Childhood friends turn to lovers.
But then love turns to hate.
What will happen when they're forced into something they both want but are too stubborn to accept?
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Fifteen years ago.
"Mama, no me gutan los vestidos." (Mother, I don't like the dresses.) I frown as my mother puts a bow on me.
"Los se, carino." )I know dear.) My mother replies, her hands tugging at the bow in my brown hair, which has been pulled into a pointytail, to my disgareement of course.
"Your papa wants you to wear it." Mama switches from our mother language to English.
"I don't care what papa wants." I tell her, just as I do all the time.
"Isabel! Don't be stupid carino!" I roll my eyes as she turns me around to face her.
"You know, your future husband could be out there." She tells me and I scowl.
"Mama, I'm a kid." I tell her and she smiles.
"A mafia don's kid." She laughs.
I never understood that.
Until now.
My future husband was in that room. I just never thought it would be, him.
I never wanted it to be him.
But, here we are.
I shift my gaze from my lap, where I picked at my silk robe that draped around me. My eyes met my best friend's soft, sympathetic ones. I don't say anything, I don't have to. Grace knows I hate this.
"The blue dress is pretty too." My future sister in law says, her hands passing over the blue dress that I hated. It was fugly, to be generous with words.
"Isn't the blue dress pretty?" She asks her mother, my future mother in law. A woman I've known my whole life, Audrey. She always got along with me, my own mother mentioned it was something about our common rebellious behavior and I loved hearing it.
"Blue..?" Grace asks, uncertainty trailing in her voice even though she knows I hate it.
"It's pretty-" My future sister-in-law begins.
"It's not." Audrey says and I bite my lip to stop the smile that threatens to break free. It would be the first smile I've had in a whole week.
A whole week.
That's how long its been since I found out I was engaged to the next mafia don of the French mafia. My childhood friend. A man I knew all my life. I've known him since I've known myself. He was there the day I found my aunt dead, he was there when I got my first period, he was there when our other friend left for Italy, he was there for me when my best friend couldn't see I was fading. I guess in some way, he is my best friend. Or at least he was.
Leo Laurent. The most strongest, artistic, gentle, romantic, handsome, the brightest soul. He was my friend. He shared his lunch with me, he escaped boring parties with me. He was my best friend, he held me when I found my aunt dead in her bathroom, we were as thick as thieves, he held my hand during her funeral, he taught me how to fight when the trainers could not , he taught me French.
