Chapter 4: The Emperor: Part 1 – Chapter 3

Amara had a problem and his name was Dante Maroni.

It was official.

It was done.

And she was absolutely miserable. Why? Because while he knew vaguely of her existence, she was nowhere, absolutely nowhere on his radar. And she? She had a crush the size of Antarctica but hotter. Way hotter. And she tried to stop. Really stop. But her heart was like a rubber-band where he was concerned. The more she pulled away mentally, the harder she felt the tug to go back to her original place.

It was all wrong. He was already eighteen-years-old, a fact that everyone in the entire city, the entire country, the entire underworld knew because him becoming an adult was a very big deal to a lot of people – some who wanted to back him, some who wanted to cut him. Dante already had enemies. How did Amara know all this already? She paid attention. It was amazing how much people tended to talk around the help without once realizing they were people with ears instead of moving furniture.

Amara wasn’t really an employee of the Maronis, but she liked to help her ma out after school and on weekends. She used to spend that time with Vin but since he started training, his schedule and hers stopped matching. They did catch up every other day though. He had recently hit his growth spurt while Amara had barely moved an inch up.

She looked up at him from her spot sitting against the tree, her novel open on her lap but her eyes on her friend as he sparred with an older Dante. They did this almost once a week because according to the rumor mill, two kids in training were incredible with knives – Vin and Tristan, the new boy whom she’d started to refer to with his name after the Incident. She still remembered the shock that had coursed through her when he had laid out Mr. Maroni without any fear. Ma had told her that night that the boy had a death wish. Amara didn’t disagree.

However, the reason Dante trained every other week with the knives with Vin instead of Tristan was because Vin was more cheerful and less likely to seriously kill him out of annoyance. They liked to train outdoors, in a little clearing right in front of Tristan’s cottage by the lake. And every other week, Amara came with a book and her friend and planted herself quietly in front of a tree to watch the show.

If Dante thought it odd, he never commented. In fact, he rarely said a word to her after that first time she’d bumped into him. But he didn’t ignore her either. She was just there. Some days, he’d give her a little nod and her heart would flutter like an overexcited hummingbird. Some days, he’d look at her and grin and her entire stomach would roll with butterflies. And some days, rare days, when he said a cordial ‘hey’, Amara would save his voice in her memory and squeal on the inside while planning their babies’ names.

Ugh, she was hopeless.

Her mother didn’t know what she did when she came to watch the boys. She thought Amara just went out in the sun to read during the summer break. Amara never corrected her. Not that her mother would stop her from going; she just wasn’t ready to share this with anyone yet. Whatever this was because it passed a simple crush a while ago. And she was ninety-nine percent sure he didn’t actually know her name.

The clang of metal on metal broke her out of her reverie. With all her adolescent heart, she focused on the man of her infatuations, watching his tall, very tall form move swiftly as a shorter, younger Vin attacked him.

Dante Maroni was a piece of art – a very fine, very exquisite piece of art. Every time she saw him, she wanted to do a chef’s kiss gesture to the sky. Yeah, he was that good. From his dark, untamed, slightly overlong hair that framed an absolutely stunning face – a face that got more and more chiseled as he grew older – to that jawline Amara traced with her fingers in her daydreams, to his deep chocolate eyes that she still found the prettiest, to his arms that flexed with muscles as he moved… yup, she was a goner. It was pathetic.

Annoyed with herself, Amara looked down at the book she’d borrowed from the school library.

‘The very instant that I saw you did my heart fly to your service…’

Okay, she needed to get some non-romantic poetry because Shakespeare wasn’t really helping. Unable to focus, Amara looked up again to see the boys wrapping up their session. They always did that with Dante giving Vin some pointers. Vin, her chubby best friend who wasn’t so chubby anymore, always listened seriously. Amara was pretty sure Vin had a man-crush on Dante. Who could blame him though?

Although in all honesty, Amara didn’t even know if what she felt was even a crush anymore. A crush was supposed to die a natural death in a few months. At least that’s what she heard the girls at her school say. She wasn’t really close to them, or anyone at school. Outside kids treated the compound kids very weirdly. And all the other kids at the compound were either too younger or too older than she was. Only she and Vin were close in age, and that was why they’d just stuck together as soon as they could walk.

Vin nodded to Dante before walking to her, his dark hair cut much shorter now. Dropping down beside her, he took a sip of water from the bottle she handed him, both of them watching as Dante climbed the steps to Tristan’s cottage and walked in the door without knocking.

“Damn,” Vin whistled beside her, finally able to whistle properly. “He’s got some big balls.”

Ew. Amara did not want to think about Dante or his proverbial balls. Her love for him was very pure and sanitized at this point.

“I didn’t need that picture in my head,” she made a disgusted face. They had studied male and female reproductive systems at school last year. While that had been very clinical, the extra workshop their entire grade had had over the last month on sexual diseases, prevention, and contraception had been a lot to process. Amara knew Plug A went into Slot B but she didn’t want to imagine anything related to that yet.

Vin chuckled. “With the way you stare at him, that’s hard to believe.”

That brought her up short. “What do you mean?” she asked, her voice coming out high as her heartbeat picked up. Ugh, she needed to work on her pitch. Her music teacher at school kept telling her she had a great voice but her pitch was totally off.

Vin shrugged. “You just look at him like he’s Zia’s best batch of cookies and you’ve been hungry for a month. Like he’s fresh out of the oven and you’re waiting for him to cool before eating.”

Her stomach grumbled at that very vivid visual.

Okay. This wasn’t good. This wasn’t good at all. No one was supposed to know.

Amara swallowed. “Do you think he noticed?”

“It’s kinda hard not to,” Vin pointed out, clearly amused. “You come here every time and it’s not to read your book.”

Amara groaned. “Vinnie?”

“Hmm?”

“Kill me, please.”

Her friend chuckled. “Oh, don’t be so dramatic. It’s not that bad. Plus, it’s a phase. You’ll grow out of it.”

Amara shook her head. “I can’t help it. Trust me, I’ve tried. My eyes are traitors.”

Vin huffed a laugh before drawing his knees up, his hands dangling over them. “A crush is fine. Hell, it’s even natural. But don’t want more than that.”

Amara turned to look at his profile as he stared at the cottage, feeling the sun on her skin. “Why?” she asked softly.

“Because he’s Dante Maroni, ‘Mara,” Vin replied, equally soft. “We’re young right now and it doesn’t feel like anything. But he’s going to be a king. He’ll have enemies. Hell, he already does. He’ll be everything dark and you’re afraid of the dark, remember? You don’t belong in that world. You deserve better.”

The lump in her throat was lodged there tightly. Even though Amara never imagined anything, she knew Vin was right. Dante Maroni was destined to rule the underworld. And she was the furniture people like him forgot about.

Breathing out through her mouth, Amara rested her head on Vin’s shoulder, finding comfort in knowing he was someone who knew her, loved her as fully as she did.

“Will you be dark too, Vinnie?” she asked him quietly, wondering about where his fate was taking him. If his training, his father’s life was anything to go by, it wasn’t a good place.

“I don’t know,” he sighed. “But I’ll never be dark for you.”

Amara smiled slightly. “I’ll love you anyway, you know.”

“Yeah, me too,” Vin nodded. “Please don’t get mushy on me now.”

Chuckling, Amara hit him lightly with her book, and they both watched as Dante Maroni came out of the cottage. He nodded to them, before climbing back up to his castle, a king in the making, while she stayed on the ground.