Control doesn’t always equal power.

Dante Marcello had never been more aware of that statement until now.

“I own forty percent of Marcello Industries. You can’t get rid—”

“I can,” Antony interrupted calmly. “I own fifty. Giovanni owns ten. I’m paying you out, Dante.”

Dante blinked, his hands balling into fists at his sides. The large wall-to-wall windows overlooked the city, a sight so familiar to him that he found it comforting. He spent eight hours a day, six days a goddamn week in this building. Marcello Industries had always been just as much his as it was his father’s. This didn’t make sense.

“It’s time for you to stand on your own,” Antony said. “You’re capable, so show me.”

“Stand on my own?” Dante’s anger vibrated through his entire body. “I’m twenty-eight-years-old. I’ve worked with this company since the day I graduated—”

“You’ve worked for me.”

“This is ridiculous!”

“Is it?” Antony asked, opening his arms wide. “I’m asking you for something simple, Dante. That’s all.”

“You’re upending my entire fucking life. Everything I’ve worked for.”

“No, everything I’ve worked for. I want to see what you can do, now. Challenge me. Rival me. Surpass me. But you can’t be me, Dante. You have to be you.”

His father pushed away from the edge of the desk, turned around, and grabbed a small slip of paper off the top. Antony held the check out to Dante, waiting patiently for him to take it.

“Go on,” Antony urged.

Dante eyed the check with too many zeros to count, his disdain making him sneer. “Fuck you. I don’t want your money, Dad.”

“It’s your cashed out shares, so it’s not mine.”

He couldn’t believe how unaffected his father seemed to be. Like this entire show was nothing for him.

“Burn it,” Dante spat. “I don’t want it.”

“You’ve rallied against everything I’ve asked of you. You said it, son. You’re twenty-eight—nearly twenty-nine. This is more than Marcello Industries right now. It’s only one thing. Think about it. If you won’t step out on your own willingly and begin your life, then I will force you to.”

Dante swallowed the burning fury scalding his throat. “You’re talking about marriage. Again.”

And doing in it a really shitty way, Dante thought.

“Marcello Industries is just one thing,” his father repeated. “It’s a start, though.”

“I—”

“You’re capable, Dante. Show me.”

• • •

Dante slammed the office door open so hard it crashed into the wall with a bang. Gio stood from his chair, arm outstretched with a gun pointing at the door and the hammer cocking back. Cain growled from his spot at his master’s feet. The moment his younger brother knew who intruded on his space, the weapon lowered.

“What in the fuck are you trying to do, get your head blown off?” Gio asked bitingly.

“Did you know?”

“Seriously, doing shit like that is liable to earn you a bullet, Dante. We’ve got issues on the streets right now, and the last thing I need is people rushing my office like a fucking idiot. You’re goddamn lucky I’m a see first and shoot second kind of man. Lucian or Dad would have popped your stupid ass.”

Dante ignored his brother’s rant. “Did you know?”

Gio set the gun to the desk. “I just asked—”

“What Dad was going to do to me with Marcello Industries, did you know, Gio?” The expression on his younger brother’s face said he didn’t. Dante fell into the closest chair as bitterness raged. “I guess you wouldn’t. He doesn’t need your sign off. You’ve only got a ten percent share.”

“That I don’t even use,” Gio said like his brother ought to already know. “I get a payout once monthly into an account I never touch.”

Dante glanced at Gio. “What the hell do you do with it, then?”

“Pay taxes on it and shuffle it around between other accounts to pillow illegal funds.”

Made sense. Dante chewed on his cheek, irritated. “This is crazy.”

“What happened?” Gio asked, resting into his chair.

“He paid me out.” Dante winced, remembering the check he tossed into his father’s garbage can. “Tried to. I refused the money.”

“How much?”

“That’s what you want to know, really?”

Gio shrugged. “Curious about the company’s worth.”

“Four-hundred-million.”

“Whoa.”

“Yeah,” Dante said, sighing. “He’s in everything, you know. Marcello Industries has a hand in fucking everything. The last five years alone it’s doubled in value.”

Gio cleared his throat, shooting Dante with a look. “Since you signed on after college.”

“Exactly.”

“But you’ve focused hard on developmental projects with real estate and investing. Dad goes all in everywhere else, including those.”

Dante frowned. “What are you getting at?”

“Your attention is better spent where you’re great and not just good.”

“So?”

“So, why would Antony keep you in a place that’s only going to hold you back by making you focus on several pictures instead of just the one?”

“Fuck you,” Dante muttered, his anger coming back rapidly. “You don’t get it.”

“Why, because I don’t own a twenty-million dollar condo on Fifth Avenue and I don’t want to? Shit, Dante, I can see Dad’s point, even if he has a crappy way of proving it. He’s going to make you do what you’re good at instead of eventually forcing you to take over a company you might not want in thirty years.”

“It’s Marcello Industries for a reason, asshole.”

Gio nodded. “Sure, but companies sell out all the time and he’s fifty-eight-years-old.”

Dante canted his head, something in the lilt of his brother’s tone catching his attention. “What does his age have to do with this?”

“Nothing. I didn’t mean it like that, I just—”

“Liar. What aren’t you telling me?”

Gio wouldn’t meet Dante’s stare. “Dante—”

“Tell me, Gio,” Dante demanded.

“A few months ago, after Johnathan’s Christening …”

“What about it?”

“It wasn’t just about Marcello Industries, was it? Today, whatever he said to you, it was probably more than just the business. Am I right?”

Dante’s jaw ticked. “Maybe.”

“That’s what I thought.”

Dante’s opinion on the topic of marriage was well-known to his family. As in, he didn’t want to be married at all. His life was a thoroughly planned event and always had been. The most important goal he wanted to achieve was just beyond his reach—being the Don of the Marcello Cosa Nostra. He wouldn’t be considered until a woman stood at his side wearing a wedding band and toting his last name.

It was completely fucking absurd, but that was the Commission’s demand.

“Has Dad told you, yet?” Gio asked.

Dante frowned. “Told me what?”

“I can’t believe he hasn’t told you. We’ve got a Commission meeting in six months and—”

Whatever patience Dante had left was gone. “Told me what?”

“I’m not surprised he’s paying you out and forcing you into your own thing, especially where Marcello Industries is concerned. He’s ready to retire.”

Dante’s mind fell silent, his thoughts leaving right along with his ability to talk.

“Lucian is not going to take over the family. I’m too young and I’m not made for it. You’ve got six months to get your shit figured out. Have you been seeing anyone?” Gio asked quietly.

Dante leaned back in the chair, the ceiling gaining his attention. “No.”

“Not even for a quick fuck?”

“Well, that’s not what you asked, little brother. Really, I don’t have much time for that at the moment, either.”

“If someone is good enough to sleep with, why isn’t she good enough to date, Dante?”

Dante could ask his brother the same goddamn thing about his past ventures with women, but Gio was married now, so the point would be moot.

“It’s just marriage,” Gio continued. “What are you scared of?”

Not being able to give a woman the normal things that came along with marriage and love. Failing at one thing in life that should come easy, but likely wouldn’t. Beginning something with someone only to have it end eventually.

Dante wouldn’t admit those things out loud. “A woman isn’t going to make me a better boss.”

“But she might make you a better man, Dante. And I bet that’s what you’re most afraid of.”