Chapter 16

CHAPTERSIXTEEN

LUCA PINCHED HIMSELF, digging his fingers into his skin until the pain became too much and he let go. He rubbed the red mark.

Okay, so this wasn’t a dream. Or a nightmare. Nothing he could wake up from. This was really happening.

He was the heir to the Fiore crime family. A family he’d never known, never seen, never heard of. A family that cared about him so little they’d thrown him away, but why? He’d been too overwhelmed to even think to ask Dom what had led to his being cast out, but from the way Dom talked about the Fiores, it seemed like they’d done Luca a favor.

He’d ended up with loving parents. Even if they weren’t his biological family, he’d had a happy childhood, and he’d worked hard to get the opportunities he had now. That was so much more than warring in the streets with guns, trying to kill each other for no good reason. How could he even be related to cold-blooded killers?

He looked straight ahead at the mirror and reached up to touch the freckle on his cheek. There was no doubt about it—he looked just like the woman Dom had called Gabriella. Not for the first time, Luca’s stomach twisted and he ran to the bathroom, thinking he might be sick. When all he could do was dry-heave, he splashed some water on his face and avoided the mirror. He’d always thought he was a moderately attractive guy—nothing special, but nothing to sniff at either. But now every time he looked at himself, he saw her. No wonder Dom hated him. He looked like the enemy. He was the enemy.

But something niggled at him, something in the back of his mind that didn’t make sense.

Why now? He’d spent twenty-four years on this earth in peace, not knowing the truth, and it was a blissful ignorance he’d happily go back to, even now.

So why had Dom and his family come for Luca now? Why did they think the Fiores would even care if they had him when they’d given him up before?

This was when his phone or a notebook would’ve come in handy, to write all the things in his head down so he wouldn’t forget the next time he saw Dom.

Although…technically there wasn’t anything keeping him in his room, right? So he could leave and find Dom to get these questions off his mind.

Luca tried the knob, expecting the door to be locked for the night, but it twisted easily. He stepped out into the hall, nothing but silence meeting his ears. He could roam around as he pleased, then. Would Dom be downstairs, or maybe…

Luca glanced at the closed door beside his, the one room he couldn’t get into before. With a firm hand, he knocked on the door and waited. A few seconds passed with no response, so he knocked again, this time pressing his ear to the door to see if he could hear anything.

“Go to bed, Luca.”

He jerked back from the door at Dom’s voice. “I can’t sleep,” Luca said. “I need to know why—”

“No.”

“But—”

“I’m not answering any more of your questions tonight. I’m done. So unless you want to go to sleep permanently, go the fuck away.”

Luca opened his mouth to respond, but found he no longer had the energy to keep fighting. He headed back to his room and leaned against the door as it clicked shut. He took in a breath and let it out slowly, hoping it would calm some of the craziness flooding his head. There was no way he’d be able to sleep tonight, not with everything he’d just learned. But on the flip side, he knew he needed to get some kind of rest. God knew what they had in store for him, and with two meals in his belly, the best thing he could do for himself right now was try to rest up in case they came at him again with something physical. It was clear these guys had no qualms at using brute force and violence to get what they wanted, so the better shape he was in, the better off he would be.

Luca scrubbed his hands over his face, not wanting to think about that.

Get through one day at a time. Hell, one minute. That’s all you have to do right now.

He pushed off the door, about to head to bed, and that was when he spotted a clothing rack standing in the far corner of the room.

When had that gotten here? He hadn’t seen it earlier in the day, but then again, when he came back here after dinner, he was so distracted he could barely see straight. Who had even brought it up here? He hadn’t seen anyone come and go from the penthouse since Dom’s father.

Luca slowly made his way across the room as though someone might jump out from the en suite or closet and ask him what the hell he thought he was doing, but when that didn’t happen, he kept going.

Several hangers of pants, shirts, and garment bags hung side by side, and on the bottom of the rack were shoes and toiletries, along with packets of briefs and boxers.

It was weird, like some kind of mini department store had been delivered to his room. Luca reached out to take a look at one of the shirts closest to him and, when he saw his hand was shaking, balled his fist.

“Pull yourself together. It’s a shirt, not a time bomb.” He was about to try again when he spotted a note pinned to one of the garment bags.

Your clothes are rank. The basement will do that to you. Maybe these will inspire you to stay out of it.

Wait, so these were for him? That made no sense. He was their prisoner, and yet now was being given clean clothes? As if this all wasn’t a mind fuck on its own, let’s add in a brand-new wardrobe.

Almost on principle he wanted to say fuck you to Dom and his “suggestion,” but then he sniffed at himself and yeah, the adrenaline plus two days in the same clothing had made him a little ripe.

With a steadier hand this time, he pulled a hanger free, and when his eyes landed on the label, they almost fell out of his head. Versace? Seriously?

Luca quickly shoved it back in place. That thing cost more than his entire wardrobe, and the last thing he wanted to do was damage it in any way and give Dom another reason to punish him.

He moved away from the rack, not wanting to have to think about this place, those clothes, the man in the room down the hall from him, any more tonight. His entire life had been turned on its head in a span of days, and he was going to need every ounce of courage and determination just to make it through the night.

Luca kicked off his shoes and climbed onto the bed, not bothering to pull the covers back. He wasn’t going to get any real sleep, he knew that. But if he could just shut off his brain for a few minutes and reboot, then maybe he stood a fighting chance.

He settled in with his back against the pillows and headboard, his knees up tight against his chest, and stared at himself in the mirror across the room.

Who am I?He had no goddamn clue. But if he was who Dom said he was—the heir to this rival family—was there really any hope he was going to get out of this alive?

A tear fell free and rolled down his cheek, but instead of wiping it away, Luca closed his eyes and tried not to think of the fact that he was now merely waiting to die.