He simply said, “Dad’s already gonna kill me for the lodge—who gives a fuck about the car?”
And then he kissed her.
She could still feel the way his lips molded against hers when he leaned inside the opened driver’s window to say goodbye. Even the strokes of his tongue and the graze of his lips were still imprinted on her memory long after he was gone.
She still felt it.
Still tasted him.
She hung onto that memory even when the gate guarding the driveway’s entrance started to open. Luca’s kiss still teased her senses and felt like a ghost on her lips as the car crawled closer and closer to the Donati family home.
Luca didn’t know—she hadn’t told him—but asking him to go home and let her finish her job alone wasn’t easy. In fact, it was the hardest thing she had needed to do yet when he was ... still her safe place at the end of the day. But she wanted him to keep being that for her.
This needed to happen.
Penny hadn’t expected to find Cross waiting for her on the front porch of his large home. She certainly hadn’t thought Nazio would be standing there beside his father when she parked the Vanquish, either.
Neither man seemed shocked when she stepped out of the vehicle. Penny was sure she was still quite a sight—despite getting fully dressed—with her wild hair, calm demeanor, and sure stride. She could have lost her life tonight; it was just another night for her, though.
They didn’t know that.
“I told you—”
“Zeke will not be pleased the Vanquish was used,” Cross muttered, interrupting whatever his son was about to tell him.
Naz’s lips pressed in a thin line as he glanced sideways at his father. “That’s not even close to being the most important thing happening right now, and you know it.”
“I’ve said what I’ve said, Naz.”
“Dad—”
“I did what I did.”
Ah.
Penny came to a stop at the bottom of the stairs leading up to the porch at the same time she realized Naz being here wasn’t entirely coincidence. It seemed the man had finally found out the truth about his father’s involvement with her disappearance years ago, and he had come to talk about it.
Bad timing.
She was here for her dues, too.
“The lodge was attacked—The League came up on us,” Penny told Naz. “Three hours after you guys left.”
“Is Luca—”
“Probably dealing with his father now.”
Naz flinched.
Next to him, Cross simply stared at Penny. “Why are you here? That’s a better question.”
Wasn’t it?
“This needs to end,” she told her former boss, “but I think I need your help.”
He’d helped her once.
She was willing to ask again.
18.
Luca
THE familiar ceiling above his head should have been a comfort to Luca when he woke up, but it wasn’t. He spent too many seconds following the curvy swirls in the plaster with his gaze and breathing in the scent of his parents’ home. A mix of cinnamon and fresh apples. Scents his mother loved, he knew.
He’d barely been awake more than a minute before a throat cleared to his left. He didn’t need to turn his head to know his father was watching him from the living room entryway. He still did nonetheless.
Zeke stared back, quiet.
The mug of coffee in his father’s palms, the rim rolling with steam, dared to make Luca’s mouth water at the thought of something hot and bitter. Zeke didn’t offer the mug, or even a word, where he leaned in pajama pants and a plain tee while Luca righted himself to a sitting position on the couch.
“What time is it?” he asked.
Zeke sucked air through his teeth, replying, “Little after ten.”
Luca blinked. “In the morning?”
“It’s not dark outside, is it?”
He didn’t bother to check the window. He was more surprised at the fact his father was still in pajamas considering the time. It told Luca a lot without his father needing to say a word.
“How much was lost?” Zeke asked.
Yeah.
Shit.
Just like that, the night before came rushing back. Not that he really forgot but in his haste to sleep off the exhaustion that carried his footsteps up to his parents’ home, he hadn’t stopped to explain very much when Luca and Katya came out of their bedroom to find him using his key to get in.
Clearly, Zeke found a way to fill in the blanks.
“What do you know about what’s going on?” he asked his father.
Zeke lifted one shoulder. “As much as Cross.”
Well, then ...
“The Vanquish is gone,” Luca muttered. “Or it will be.”
“And?”
“I don’t know about the lodge in—”
“I had that entire place designed for your mother, Luca.”
He winced. Zeke wasn’t even angry—the dip in his tone and almost resigned delivery spoke of disappointment. How long had he been doing that to his father—disappointing the man? Shit, even when he didn’t try.
“I’ll replace everything,” Luca said, pushing up to stand from the couch. He tossed the afghan blanket to the tan-colored, leather arm, and faced his father again. “Or Naz will. Penny, maybe. We have time to figure out the details.”
“Do we?”
He didn’t know what his father wanted him to say. No doubt, there was a whole spiel that Zeke was holding back. He wasn’t sure what he could do about that, either.
His father didn’t hold back for long.
“What in the hell are you doing?” his father demanded. “You disappear for weeks and days at a time—I can count on one hand the times you’ve called your mother in the past couple of months. How did you go from hunting down an invisible girl to—”
“I never hunted her. I only wanted to find her, Dad.”
Zeke’s tension didn’t ease. “To what cost? Have you really asked that yet? Really considered it?”
“Yes and no.”
Because it didn’t matter.
“Luca ...” Zeke dragged in a hard breath, stopping only when Luca felt like all the air had been sucked from the room. He didn’t pretend to be perfect—he could be selfish even if some people might call him selfless. It was why Zeke knew better than to ask for an apology when Luca wouldn’t say he was sorry. “This isn’t what I wanted for you, son. This—what you’re doing. I wanted you to be—”
“It’s what I wanted, and I can’t be like you. I won’t be like you.”
“What does that mean?”
Now or never, he supposed.
Right wasn’t always easy.
Penny taught him that.
“You were like me once—doing what you wanted, being who you wanted. The only difference between me and you is that you let your father decide your future, but we both know you won’t do that to me, too.”
Zeke said nothing.
Luca understood why.
The values of Cosa Nostra had been at the base of their family’s entire life. Everything about the way they invited people to their home to the color car his father could drive was determined by the rules of made men.