“Any special reason you didn’t take soldiers?”
“It’s not a big deal, Stef. I didn’t think I’d need them.”
“Or you didn’t want your father to see Sabbioni soldiers in territory he thinks belongs to him?”
“It’s not like that. You know that.”
“Isn’t it?”
He sighs, drinks a sip of espresso, then touches his lip because the liquid is steaming hot.
“Sicily is yours. He knows that. He’s not stupid enough to try something like that. He’s your uncle, Stefan. He respects that. Respects you.”
“My aunt is dead. No reason for loyalty. And when she was alive it was a very fragile bond.”
“He just helped you find Gabriela, for fuck’s sake. He wouldn’t help his enemy. He’d want to weaken you if he was your enemy.”
“Or maybe he set it all up to gain my trust.”’
“You’re not that stupid and trust doesn’t come that easy. He knows that.”
I sip my espresso. “How often do you see him?”
He shakes his head like he’s trying to remember, but I know him. Rafa doesn’t forget a thing. He’s just trying to figure out the best way to answer me.
I think about what I told Gabriela. About how that line between ally and enemy is constantly shifting.
But Rafa has been like a brother. It doesn’t apply to him.
Antonio was my brother, too. He was also my father’s son. He turned, didn’t he? No one is beyond reproach.
I need to remember that.
“He’s my family, Stefan.”
“So am I. And I’ve been more family to you than he ever was.”
“What do you want me to do? Cut off ties?”
“Thing is, I thought you already had.”
“That was a long time ago. After your father died—”
“Was murdered.”
“Was murdered, I wanted to have mine back. You can understand that, surely?”
“I can understand that, but what I don’t understand is why I’m finding out through my fiancée. Why you asked her to lie to me about it.”
“I didn’t ask her to lie.”
“Omission is a lie.”
He opens his mouth, closes it and runs a hand through his hair. “I knew you’d be pissed. She could have gotten hurt.”
“She did. Two cars sideswiped you and you lied about that too.”
“For the same reason. I lied for the same fucking reason.”
“Who were they?”
“I don’t know. I’d never seen them before. But one of them was at the house. In Pentedattilo.”
I don’t expect him to tell me that, but then again, he has more to gain than lose by offering me that small piece of information.
“And you don’t know who he is?”
He shakes his head. “Or who he works for.”
I finish my espresso and stand.
He stands too.
“I don’t want you to lie to me again, Rafa. You know I consider you a brother.”
“I know, Stefan. And I feel the same way about you. You are a brother to me.”
We stand like that for a minute and I study him.
“We good?” he asks.
“Yeah. We’re good.” I check my watch.
“How is she?”
“She’s okay. She’s tough.” I wonder how she’s going to like what I have to tell her today. “Did you put anything other than the tracker on the new phone?” I ask. Rafa was the one who set up Gabriela’s cell phone both times.
“Like what?” he asks. “Man, I’m starting to think she’s right.”
“Right about what?” I ask, noting the change of subject.
“She thinks you’re jealous of me.”
“Yeah, Gabriela likes to fuck with me.” The word fuck and Gabriela in the same sentence makes my cock stir.
“I just loaded the tracker on the phone like you wanted,” he says. “I’m going to see Clara later, by the way,” Rafa says. “Thought I’d go take her out before she loses her mind.”
I chuckle. “She bored?” Clara likes to party and she and Rafa have a lot of fun together.
He rolls his eyes. “You’d think it was the end of the world.”
“I can move her to Rome. She wanted to be closer by.”
“I’ll talk to her. Why don’t you come with me? Like old times. I miss those days.” It used to be the three of us having fun together, but I don’t feel like it anymore.
“I’ve got too much going on here. Next time.”
Rafa grins, one eye narrowing. “You like her.”
“What?”
“Gabriela.”
I just look at him.
“I saw how you looked at her at the well, Stefan. I’m not fucking blind. And if a woman looked at me the way she looks at you, hell, I’d stay home too.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Rafa.”
“Just take care you don’t like her too much. Makes her a weakness. You don’t want to make a target out of her again. Your enemies will pounce when they see it.”
I don’t like his tone.
“Relax, man. I’m messing with you,” he says when I don’t reply.
I don’t relax. “Tell Clara I said hello.” I walk to the door.
“Will do. You alone?” he asks when I’m outside.
I nod.
“Don’t do that, man. You know it’s not safe.”
“I’m just visiting my cousin. Why wouldn’t I be safe?”
“There are eyes and ears everywhere. Just be fucking careful.”
Something about all that bugs me the whole way home but when I get back and Millie tells me that one of my attorneys, Paulo Alessi, is here and waiting out on the patio, I put it out of my mind.
I walk out there to find him sitting with Gabriela. She’s in a bikini, the little pink one. Too little.
He’s laughing at something she says but stops and clears his throat nervously when he sees me. I move to stand behind her chair, putting both hands on her shoulders just to be sure everyone’s clear where we stand and to whom she belongs.
“Stefan,” he says, shifting his gaze quickly from Gabriela as he stands and extends his hand. “I got here early, and Gabriela was kind enough to keep me company.”
I take a moment before I shake his hand. “I’m late. Thought I had more time. Ready to get started?”
“Of course,” he says, picking up his briefcase.
“Nice to meet you, Paulo,” Gabriela says, standing now that I’ve removed my hands from her shoulders. She extends her hand to him.
He looks at it, then at me, doing anything and everything to not appear to be looking at her in her too little bikini.
I give the briefest nod from behind her.
“Nice to meet you,” he says with a quick shake of her hand.
“Millie,” I call out as she’s passing. “Show Paulo into my study.”
“Of course,” she says, and he follows her.
I look down at Gabriela’s ass clad in a skimpy triangle of cloth and step closer to her to cup one cheek.
“I don’t want you wearing these when I’m not around.” I squeeze, inhale the scent of sunscreen at her neck. She smells like summer. Like sunshine.
She turns her face a little. “I thought you liked me sitting by the pool,” she says, her tone seductive, like she knew what she was doing.
I give her ass a quick little smack that makes her jump.
“Hey.”
“You’re mine. You only wear these around me. Have Millie help you pick out some more modest suits.”
She rolls her eyes. “You bought them for me, remember?”
“Put something else on until I’m finished and wait for me upstairs. Then I’ll strip you naked and we’ll get back to what we were doing earlier.”
“Jealous much?” she mutters as she walks away.
I grab her ponytail and tug her backward. “Like getting your ass spanked much?”
Fuck. Me.
I pull her to me to kiss her once, then bring my mouth to her ear. “When I’m finished, I’m going to bend you over my knee, bare your sweet little ass and spank you until you come.”
Her breathing is short, and her eyes dark when she lifts her gaze to mine.
“Then I’m going to teach you how to suck my cock properly.”
“Jesus.”
“You go think about how you’re going to look to me on your knees with my cock stuffed down your throat after you’ve been spanked to orgasm. Think about how my come is going to taste when you swallow it.”
I slide my free hand into the crotch of her skimpy bikini.
She makes a sound, something between a whimper and a moan, as she grinds herself against me.
“You dirty girl. You’re already wet.” I kiss her neck, her throat, then slide my hand out, smear it across her belly. “You like when I talk to you like this. Just make sure you don’t put those fingers on your dirty little pussy and make yourself come until I can watch.”
“You’ll never know if I do,” she says with a smirk.
“I’ll know.”
She reaches to touch my erection over my jeans. “Are you going to sport that hard-on through your meeting?”
I pull her hand away. “I’m a big boy. I’ll manage my hard-on.” I smack her ass again. “Now go to your room and wait for me.”
12
Gabriela
I slip a dress on over top of the bikini and decide to wait in the library instead of my room for Stefan to finish. I try reading but all I can do is think about what he said, what we’re going to do.
And he’s right that I want to slide my hand into my bikini bottoms and make myself come, but I somehow don’t and for the next two hours, manage to get myself so worked up, I think I’m going to explode if he doesn’t finish his meeting soon.
I leave the door open a crack so I can see when the attorney leaves. Miss Millie goes into the study with coffee at some point, but no one comes out.
When the doorbell rings an hour after that, I listen as Miss Millie lets whoever it is in.
“Mr. Sabbioni is expecting you,” she says.
He’s expecting someone else?
“Thank you,” a male voice says.
I freeze.
I know this voice. It doesn’t belong here. It’s so out of place that it takes me a moment to make sense of who it is.
I get up, go to the door and peer through the crack.
“Right this way, Mr. Waverly,” Miss Millie says.
I watch in shock as my father’s most trusted attorney enters Stefan’s study.
“What’s he doing here?” I ask Miss Millie as soon as the study door is closed.
“Gabriela.” She seems surprised to see me there. “I thought Stefan asked you to wait upstairs.”
I guess he had but I hadn’t realized it was an order. That he had a purpose in mind with his casual command. So casual I missed the command part.
“That’s my father’s attorney. What’s he doing here?”
“I don’t know, dear. Why don’t you go upstairs and wait? I’m sure Stefan will explain once he’s finished.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” My eyes are locked on the study door I’m marching toward.
“No, Gabriela.” I see her signal to the soldier down the hall. “He won’t like to be disturbed.”
I manage to open the door just as that soldier takes hold of my arm.
“What the—” Stefan’s gaze snaps to me. He’s standing against the far wall, a pissed off expression on his face. The man I met earlier looks flustered and the only one smiling is Waverly.
“I’m sorry, Stefan,” Miss Millie says, reaching to close the door as the soldier drags me backward.
“What’s going on? Why is he here?” I ask, struggling to stand my ground, remembering what my father said about the modification to the contract. About how Stefan may not be so forthcoming about the change.
“I told you to wait in your room,” Stefan says.
“Let me go!” I yell at the man holding me. “I have a right to know!”
“She does,” Waverly says, a smug smile on his face.
I hate him. I hate that man. I always have. He helped my father cover up what he did to Gabe. He’s always helped with the dirty work.
“Shut the fuck up, Waverly,” Stefan tells him. “I’ll tell her when it’s time.”
“Tell me now!”
“It’s the modification your father mentioned, Gabriela,” Waverly starts.
“Get her out of here!” Stefan orders and the soldier lifts me off my feet.
“Let go!”
“The one where you’ll vow to never see or speak to your brother again.”
What?
“You can understand it’s far too dangerous now,” he continues. “I mean, especially considering what happened to Mr. Roma—”
The door slams shut, and I’m carried up the stairs screaming and kicking.
He can’t do this.
He can’t.
Gabe is the last person I have left. He can’t take him away too.
I struggle as the soldier enters my bedroom and drops me on my bed.
I scramble up, walk to the door, but he steps in front of it and folds his arms across his chest.
“Get out of my way!”
He just stands there like the stupid brick wall he is. I try to shove at him, try to move him, but it’s impossible.
The balcony. I’ll go through Stefan’s room. But before I’m even outside, the bedroom door opens and Stefan steps in. He orders the soldier out.
“Gabriela,” he starts, tone calm.
I fly at him, a scream like a roar coming from my throat.
He catches me but I beat my fists against him, pound his chest until he takes hold of my wrists and forces them behind my back.
“I told you to wait here for a reason.”
“So you could sneak Waverly in without my knowing? So you could make this change without my knowledge? How could you? After everything? How could you?”
He walks me backward, sits me on the edge of the bed. He keeps hold of my wrists as he leans down over me. “You don’t understand, Gabriela—”
“Let me go. Don’t touch me.” I yell, struggling against him, ending up on my back for all the effort.
Stefan’s on top of me, his weight almost too heavy. “There’s a reason I waited.”
“You waited.” I squirm, my hands hurting with our combined weight on them. “How long have you known? Before my kidnapping? How long?”
He takes a deep breath in.
“You’re hurting me. Let me go. Get off me.”
“Calm down and I will.”
“You want me to calm down?” I twist beneath him, pulling at my hands. It’s useless until he decides to let me go, I know it. His grip is like an iron manacle. “You want me to calm down when my father’s lawyer—that horrible man—tells me that I’ll never see my brother again? Will never talk to him again? While you knew all along? While you agreed?”
“Christ,” he says, letting go of my wrists and pushing off me to stand.
I stand too and without a moment’s hesitation, I draw my arm back and I slap him so hard, his head jerks with the blow and the sound reverberates off the walls.
My hand stings as the room falls dead silent and when he turns his face back to mine, I see rage in his eyes. Pure and absolute rage.
“You are never to do that again,” he says, speaking slowly, enunciating every word.
But that rage he’s feeling? I can match it.
Hell, I can top it.
“No?” I ask, raising my arm again and swinging.
I don’t make my target though. Stefan’s no fool. He catches my wrist and throws me backward so hard that I bounce twice on the mattress.
He has one knee on the bed and closes his
hand around my throat. “You don’t fucking listen. That’s your problem. You never fucking listen.”
I claw at his forearm as he squeezes, digging out rivulets of skin and blood as I watch his crazed eyes darken. I slap at his arm, his chest. Anything.
He makes a sound, releases me.
“You’re just like them! I hate you!” I scream, rolling onto my belly, scrambling away. I kick at him when he catches my ankle and drags me backward. His full weight is on me and one arm is locked around my neck, his bicep at my throat. When he flexes, I stop moving because I stop breathing.
“I don’t want to hurt you, Gabriela,” he says, his breath hot against my ear. “Don’t make me hurt you.”
A gurgling sound comes from my throat and he finally removes his arm.
“You’ll hurt me anyway,” I choke out the words.
He flips me over onto my back, keeps me trapped beneath him. “You don’t understand—”
“I understand that you’re no different than the man you hate.”
His eyes narrow and I know those are the words he hates most. “You need to open your eyes and see the monsters for who they are.”
“And the heroes for who they are?” I ask, sarcasm my poison.
But then Waverly’s words ring through my ears again.
You’ll vow to never see or speak to your brother again.
Sadness overwhelms me. I’m powerless. I always have been.
“You said you didn’t want to hurt me.”
This betrayal, it’s harder to take, because I thought things were changing. I stupidly thought Stefan cared.
“Fuck.” He lifts himself up a little and with his thumbs he wipes at my tears. “You said you wanted to trust me, Gabriela. Trust me.”
When he told me I was sweet and innocent, what he meant was I’m a fool. A stupid, naïve fool and his perfect target. A perfect target for all of them.
“Are you even listening to me?” he asks.
“Get off me. Don’t touch me.”
Something in the way he looks at me changes and he slides off me. Stands. He looks down at me, runs a hand through his hair.
“I’m not going to hurt you. I never was. I told you that last night.”
“I don’t believe you.” I pull myself up to a seat as far from him as possible, draw my knees up and wrap my arms around them.
Damage Page 8
