Bonus Content

BAD BISHOP

As included in the Walmart edition and UK edition

Tierney Callaghan was straddling the edge of immortality.

Or so it felt, each day that passed without Achilles Ferrante assigning her with the elusive husband he deemed right for her.

She took great pains to pretend she wasn’t terrified of what he had in store for her. Fluttered about her life like the colorful social butterfly that she definitely wasn’t. She laughed. She shopped. She clubbed. Sometimes, if he assigned her to an unobservant Camorra soldier, she even fucked.

That promise he held over her head like a knife was still there, in the periphery of her existence, gnawing at her soul. It was the last thing she thought about before she went to bed, and the first thing that slid into her consciousness when she woke up.

Even so, she managed to fake it until she made it.

She no longer suffered from panic attacks when she thought about it. Or, rather, almost never.

She no longer cried herself to sleep after seeing Tiernan and Lila tangled in a dance, or smiling at each other from across the room, silently speaking in a love language only they understood.

It was pitiful, how she still believed in true love. Pathetic, even. But her brother was living proof. If his blackened heart could beat for someone else, so could hers, goddammit. 

In the end, it all happened in a rather mundane way.

A ring on her doorbell at ten thirty three in the morning.

A moka pot placed back on the stovetop to answer the door (she had an expensive espresso machine, but ever since her sister-in-law introduced her to old school coffeemaker, she considered herself a convert).

It was probably Lila, dropping off her nephew at his auntie’s so she could catch a spontaneous pilates class. Lila and Tiernan no longer lived in the neighborhood, but they still frequented Hunts Point often enough.

Lila opened a new youth center for kids with disabilities a block down. Helped finance a high-end gym. She wanted to help. To make things better. When Tierney once told her it was pointless, trying to turn around a place like Hunts Point, Lila answered vocally, her speech slow but clear, “Even one drop of blood in a bucket full of water changes its color. It is never pointless to be kind.”

Tierney threw the door open, ready to coo and fuss. A familiar scarred face met hers.

Achilles.

Like all ugly things, he was both beautiful and fascinating in a unique, grotesque way.

And while his face was nothing short of horrendous, the rest was definitely easy on the eye. Very tall. Very lean. Very muscular. Very tan. And tattooed head-to-toe.

His presence activated the first alarm bell.

“Well, well, well. If it isn’t my favorite blow-job artist.”

“The answer is no.” She choked the door handle from the inside, glad he couldn’t see her white knuckles. “I don’t want to hear about your Jehovah Witness journey.”

“Glad I caught you in a perky mood, Piccola Fiamma. I have some good news.”

“You have an incurable disease?” She lit-up theatrically. “You’re saying your final goodbye to people?”

He flashed his trademark, predatory smirk. “You gonna invite me in?”

“Not in this lifetime.”

He pushed past her, inviting himself, anyway. His scent clung to her nostrils. An exotic mix of sandalwood, bergamot and floral musks. She was a candle connoisseur, and he reminded her of The Renaissance by Harlem Candles.

Rich. Smoky. Masculine. Expensive.

“Hmm. Espresso Italiano. I’ll have some of that.”

“That’s a nice plan, Achilles. Go get yourself a cup at the deli down the street.” She folded her arms over her chest, hoping to conceal her pointed nipples before he noticed them.

He strolled along her apartment, taking note of things, running a finger over furniture pieces. He left pieces of himself every time he paid her a visit, so he could haunt her even when he was across the pond, tending to his business in Italy.

“Everything okay?” he asked, out of nowhere.

“Yeah. Why?”

“I’ve been here for as full minute and you still haven’t hurled any sharp subjects at me.”

“I’m reserving all my energy in case I need to claw your eyes out.”

“It’s your lucky day, little flame, because I’m about to give you a great reason to.”

She didn’t like the sound of that.

She didn’t like it at all.

“I found you a husband.”

A beat of silence. A gasp of breath. An imaginary rug pulled beneath her feet.

A universe tilted upside down, falling, falling, falling into the pitch black of nothingness.

She smiled. She always smiled. Freddie Mercury taught her that. Even when it hurt. Especially when it hurt. Show must go on, and she was the best show in town. 

“Is he tall? Dark? Handsome? Rich?” She clucked.

“Yes, yes, and very. Respectively.”

“You’re not handsome, Achilles,” she rebuked.

Objectively, this was true.

Subjectively, she found him womb-achingly sexy. Did he decide to marry her? Would his father ever let him? It was always her suspicion her mysterious groom would be…well, him.

“Me? No, sweetheart. I’d swallow you whole.”

“I’d make you choke on me,” she volleyed cheerfully.

“I don’t doubt it. But it’s still not me,” he said dryly.

An invisible punch to her stomach.

She snorted. “Yeah, right.”

“I’ll be delivering you to him shortly, so I suggest you start packing. I need his business, and he needs a wife.”

“Wait, what? Achilles, no.”

“Yes.” One word. Final. Simple. Deadly.

“But I thought—I mean, I—I…” The words extinguished in her mouth, tiny, heatless flames. The shock made her teeth chatter, and she hated that her carefully constructed façade was slipping so effortlessly whenever he was around.

“You didn’t really think I’d risk the don title by marrying some lowly Irish slut, did you?” His brow crumpled in mock-confusion. “I thought we knew each other better than that.”

All she could muster is an angry stare. She didn’t even know why she was upset. He was hideous to look at. Waking up with this man by her side every morning would be a punishment.

Yes, she did think he’d take her as his wife.

She was stupid enough to think that, for once, someone would choose her.

“Oh.” Achilles smiled, reaching to pat her cheek leniently. “That’s too bad.”

The humiliation suffocated her.

“Don’t do this,” she warned.

“Already did.” He was halfway out the door.

His back was the last thing she saw before her knees buckled and she broke down.

TWISTED PAWN 

As included in the Walmart and UK edition

Okay.

Slow fucking breaths.

Stand up straight.

Pull yourself together.

You can do it.

You can.

You’ve done so much worse.

Hell, you put her through emotional torture without as much as blinking.

But this was different.

I knew it was different [GS1] because in that Prague apartment, holding the back of Tierney’s head tightly to stop the bleeding, trying desperately to wake her up when she looked so very dead, I finally succumbed to the truth I’d been running away from for over a decade.

I still loved her.

Never really stopped.

And if there was no her, there would be no me.

It was as simple as that.

I’d cease to exist if she died. And now, when she was on the other side of the door in a hospital room, with all medical predictions signaling she was going to make full recovery, I should have felt relief.

But all I felt was even more panic. Because how did I get her to forgive me for everything?

“Everything okay over there, buddy?” My brother Enzo poked his head up from the corner of the hallway, giving me a reassuring smile. Fucking Enzo and his stupid sunshine personality.

“Of course I’m okay,” I growled.

“Right. So you wouldn’t mind telling me why you’re squeezing this door handle like it’s Tristan Hale’s throat.”

His mere fucking name made my entire body convulse from the inside out.

The fucker.

The asshole.

The goddamn menace.

Once I got my hands on him…there would be nothing left to deliver to the gates of hell.

My throat worked around a swallow, which was when I realized my mouth was completely dry. I looked down at my hand, which still held the door.

Fucking Enzo and his never-ending sweetness paced toward me, putting a hand on my shoulder and rubbing soothingly. “Want me to help you open the door, big guy? It’s a little complicated, what with the tilting down and pushing forward…”

“I swear to God, I’m going to skin you alive and make bacon strips out of you if you don’t shut up.”

“Turkey bacon strips.” He pouted. “I’ll have you know I’m the less fatty version. Some would say healthy.”

“Go away.”

He ignored my words. “She’s unconscious, Achilles. She can’t bite your head off.” I hated that he knew how weak, how miserable, how utterly hopeless I was. I loathed, with the passion of a thousand suns, the fact that my weakness was so visible, so clear, so easily detected.

Her.

It was always her.

She was my Achilles’ heel.

“I know that.” I seethed. “Believe me, I know she’s unconscious. It’s because of me that she is lying there, connected to a bunch of machines to keep her alive.”

“You’re right,” Enzo said casually, his words hitting me straight in the balls. I expected him to at least deny it. He was the fucking nice one, goddammit. “She is here because of you.”

I shot him a deadly glare.

“She’d be in a coffin if it weren’t for you,” he said, elaborating[GS2] . “If you didn’t have the foresight and the care to follow her on her road trip across Europe, to make sure she was okay, to go up those stairs in that apartment building, making sure she wasn’t ambushed. But you did all those things, which was why she was saved. You held her head, you called for help, you saved her life.”

The ball of shame and guilt in my throat somewhat deflated, to a degree this time I did manage to swallow. He had a point.

I ruined her life, but I also saved it.

Several times.

Maybe it was enough for redemption.

Maybe.

“Open the door, Achilles,” Enzo said.

I didn’t move, my hand still on the handle.

“Open it,” he prompted.

Nothing.

With a sigh, Enzo pulled the door open for me and pushed me inside, closing it behind me. I stumbled into the darkened room, my breath knocked from my chest.

The beeping and glow of machines was the only thing detectable in an otherwise motionless and silent room. Tierney was lying on the hospital bed, eyes closed, her head wrapped tightly.

“Baby,” I choked out. “Look at you.”

And then, because there was no one here but the two of us, or maybe because I was just too tired of being a coward, I allowed myself to drop to my knees in the middle of the room and sob.

At least it wasn’t full-blown fucking wailing—the kind I suspected Enzo would produce if he broke his fingernail or something. It was quiet sobs that shook my entire fucking body as I crawled my way to her bed on hands and feet.

When I finally reached her, I sank my elbows into the edge of her mattress and stared at her. It was so wrong to see this beautiful, ferocious creature who always had fire in her eyes lying here, pale and broken.

She deserved so much more than the hand life had dealt her, and none of it was her fault. Not one thing.

It wasn’t her fault Igor killed her mother.

Wasn’t her fault that he kidnapped her and raised her in a gulag.

It wasn’t her fault that, as soon as she got here to America, she realized her father and older brother were shits.

And she especially didn’t deserve the crap luck that the most monstrous, cruelest beast in the Camorra fell in love with her and decided that if he couldn’t have her, no one else could.

That would be me.

I was that fucker.

I hated myself so much I wanted to vomit.

None of this should have happened.

I should’ve walked out of her room when we were fourteen and never bothered her again.

But what was done was done. I couldn’t undo everything that had happened between us. All I could do was make it up to her.

If she’d let me.

No if about it. You’re going to grovel, crawl, put your nose in the dirt, and let her walk all over you to get her back. You will pull no punches to achieve your goal. This is your last shot, bastard.

I grabbed her cold, bony hand in mine. It was so small. So dry. It made me admire her even more. This hand tried to kill me in Venice. Tried to strangle me to death. This hand knew how to shoot—and well. This hand slapped me and other mobsters who normally had women cower in their presence.

This hand belonged to my little, red-haired warrior. And one day I was going to slip a wedding band onto it and claim her as mine forever.

“Hey, sweetheart, it’s me.” I pressed my lips to the back of her hand, speaking into it, hoping some of the heat of my breath would warm it up. It was so damn cold. “I’m so sorry about the last twenty-nine years. So, so sorry. God seriously messed it up and swapped your karma with someone terrible. I’m going to have some words with Him when I die.”

She didn’t even twitch.

I continued. “In the meantime, while I’m still on this earth, I want you to know I’ll make it up to you. I’ll live every day for the sole purpose of making you happy. I will do whatever it takes. Completely at your disposal. Day and night. Please, just give me a chance to prove myself. I know I don’t deserve one, but you are all I have, everything I’ve ever wanted. Please, please, get better.” I buried my face in her lap. “I promise you it’ll be worth it, because you’ll get to see me making a fool of myself on a daily basis when I try to win you back.”

A rough male voice penetrated the silence. “Tier, please get better. I’d love to see Achilles making a clown of himself.”

I whipped my head around.

Tiernan was standing at the door.

He stepped into the room. I didn’t move.

I’d learned to accept and even respect my brother-in-law, but the truth was, I never forgave him for what his twin sister had been through. It wasn’t his fault, and he’d been a good brother to her—as much as he could be, at least. But I still couldn’t shake the conviction that he should have dropped everything else and just tended to her.

Finally, I stood up. I didn’t wipe the tears from my face. “How’s she doing?”

“Fine.” Tiernan strode deeper into the room, one hand casually tucked inside his front pocket. “She should come to anytime now. They took her out of the medically induced coma.”

My throat tightened again. “That’s…good.”

“Achilles.” Tiernan put his hand on my shoulder, staring into my eyes with the one eye he had left. Some days, I regretted taking his eye out. But for the most part, I was glad I did because that had brought him and Lila together. I didn’t know any couple that belonged to each other more.

“Yes?”

“I need you to listen to me carefully. I know your heart is in the right place. I know that you love her. But I’m warning you: if you ever hurt her again—forget hurt, if you make her feel mildly uncomfortable, I swear it on my entire life, I will burn everything Ferrante related to the ground. And you know Lila will help me.”

I nodded in understanding. “Yes.”

“And you’ll marry her,” he drawled. “You.  No one else.”

“You can bet your last penny on it.”

“Her word will be your gospel.”

“Already is.”

He offered me his hand. Instead of shaking it, I brought it to my face, bowing my head and pressing my lips to it like I was his servant. It was intimate and humiliating and necessary.

I needed him on my side.

I needed him to tell her that I deserved another chance.

“I won’t let her down, Callaghan.”

“Oh, I know you won’t,” he said easily. “Because if you will, I’ll kill you.”