From the Don's Son's Plus-Size Girl to His Brother's Claim novel · Chapter 4 of 24

Chapter 4: Not on My Knees

The dress was emerald green, and it was my mother's idea.

"Not red," she said, pinning the hem on the kitchen table. "Red is what he saw you in. Green is what he sees you leave in."

Killian picked me up at seven forty-five in a black car he drove himself.

He got out and opened my door, and then he just stood there holding it.

"What," I said.

He didn't answer for a second.

"Nothing. Get in. You'll freeze."

The ballroom was on the thirty-ninth floor, one below the roof.

Three hundred people, a string quartet, white flowers on every table, and a photo wall with the Caravello and Scalise names twisted together in gold.

When we walked in on each other's arms, the quartet didn't stop.

Everything else did.

I felt it go across the room.

The deli girl. With the other brother.

"Breathe," Killian said, without moving his mouth.

"I'm breathing."

"You're squeezing my arm off."

"You've got two."

His mouth twitched.

Cristina found us before we'd made it to the bar.

She was in white satin with a slit up to her hip, and she had her phone in her hand.

"Oh my God. You came." She looked me up and down. "Green. Brave. Did they have it in your size, or is that from a tent store?"

The women behind her laughed.

"It's from my mother's kitchen table," I said. "She hemmed it tonight. What did yours cost, eight thousand? It's pulling at the zipper, by the way. You might want to stop eating the crab."

Cristina's hand went to her back before she could stop it.

Killian made a small noise that might have been a cough.

"Killian," Cristina said, all sugar. "I didn't know you brought dates. I didn't know you talked."

"I talk," Killian said. "Just not to you."

He steered me away.

At nine, the quartet stopped.

Tiziano stepped up onto the little stage by the windows with a glass of champagne and a microphone.

He looked like a magazine. Navy tux, gold watch, that white grin.

He made a speech about family and the future and the Scalises, and people clapped in the right places.

At the head table, Rosario Caravello sat with his reading glasses pushed up on his silver hair, clapping slowly.

He'd eaten a meatball sub at my counter every Thursday for twenty years.

← Chapter 3 · All chapters · Chapter 5 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend