I slowed my hasty steps, pressed a hand against the cool bricks of the building at my side, and exhaled a long breath. “Hi.”
“Are you all right?” Concern tightened his voice. “You sound upset.”
“No.” I swallowed back my stupid fears and shook my head even though he couldn’t see me. “I’m fine. Just missing you.”
“I like you missing me. What are you doing?”
I looked up and around the quiet street, knowing if I told him the truth, he’d rupture a blood vessel. Even though he’d agreed to let me work with Felicity, he wasn’t wild about the idea. And he’d made me promise not to go anywhere alone. Today’s little excursion had been a spur-of-the-moment decision I’d had to make without telling him.
“I-I’m at the market in Siena. With Caprice. Getting groceries.”
“With Caprice?” He chuckled. “That must be a fun experience.”
I closed my eyes against the lie. Caprice was Felicity’s fifty-something housekeeper, and she had the personality of a cardboard box.
“Yeah.” I ran a hand over my hair, hating that I was lying to him. I especially disliked how easily I was doing it lately. “We’re headed home soon. Did you need anything?”
“Nope. Just you.”
Those three words had the power to make me completely weak. I sagged against the building at my side.
No, he was absolutely nothing like the men in his family. “When will you be home?”
“Hopefully six. I have a few things to finish here. Then I want to spend all night with you.”
A smile curled my lips. “That sounds heavenly. I think I might even cook for you tonight. I was thinking it’s time I tried my hand at spaghetti alla carbonara.”
He gasped in a playful way. “You’re trying to seduce me, aren’t you?”
I couldn’t stop myself. I laughed. “Yes. Always. Hurry home, vita mia. Senza di te non posso più vivere.”
“I can’t live without you either, angioletto. I mean that.”
I sighed, feeling better with every passing second. “Ti amo.”
“I love you too. Now hang up so I can get my work done and come home to you. Every time you speak to me in Italian it makes me freakin’ horny.”
I laughed. “Okay, okay. Ciao, bello.”
“Ciao, amore mio.”
I clicked End on my phone and headed back for the Central Market to pick up the items I’d need for dinner, but my feet came to a stuttering stop when I spotted a familiar face through the crowd.
Gio’s light eyes were locked on me, and a predatory smile curled his lips, telling me this wasn’t a chance meeting.
Heart in my throat, I turned and ran.
My feet came to a skidding stop on the sidewalk. Not twenty feet from me, David Bonello’s tall frame blocked my path to freedom.
“Look what we have here,” he said in English, his accent thick. “A lost maiden. Giovanni, I think she needs help finding her way.”
A hand closed over my arm, and I gasped because I hadn’t realized Gio was so close. With a wicked smirk, he jerked me into an alleyway between two large buildings, dislodging the hat from my head. I cried out, but his other hand closed over my mouth, muffling the sound.
I kicked and scratched, but they easily picked me up off the ground and carried me deeper into the alley and behind a dumpster. My purse slipped from my arm and clattered against the ground, the contents spilling over the pavement.
Horror tightened my throat because I knew what they were about to do. This wasn’t a warning. This was payback for the other night. This was Giovanni not following anyone’s rules but his own.
I kicked harder and fought with everything that was in me. Bonello grabbed my legs as I struggled. Gio wrapped his arm around my chest and kept his hand clamped over my mouth as he held me against him and fumbled with some kind of door at my back. “Hold her still so we can get her in here.”
“I’m trying,” Bonello said, grappling with my feet. “She’s fucking fighting me.”
I knew if they took me through that door I was never going to survive. I fought harder and wiggled my mouth until I could grasp a finger, then bit down until blood rushed over my tongue.
“Santo cazzo Madre di Cristo!”
The second Gio jerked his hand back, I screamed as loud as I could.
A fist slammed into the side of my face, choking the scream in my throat. I hit the ground on my side and skidded over the dirty pavement.
Italian voices echoed around me—Gio’s, Bonello’s—but there was another voice. A third I vaguely recognized. Shouting angry, incensed words in Italian.
I tried to push myself off the ground, but the entire side of my face and body was on fire. Hands closed over my arm, and I gasped and jerked back, then I heard a calm voice say, “Easy. It is me, Signore Vecellio. You’re all right, signora. We help you.”
My vision wavered. I blinked and looked up at both Signore Vecellio and Signore Polermo, helping me off the ground. Gio and David were nowhere to be seen.
“Are you all right?” Signore Polermo asked when I was on my feet.
“Y-yes.” My heart was racing, my adrenaline still in the out-of-this-world range, but a quick check told me nothing was broken. “I-I’m okay. Thank you. Grazie. If you hadn’t come along—”
Signore Vecellio pulled me toward the end of the alley while Signore Polermo stooped to pick up my hat and the spilled contents of my purse. “You must hurry. Drive straight home. It is not safe for you here. Where is your car?”
I took the items Signore Polermo handed me. “O-on the other side of the market.”
“We walk you there.”
The two men walked me at a clipped pace all the way to my car. As soon as I was behind the wheel of the Mercedes, they looked down at me through the open door, and Signore Vecellio said, “Do not make any stops. Drive straight to the Romano estate. They will be looking for you.”
It occurred to me I should be scared these two old men knew where I lived, but I didn’t care. They’d saved me. “T-thank you.”
“Sbrigati!” Signore Polermo said, closing my door as both men stepped back.
I wasn’t sure how I made it back to Marco’s estate. I don’t remember the drive. But the second the gate closed behind me and I pulled to a stop in front of the guest villa, I dropped my forehead to my hands against the steering wheel and let the shakes I’d been holding back consume me.
A tapping sounded at my window. I shrieked and jerked back.
Through blurry vision, I realized Ariana was standing outside my car door with a worried expression on her face.
I braced a hand against my chest and exhaled a hard breath. She jerked my car door open and reached for me.
“Natalie? What happened? I came by to see you, only you weren’t here, so I waited on the porch. You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
She helped me out of the car. I wobbled on weak legs but steadied myself with a hand on the door. Ariana reached for me to hold me upright, then stilled at my side.
“Mio Dio,” she whispered.
I turned toward her, knowing this time my face looked a whole lot worse than it had the last time Gio had hit me.