Toxic Love: A Dark Enemies To Lovers Mafia Romance

“Tempest.”

Someone’s calling my name, but it sounds as if it’s being spoken underwater. Why do I feel so sluggish?

I frown and glance down.

Why the hell am I sitting on the floor next to the toilet in Dante’s bathroom?

Blinking to try to clear the fog in my head, I force myself to stand.

“Tempest, are you okay?”

My brow furrows as my hand comes up to push the hair back from my face. I turn, frowning again at the vomit in the toilet, tinged with red.

Oh. That can’t be good.

Slowly, the events of the last five minutes come back to me. I was getting dressed for dinner and suddenly felt both lightheaded and nauseous, so I ran into the bathroom. I’m not sure how I ended up on the floor, but I’m starting to think it was after I realized I was throwing up blood.

“I’m fine!” I call to Dante through the closed bathroom door. “Be right out.”

I flush the toilet and walk on slightly unsteady feet to the sink, where I splash cold water on my face and rinse my mouth out with mouthwash.

I’m getting sicker.

Deep down, I know it’s true, even if I keep coming up with every excuse in the book to explain my worsening symptoms. That I slept badly. That I need to eat more than Pam’s smoothies, which she’s been amazing enough to keep sending to Dante’s house.

The central air in the penthouse.

The weather.

Basically anything I can blame instead of the increasingly obvious reality: that I’m dying.

The sand in my hourglass is running out.

Taking a deep breath, I open the bathroom door to find Dante standing right there. But it’s not anger or suspicion on his face as I exit the bathroom.

It’s concern.

“Sorry, I was zoned out on my phone,” I lie. “Ready to go?”

His hand comes up to touch my chin gently, lifting my eyes to his.

“Are you okay?” he rumbles quietly, sending a bolt of…I don’t know what…deep into my chest.

Something’s changed with us. I could say it happened the night of the firemen’s ball, when Silvio attacked me. I could say it was when we let our pain bleed out together—me telling him about what happened to me, and him telling me about Claudia.

But not so very deep down, I know it started much earlier than that, even if I can’t pinpoint exactly when. I don’t even think there was a “moment” when things flipped like a switch. It’s like reading a good book and getting so lost in it that when you finally look up, day has turned to night.

It’s changed. We’ve changed.

…Just in time for the tragic ending.

“Yeah,” I lean my cheek into his palm as my eyes get lost in his. I inhale his familiar scent, and feel the way his closeness makes my core tighten, my skin tingle, and my heart race a little faster.

“I’m great.”

No falling in love.

No falling in love.

…Except I’ve already broken that rule.