Chapter 22

TWENTY-TWO

Angelo

The day breaks peacefully over the water as the skipper turns the yacht into the marina at Bastia.

My phone rings in my pocket with the ringtone I saved for Sabella.

I fish the phone out in a second, my heart pounding. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

Her husky voice washes over my senses. Why haven't I realized before how much I love the soft, feminine sound of her words?

"I know I'm only supposed to use the phone in case of an emergency," she adds quickly, "but I couldn't stand not knowing any longer."

I soften my tone. "Knowing what?"

"If you're all right."

Despite all the shit that's going down, a smile stretches my lips. "Are you worried about me?"

She doesn't hesitate. "Yes."

That may be the sweetest thing she's said to me. "Don't worry, cara. I'm fine."

"Your uncle said you left with the yacht in the storm. I wanted to call last night, but I didn't want to distract you if you were navigating through a storm."

I go rigid. "My uncle showed up at the house?"

"Yes."

"Which one?" I ask, clenching the phone hard.

"I'm not sure. I can't tell them apart."

"What the fuck did he want? Did he hurt you?"

"He wanted to know what Lieutenant Lavigne and I talked about. He won't dare to hurt me. He knows there will be consequences."

"You should've called me."

"Like I said, I didn't want to disturb you."

"You couldn't be a disturbance even if you tried. Call me, understand? And don't let anyone except Heidi in the house again."

"He had a key. He said his son made him a copy."

Only Toma had a key for the house. It must've been Uncle Nico then.

Motherfucker.

"I'll be home as soon as I can," I say. "Lock the doors and stay inside."

"What's going on? You're scaring me."

"Don't worry, bella. You're safe. My men are protecting the property."

"Why?" she asks with a soft gasp.

"Your safety is very important to me." When she doesn't reply, I ask gently, "Do you understand?"

"Yes," she says, but she sounds uncertain. Confused. "What about Lieutenant Lavigne? What happened yesterday?"

"Nothing you need to worry about."

"Did you?—"

"There are things we need to talk about, but we'll discuss them when I get home."

"Yes, there are things we need to talk about." She lets out a shaky breath. "I'll wait then."

"You do that," I say with a gentleness I've never felt for another woman. "See you soon, cara."

When I hang up, the skipper comes over.

"We have a clear weather forecast for the rest of the day," he says.

I take my gun from the table and stand to tuck it into my waistband. "I need a couple of hours in Bastia. Go on home. I'll make my way back by car."

He salutes me. "I'll leave straight away then."

Ten armed men wait in three cars that are parked in the street. I get into the back of the car in the front and give the driver instructions.

The sun hasn't climbed high into the sky yet when I bust Uncle Nico's bedroom door open and charge inside.

His naked body is splayed out on the bed, the covers thrown aside, and an equally naked Emilia straddles him, riding his cock. She jumps off him and crawls to the edge of the bed, getting tangled in the blankets in her haste to escape.

My uncle pushes up onto his elbows. "What in the name of God are you doing?" He yanks the sheet up to cover his body. "Where are my men? They're fired for letting you upstairs when I told them I don't want to be disturbed."

I saved him the effort. They're dead.

I don't miss the fear that passes over his face even as he says with annoyance, "You better have a good reason for barging in like this."

Emilia grabs a shirt from the floor and pulls it on with jerky movements while eyeing the exit I block.

I take my gun from my waistband, flick off the safety, and point the barrel at him. "I do, in fact. Two good reasons. One, you dared to go near my wife. Two, you betrayed me."

His skin turns pasty white. "Whatever you think is going on?—"

Pop.

Blood and gray matter splatter the white headboard, covering the gold and creamy browns of the hand-painted angels.

Emilia screams.

I turn the gun on her. "Shut up."

She clamps her lips together and raises shaky hands.

"How long have you been fucking him?"

She steals a sideway glance at the mess on the bed and pinches her eyes shut. "Since the casino."

I cross the floor. When I speak closer to her, she jumps.

"What did he tell you? I know you're not just a pretty face." I tap the barrel against her temple. "There's brains in here too."

"Please," she whimpers. "He paid me. That's all."

"To do what?"

She opens her eyes a crack and stares at me through the slits. "He paid me to sleep with you."

"Why?"

"He was going to take pictures."

"Why?"

"To show them to your wife," she says, trembling from head to toe.

"Why?"

"I don't know," she yells hysterically, snot and tears mixing with her words. "He just told me to do it." She sniffs. "To make her jealous, I guess."

Or to ensure the rift remained between us. It would've given Sabella more motivation to sell me out and run.

"I only did it for the money," she says through sputters of breaths. "I don't know anything else."

"Did he pay you to play the maid? Was that his fantasy?"

"Y-yes."

I believe her. She wasn't in cahoots with my uncle. She was only an instrument in his plan to overthrow me.

I motion at the door. "Get out of here."

She doesn't let me invite her twice.

"And Emilia?"

She stops dead on the threshold, not turning to face me.

"If you ever say a word about this or show your face in town again, you'll end up like him."

She runs, stumbling over her own feet and righting herself before disappearing down the hallway.

One down.

Three to go.

My next stop is Uncle Enzo. Like at Uncle Nico's house, my men take out his guards before one of them can sound an alarm.

My uncle is having breakfast in the sunroom facing the pool. His mouth pulls into an O when he spots me through the glass doors.

My ringtone breaks the peaceful chirping of the birds. My uncle gets to his feet. I take my phone from my pocket and check the screen while walking. It's my driver. He should've dropped the kids off at school five minutes ago.

Keeping my gaze trained on my uncle who stands like a statue behind his breakfast spread of caviar, strawberries, and champagne, I answer the call with a swipe of my thumb.

"What is it, Waldo?"

"It's not Waldo," an unfamiliar male voice says.

I stop in my tracks. "Who the fuck is this?" My scalp pricks. "Where's Waldo?"

"Don't worry. We have Waldo and the kids."

"Motherfuc—"

"They're fine. For now. If you want them back in one piece, you better do exactly as I say."

I bite back the threats and insults on the tip of my tongue and push down the wild rage that bleeds into a violence unlike any I've felt. If he has my niece and my nephews, I can't risk angering him. In any event, he's dead. I'll fucking skin whoever is behind the kidnapping before I slice his guts open. When that graphic picture manifests in my mind, deadly calm takes over.

"What do you want?" I ask, already calling up the app that tracks Waldo's location via his phone.

"Ten million in cash. Unmarked bills. Tomorrow morning at eight. That'll give you enough time to get creative with your banker during the all-nighter the two of you will have to pull. I'll confirm the delivery address."

I ball my hand at my side, imagining the crunch of the motherfucker's windpipe as I squash it between my fingers. I don't even argue the fact that I can't scrounge that kind of money in unmarked bills in twenty-four hours. It doesn't matter. I'm going for him with everything I've got. Come eight o'clock, his body will be chopped into pieces and fed to the pigs.

"Do you understand, Mr. Russo?"

"Yes," I say, grinding my teeth.

The sick fuck says with a grin I can hear in his voice, "If you come after me, your sweet little niece will pay."

I swear to God, I'll make him?—

Beep.

The silence on the other end of the line rings in my ear. My uncle and I watch each other, our gazes locked through the glass. His face is ashen. His expression carries both knowledge and a question. He knows why I'm here, why some men surround me while others went ahead and checked the house. But he also saw my face when I took the call.

I check my screen, a part of me not wanting the only connection I have to the kids severed. The line is dead.

Motherfucking fuck.

The tracker app shows Waldo's location a short distance north of the village. They're on the move, going toward the mountains southwest of Bastia. Judging by their speed, they're traveling by car.

Just because there's a signal doesn't mean Waldo is alive. They could've killed him. I never answer calls from unlisted numbers. That's why they used his phone. Now that they made contact, it's only a matter of time before they destroy his phone. They must know I'm able to track him. Time is of the essence.

One of my men opens the sliding door in the lounge and exits. "The house is clear. He's alone."

I'm shaking with fury and an unfamiliar feeling that my brain classifies as fear. I bark out a command, letting it fall on the ears of whoever is closest to me. "Tell the driver to bring the car."

"Yes, sir," the man on my left says, pressing his phone against his ear to execute the order.

"Round up the men. Get a 4x4 here. We're heading toward Monte Cinto."

My uncle steps out. "Angelo, what's going on?"

"What weapons do you have on site?" I ask him.

"A few automatic rifles and grenades," he says. "They're in the cellar."

I hold out my palm. "Key."

He takes a chain with a key from around his neck and hands it over. I throw it at the man on my right who catches it in midair.

"Get everything. Now."

He jogs toward the house with two men following on his heels.

"Angelo," my uncle says again. "What happened?'

I can barely stand the sight of him. Disgust wells up in my throat. "Someone took the children."

He blanches, looking as if he may keel over. "I know why you came, but you must let me help you."

"Help me?" I utter a cold laugh. "Why would I do that?"

"Because this is our fault."

"What the fuck have you done?"

He holds up a hand. "We didn't mean for it to go this far."

In a blink, I'm in front of him, fisting the front of his silk gown. "Their lives are at stake, so speak or I'll cut out your tongue."

Unfazed by the threat he knows too well is real, he continues in a regretful tone, "Nico made a deal with Mario."

I go quiet. I must've heard wrong.

"I'm sorry, Angelo. We wanted to do right by our brother, and you weren't thinking straight where your wife was concerned."

No, I haven't been thinking straight. Thanks to them. Thanks to my uncles' manipulative scheme in convincing me Sabella betrayed me.

Yes, she tried to marry her best friend to escape being tied to me in name and blood, but for the first time, I see that day with clarity. In one of the most terrifying moments of my life, I finally see everything for what it is.

I see that she did what she did to save herself from a monster who never gave her a reason to believe in him. She gave me her heart once, and in return, I ruined her father before killing him. I never lied to myself about who I am, but as I'm forced to face that I can't go through what I suffered with Adeline and my mother again, I see it clearly. I can't lose another person I care about.

I can't lose Sabella.

If I do, my life will no longer have any meaning.

For the first time, I'm standing on the outside, looking in, and I understand what needs to be done. I understand what she did when she told me she was sorry. She offered me forgiveness, and I threw it back in her face. And I see what I didn't want to admit, that we can only move forward if I lay my vengeance to rest.

Start anew.

Begin over.

Give us the beginning I stole from us.

All I achieved in my feverish determination to make Sabella mine was drive us to our end.

Yes, I see it all, how my bitterness blinded me and how my uncles exploited that. They made a deal with my rival.

Marziale.

"What did you do?" I ask, shaking him hard.

"It was Daisy Remington's idea. She came to us with a plan, and we reckoned it worked in our favor."

Bowled over, I let him go with a shove. "Daisy fucking Remington?"

He has the decency to look guilty. "We made a pact. Laid down borders. Agreed on routes. She wanted Powell's business. We wanted the rest. Mario would get thirty percent of everything."

"In exchange for what?"

"For respecting our territories. For avoiding a war between us."

"And all you had to do before setting this brilliant plan in motion was to remove the only obstacle that stood in your way—me."

He hangs his head.

His stupidity makes me laugh. "Did you for one minute believe Marziale would honor your terms? Once you'd gotten rid of me, he'd shoot you in the head and take everything. You know that, right?"

"You have to let me help you, Angelo. Let me go with you to find those kids. I know Monte Cinto like the back of my hand. Those mountain passes are treacherous. I did tracking training with the nationalists there in my day. You'll never find the secret paths into the gorge on your own."

My man runs up. "A driver is on the way with the 4x4, sir. We loaded the weapons in the cars."

I look at my phone, and then I go cold. The app is no longer tracking Waldo's location. His phone signal is dead.

"Please," Uncle Enzo says. "Taking the kids was never supposed to happen. You have to let me make this right."

I don't spare him another glance. He doesn't deserve my attention. "Bring him," I say as I turn my back on him and head toward the car. "If he makes a wrong move, shoot him in the head."