“Whatever you say, sir,” she says in a voice so dripping with sarcasm I want to pull this car over and spank the sass right out of her. I won’t, though. I’ll give her this space.
Later, we’ll talk.
Later, we’ll make amends.
I don’t know how, and I don’t know when, but we will.
I caught a glimpse of what life looked like with the woman that I love, and I want that life. I won’t let this happen. I won’t let anything drive a wedge between us.
I fucked up. I’ll have to grovel, something I would literally only do for the woman I love.
The woman I love.
I want to see the light in her eyes again. I want to hear her voice go all soft and melty when she talks to me. I want to see the color on her cheeks when I kiss her. I want to hear her moan when I make her come.
She takes my phone, pulls up Romeo’s number, and hits it to call him. She puts it on speakerphone.
“Tavi? You find him?”
“No, Rome, but I think I might be close. Do me a favor, brother?”
“Yeah?”
“Take the tracking off my phone.”
He’s silent for a minute. “Can’t do that, Tav. What if something happens to you? Can’t find you if I don’t have your tracking on your phone. It’s for your own safety.”
I grit my teeth. “Romeo, you need to take it off since I’m heading in to find Santo. He left, brother. Elise called it, said Anna Regazza was at our house as a diversion. I looked through the footage. He left right when she came.”
He curses under his breath.
“And I don’t want him knowing I’m coming. I need to get to the airport without him knowing.”
Romeo curses under his breath. “If he betrayed us, Tavi…”
I know. I fucking know. We’ll bring him before us and burn the rose that marks him as one of us right off his skin. He’ll be beaten before he’s questioned and killed.
“I’ll kill the motherfucker, Tav.”
“And I’ll help you.”
He curses up a blue streak, then finally concedes. “Fine. Fine. I’ll let you go dark, but you let me know the second you’re back, you got me?”
“Yeah.” I sigh. “Yeah, I will.”
Elise looks thoughtful but doesn’t say anything. I watch the screen as the small bright dot in the upper right corner that indicates tracking disappears.
It feels odd, going it alone like this. No brothers to back me up. No bodyguards. No one to call for footage or tracking. I haven’t gone solo in years.
I look to Elise, who’s only staring out the window. I’ve never felt so lonely in my life.
CHAPTER 18
Elise
I make myself focus on what we need to do.
When I get my hands on Santo…
Well. When I get my hands on him, I have no idea what I’ll do. Like Tavi, he’s strong and ruthless, and it won’t be like I can hurt him.
I have questions for him, though.
He’s the most merciless of all of them. I remember Piero telling me that he believed Santo to be a psychopath, back when I first found out I was going to be married to one of the Rossi brothers.
And for the first time since this all went down… over a year ago now, though it feels like it might’ve been a decade or more… I wonder.
Why did Piero have such a strong opinion of Santo?
I bring myself back to the conversation. I was in my family home in Tuscany, my mind spiraling out of control with the very idea of being married to someone I’d never met.
I feel the grief choke me when I conjure up the image of Piero, standing in the doorway. I’d practically pried the news out of him, and him revealing my family secrets led to his demise. It’s my fault. At least partly, anyway.
I served time with Santo, one of their main core. The man is a fucking psychopath. I don't want you in that family. What if they marry you to Santo? I swear he has no conscience…
Does serving time with someone really give you a glimpse into who they are? Or was there another reason why he feared my being married to Santo?
How did he know him so well?
Did they become friends?
I can hardly bear the thought of Piero being disloyal to me. No.
“Elise?” I focus on Tavi, whose eyes are on the road. He looks perplexed.
“What?”
“What’s on your mind? I was trying to talk to you, and I don’t think you ever heard me. Did you?”
I shake my head. No. No, I was a million miles away.
“I didn’t, sorry,” I say without a trace of actual regret. “What did you say?”
“I wondered if you knew anything about this airport. But before you answer that, tell me what you were thinking about just now.”
I feel my heart harden toward him. “No, Tavi. You’ve lost the privilege of knowing what I’m thinking.”
Before I can stop him, his hand comes to rest on my thigh, but it isn’t a possessive or tender grip. It’s a reminder of his power over me. It almost hurts.
“And that’s where you’re wrong, Elise. You may be angry at me. You may even hate me.”
I do, I do feel all those things.
“But you can’t hide from me. If you don’t tell me readily, I have methods of finding out.”
I laugh mirthlessly. “As if you have the magical ability to get into my mind. What are you, a magician?”
A muscle tics in his jaw before he responds. “We have ways of accessing the mind, Elise. Don’t make me go there.”
I shove his hand off of me. “So you’d torture me, would you?”
A beat passes before he responds. “Only if I have to.”
“Ah, what a nice way of starting a marriage.” My voice catches at the end. I stare out through the passenger window so he doesn’t see the tears fill my eyes.
“Elise,” he says, softer now. “If you think of anything at all that can help us find Santo, it helps both of us. How can I protect you from danger if I don’t know everything that threatens you?”
I think about this. Protect me. It sounds like it should be something nice, something I’d even crave. But I don’t want his protection. I don’t want anything from him.
Still, there’s no use in hiding anything that could help us solve this mystery, and I have to reluctantly admit that he’s right. It’s in both of our best interests if we work together, not apart from one another.
“Before I left Tuscany, when I escaped with Piero.” He nods, even as his lips thin and his nostrils flare. I don’t know if he’ll ever be able to discuss that time without getting furious. I don’t care, either. “I made him tell me why I was being sent back to America. He reluctantly told me. But when he did, he warned me about Santo.”
Tavi takes a left turn. A large sign that tells us we’re nearing the Vespucci Airport looms ahead of us. We fly by it.
“Did he? What did he say?”
I tell him.
“Piero and Santo served time together? I should know that. Goddammit.”
I sigh. The sky thunders with the noise of an airplane taking off. I stare at the red stripe along the side.
“When did they serve time together?”