“Back to Westchester?” Cole asked as they returned to the car.

“No,” Damian said. “I think I’ll stay in the city tonight.”

He was silent in the back seat as Cole navigated through traffic, the streets clogged with commuters who’d been stuck late at the office. He should have been thinking about Primo. About the man’s arrogance and carelessness and how best to combat it when they came to blows.

And they would come to blows. He was almost certain of it. Had seen the flare of ego in Primo’s eyes, the stubbornness that would prevent him from doing what was best for him and his men. That allowed him to be controlled by Malcolm Gatti. But it wasn’t Primo Fiore who dominated his thoughts.

It was the girl. Aria.

Damian hadn’t done any serious digging on her after he’d realized she wasn’t an active member of the Fiore organization. Now he realized it was an oversight, not because she was more involved than he’d imagined but because she was more intriguing.

In fact, intriguing was too mild a word for the rumble that had rocked his body when she’d come into view. He’d known she was younger than Primo, that she existed on the outskirts of his business, but he hadn’t expected her to be so beautiful.

No, that wasn’t right. Beautiful was too mild a word for the delicate features and high cheekbones, the full mouth that would have monopolized her face if it hadn’t been balanced by the big eyes fringed with thick lashes.

Heartbreaking was the word that came to mind. She had the kind of face that broke your heart and pieced it back together again all at once.

Then she’d come around the bar to bring the vodka for the table and he’d gotten a look at the rest of her, had had to force his eyes away from the full breasts straining under her T-shirt, the narrow waist that flared to full hips. She’d held his attention like a forest fire, and he’d been surprised by the breadth of his rage when Gatti had grabbed her slender wrist.

It had been more than his knee-jerk response to violence against women, ingrained deep in his psyche, an inherent injustice. This had felt personal, and he’d had to clench his fists to keep from reaching across the table, pulling the other man over by the front of his shirt and pummeling him until he had an idea what it felt like to be dominated by someone bigger and stronger.

Except he had the feeling Malcolm wasn’t really strong at all. He’d put his money on Aria Fiore in a contest of will between them. On the defiant lift of her chin and the way she’d hurried over from the bar to keep things from escalating even when it meant putting herself in the line of fire.

No, Malcolm Gatti was a bully.

His gut told him Aria was a secret warrior.

Cole pulled to a stop outside his building, and Damian reached for the door.

“Prepare the men for backlash from Fiore,” he said. “And shore up the security protocols around our on-the-ground operations.”

“You got it, boss.” Cole met his eyes in the rearview mirror. “Anything else?”

“Nothing to do but wait. Keep me posted.”

“Will do.”

Damian opened the door and stepped onto the sidewalk in front of the building that housed his apartment. His mother had owned a place on Central Park West with a doorman and a concierge, but Damian had never been comfortable there. The sprawling loft a few blocks from his office in Tribeca had been his first real estate acquisition, and he’d bought it precisely because it was nothing like the steel and glass box his mother occupied when she wasn’t in Westchester.

Now he opened the door and crossed the modest lobby, complete with its original marble floors and black and white subway tile, to the old elevator. The doors were closing when he spotted a diminutive elderly woman holding a dog and tottering toward the half-closed doors in heels.

He stuck his hand out, stopping the forward motion of the doors, and waited while she caught up.

“Thank you, Mr. Cavallo!” She stepped into the elevator car and the little dog immediately started barking at Damian, the high-pitched yips echoing off the elevator walls as it slowly rose. “Oh, stop now Harvey! You know Mr. Cavallo.”

“It’s all right, Mrs. Weaver,” Damian said. “Harvey and I have an understanding; he barks and I look the other way.”

She giggled girlishly and reached out to squeeze his arm. “You are a card, Mr. Cavallo.”

“So I’ve been told,” he said.

The elevator came to a stop and Mrs. Weaver reluctantly exited the car. “Thank you for holding the doors. You’re a dear.”

“Not a problem.”

Harvey was still barking as the doors closed. He leaned his head back against the car as it ascended, an image of Aria Fiore as she’d looked when he’d left Platinum still etched in his mind.

The elevator stopped on the top floor, and relief washed over him as he opened the door to the penthouse loft. It wasn’t the house in Westchester, but it was a close second, a large, open space with exposed brick and a wall of glass overlooking the neighborhood. It was an appealing alternative when making the drive north was impractical, and he set his keys on the console table by the door and made his way to the fridge where he grabbed a beer.

He leaned against the counter for a couple minutes, savoring the quiet, then wandered over to the big windows. The city had fallen to night, the darkness illuminated by the lights of surrounding buildings. Traffic was a low hum punctuated by the occasional horn and a siren in the distance. People hurried across the streets below, making their way home from work or to whatever plans they had for the evening.

It should have felt strange to feel so alone in a city with so many people, but somewhere along the way loneliness had become a default setting. It was impossible to imagine filling his time with anyone but the men under his command, the few employees he kept on staff at the Foundation. He was beginning to wonder if he was even capable of forming attachments to anyone or if the violence and secrecy of his childhood had broken something fundamental inside him.

He set down his beer and pulled out his phone in disgust. He wasn’t usually contemplative. Reason was his touchtone, logic his northern star. He lived to strategize, to grow the criminal empire that was the best way to issue a big fuck you to his dead father. The best way to delegitimize the work his father had so carefully used as a front for his cowardice.

He flipped through the names in his phone, thinking about each woman as her name passed under his fingers. There was the redhead with beautiful breasts and a warm laugh, the lithe runway model who moved with the grace of an animal, the brunette with lush curves ripe for the nip of his teeth, the lick of his tongue.

He suddenly didn’t want any of them. Couldn’t see any of them in his mind’s eye.

Instead he saw a small but fiery girl, the deep burgundy of her hair like the fire he’d seen burning at her center. He saw the flash of her dark eyes, the straight line of her spine, the sway of her hips that made it too easy to know how she would move under him.

Or over him.

He shoved his phone back in his pocket with a grunt of annoyance and stalked across the room for his keys. It wasn’t a woman he needed but a good workout in the gym at headquarters, a sparring partner, something to remind him of his purpose.

Then maybe he’d be ready for a woman.

Preferably one who wasn't his enemy’s sister.