Travis seemed as stunned as her husband had earlier, only for different reasons. She supposed the friendships she had forged with a few of her clients, ones like Travis, would hurt the men a bit when they ended. No, there had never been anything beyond business and a chat or two, but it was still a relationship each valued.

And it was reaching its course.

"You're giving a lot up for a man, Catrina. That doesn't seem like you at all."

"I suppose not."

"Why?"

"Power," she replied.

Chapter Ten.

"I thought I heard something back here."

Dante's shoulders tensed at Catrina's quiet voice. Four months into their marriage and he could count on one hand the amount of times he heard Catrina speak like she just had. Maybe because it was so unlike her to be soft-spoken, especially where he was concerned. She was fiery-feisty, even-and he liked that about her, even if she did drive him nine ways to crazy most days.

If nothing else, he knew he managed to find a good partner for a wife. Someone who made him competitive, but only to better himself. A woman whose strength and worth didn't need to be determined by his praises and acceptance. She had become a friend of sorts to him and most definitely a confidant.

Those qualities were rare-beautiful, actually. They also turned him on like nothing else, but their agreement was clear. The marriage was business. She didn't want a lover. Intimacy would ruin the very delicate balance they had achieved together as it was.

"Dante?"

He cleared his throat, turning on his heel to find Catrina standing in the doorway of his office. "Yeah?"

"It's like ... one in the morning."

"No rest for the wicked, Cat."

She grinned.

"Mmm, but this doesn't look all too wicked," Catrina said, nodding at the boards set up around the office. "This looks like work."

"I do more than sell drugs, traffic guns, and extort money, Cat."

"I know."

Catrina sighed, dropping her arms to her side as she took a step into the room. The cream colored silk robe she wore did little to hide her shapely legs, considering it came to a stop mid-thigh. Dante's gaze traveled over her hourglass figure. The black sash cinched at her waist made her trim shape more prominent. Even sleepy and her sleek, red hair mussed from tossing in bed, she actually looked as though she'd been rolling in the sheets with someone.

Catrina was a beautiful woman, and Dante found it harder every day to ignore his building desire. Control was his middle name-one this woman stripped away with just the barest graces of her attention.

Like now.

Dante licked his lips and turned back to the boards he was surveying before Catrina's interruption. "These are a few choices in development plans I've been working on."

"This is real estate development," Catrina said.

"Yeah. I like to own things. The more I own, the more control I have. The more control, the more power. Because control and power are not the same. They may seem like it, but they're not. The Marcellos dominate the board in a lot of things, but it's only just started to occur to me it's actually my father who dominates. He owns the properties, the businesses, and so on. He has the power, and that leaves us nowhere when he's gone."

"What am I missing here?" Catrina asked, coming to stand at Dante's side. "I feel like there's something you've left out."

Dante chuckled. "A couple of weeks before we met, my father fired me."

Catrina's head whipped around so she could stare at him, her brow furrowing. "What? Fired you? But, you're his son and it's Marcello Industries. Right?"

"I know. That was my first reaction, too. Essentially, that's what he did. Fired me. Paid out my shares in Marcello Industries though I didn't take the money. And I won't. Even if he tries to force it on me eventually, I'll donate it. It seemed really pointless for me to take the money and start my own thing like he wanted if the money had actually just been given to me from the start as an inheritance, right?"

"I get that."

"I have money," Dante explained, waving at his office but really meaning his condo as a whole. "Obviously, I have money. The money that bought this condo, my vehicles, and anything else I have did not come from my father in the end. It came from me working my ass off for years. Both on the legal and the illegal side of things.

"Sure, I had a huge share in my father's company, but I worked hours and hours every day in an office just like any other person in that building. And when I left that office, I had an entirely different job to do, too. I thought ..."

"What?" Catrina asked.

"I thought I was doing my own thing, but I wasn't. It took my father kicking me on my ass to realize I had simply been following his footsteps, not making my own."

"So, basically, he stripped you of your things by taking away what you were using to identify who you were."

"Exactly. And without things, I thought I had no control and therefore, no power."

"What made you realize you were wrong?"

Dante shrugged. "I'm still a Marcello. I'm always going to be a Marcello. I just can't be Antony Marcello. Once Marcello Industries is sold to the highest bidder-it will happen eventually-I need to have power for my family. As much as I can control, I will. Anything and everything that can be bought so the Marcello name can be attached, I will do it."

Catrina surveyed the real estate development plans once more. "So, what's all this about?"

"Slowly working back into the game, I suppose. The last few months, I've been focused on this marriage and what that all meant. In the process, I left this to the wayside in some aspects."

"Oh?"

"In a way." Dante sighed. "I have a meeting with a board of investors tomorrow afternoon. When I left my father's company, I left all I gained for it behind. Well, except for a few things. My name, reputation, and all of my contacts. The only reason I managed to get in on the meeting tomorrow is because of my contacts."

"You sound nervous. That isn't like you at all."

"It isn't. But, it's not just a meeting. It's more like a bidding war between rival companies for, well-" Dante waved at the white boards, his plans on blueprints for Catrina to see. "-this. I don't have the damn clout without Marcello Industries backing me, but I did have the contacts, and it might break my bank for a short time, but I've got the money."

"A little risk is good for you. Playing things safe will get you nowhere, Dante."

"I'm aware."

"And yet, you're still nervous."

"Because one of those companies I'll be bidding against tomorrow is my father's. I'm almost certain he'll be there. Especially knowing I will be, too. He might own the company and have teams who can do this sort of thing for him, but he's always been hands-on with investors."

Catrina fell silent.

"Am I allowed to be a little nervous, now?" Dante asked jokingly.

"Why would Marcello Industries need investor money?"

"Because they're also an investor for many other smaller companies. It's likely they're involved in this plan for development through a third-party and are acting on behalf of them. Chances are, Marcello Industries would own a small portion of the contract, the third-party would own the same percentage or slightly larger, and then the investor gets their slice based on the amount of money signed over and the contract worth."

"Seems simple," Catrina said, rolling her eyes. "Not."

"He's not going to let me just have it," Dante continued quietly. "Antony Marcello doesn't give anything to anyone without making them bleed, sweat, and beg for it. I've witnessed him in bidding wars against other companies. He's relentless."

"You've never been the one across from him, I take it."

"Nope. Why would I? I worked for him."

"I think you might be making yourself nervous for no good reason."

Dante cocked a single brow, eyeing Catrina from the side. "Did you hear what-"

"I'm a woman, not deaf. I realize la famiglia doesn't look highly on women in business, so you likely believe you're always right being a man, but in this case, you're not, Dante."

Ah, there she was. Claws and all.

"What did your father tell you when he fired you?" Catrina asked.

"To challenge him, rival him, and surpass him but not to be him."

"Well, that's exactly what you're doing."

Confusion settled in Dante. "Actually, I haven't had the chance to do much where my father is concerned."

"You're going against his company tomorrow. That's certainly a challenging stance to take. Beyond that, if you succeed in getting the investors' cash added to yours, these plans on the boards look as though Marcello Industries might have one hell of a rival in real estate development. Especially considering you're a much smaller company as of now."

"It's work though, Cat, not la famiglia."

"But it's yours, Dante. Not his."

"True," he conceded quietly.

"I meant to ask before, but forgot. Now seems a good time. How old was your father when he took over the family as Don?"

"He was in his early thirties."

"And you're twenty-nine, Dante. Already you are surpassing him in certain aspects. That's not to say you don't have a great deal more to do, and your reputation in your family will grow the longer you hold power, but he also took years to make his name stand above others. So will you."

Catrina turned to face Dante, smiling as she poked him in the stomach playfully. "You're creating your own footsteps, Dante. The longer you walk, the more prominent they'll be."

Dante smirked. "I don't tell you this often, but thank you."

"I don't need you to tell me it."

"I know," Dante murmured. "You don't seek approval. It's one of the things I like best about you."

Catrina fell silent, her green gaze flicking away from Dante's. But before she had, he saw it in her eyes. The barest hint of indecision. A wavering in her emotions. There was only one other moment he witnessed that from her. Their wedding night; the one time she let him have her. The memory of her beneath him-the only one he had-never really left the back of his mind.

Dante couldn't help but remembering her words: People like us, we're not supposed to feel. We don't get attached. It ruins us. Together, we'll be the perfect pair. Together, we have nothing to lose.

The longer he knew Catrina, the harder those words were to believe.

"You should go back to bed, Catrina," Dante said, turning back to stare at his plans.

"I-"

"No, you should go. You make it difficult for me to concentrate. I make it hard for you to be ... well, you."

Let her make of that what she wanted. It was the only olive branch Dante would hand to her.

"You really do, Dante." Then, Catrina reached out and snagged his pinky with her own, connecting them for a brief second. Standing on her tiptoes, she pressed a quick kiss to the underside of his jaw. "And I don't know if I like it or not."

Dante froze, unsure of what to do.

Catrina didn't give him a chance to figure something out. She left his office and closed the door behind her without a word.

Dante's fists pressed hard into the top of the long oak table, his anger rising. At the other end, his father sat cool and unruffled. More than anything, that pissed Dante off the most.

Out of three companies chosen to present their offers and plans to the board of investors, only Empire Developments and Marcello Industries remained. The third company bowed out gracefully after learning the other two companies had undercut their total amount by nearly twenty-five percent.

Dante and Antony, however, were nearly matched in costs and prospective payouts.

"Empire Developments is new to the game," Antony said calmly, flipping through a folder and giving it all of his attention. "So new, in fact, they've not had time to fill their new offices with the appropriate work force to manage the company."

"It's in progress," Dante replied, somehow keeping his tone level. "And if we consider these proposed plans are not expected to begin for another thirteen months, Empire Developments has more than enough time to finish the work needed on their end to meet the contract's needs."

"But, being as new as they are, will their contractors and personnel be able to keep the contract's timeline and budget when it does begin?" Antony asked.

"That's the ..." Kaleb Trenton, an investor at the far end, glanced over his paperwork, "... seventy-million dollar question, isn't it? For every month the contract goes beyond the deadline, we all lose out. Could it be made back eventually? Sure. Unfortunately, I for one want the investment to pay back as quickly as possible. Empire Developments is a huge risk on that end."

Dante released a slow breath, watching his father carefully. This nonsense back and forth had been ongoing for two hours. He was tired and pissed off.

"You have nothing to show for yourself," Antony said, finally looking up from his folder to stare at his son. "No proven numbers. No fulfilled contracts. And, most importantly, no standing to give you weight against the bigger players."

Antony reached over and hit a few keys on his laptop. The projector illuminated the wall with graphs of growth on the development side of their company from Marcello Industries. "We, on the other hand, most certainly do."

Dante did a quick check of the numbers his father was showing off and a grin began to form. Antony Marcello was getting ready to play dirty and Dante knew it. He would swipe out at his rival and with every hit he landed, a chuck of their reputation would be taken away in the investors' eyes.