a tight hold so he was essentially trapped.

Tiernan was facing me again, his face utterly placid as he was manhandled by my husband. When he caught me looking, a small smiled curled sinisterly into his left, scarred cheek.

Before I could say anything, he swung his head back into Dante’s face, catching him in the nose.

“Cazzato,” Dante cursed, but he didn’t for a moment lessen his hold on the slippery bastard who’d snuck into my office.

Still, I was done with the games.

My heels clicked against the black tile floors as I moved to pick up the discarded knife. I leveled it calmly at Tiernan’s tanned throat and looked into those eerie, pale green eyes.

“Touch my husband again and you won’t need a lawyer, you’ll need a coroner,” I told him in that same mild tone he’d used our entire interaction.

We locked eyes, tension vibrating throughout the room.

And then, he shocked me by laughing.

It was hard-edged and rusty with disuse, but it was genuine.

Smiling, he was almost as handsome as Dante.

When he finished, I arched a brow and he chuckled again.

“Tiernan?” Dante grumbled, pulling him away from me before spinning him forward again. “Che palle? You sneak up on my wife and scare her?”

“You get married and I’m not invited?”

I watched in shock as they embraced roughly, clapping hands too hard on each other’s back, chest thumping like warring animals.

“You know each other,” I stated, fisting my hands on my hips.