"Desmond," I breathe. "It has to be Desmond. He found her?—"
“Desmond?” Ronan's face is inches from mine, his eyes wild. "Why the fuck are you talking about Desmond?”
“I—”
He releases me, and the chair crashes back down. “You better start fucking talking, Cattaneo. Annie’s things were at your penthouse. Start telling me what the fuck is going on, and maybe I’ll give you a quicker death than you deserve. Because if you don’t, I’m going to start taking off pieces for every answer I don’t fucking get.”
Fear rattles through me. I can’t think. There’s too much coming at me—Ronan knowing Annie was at my penthouse, Annie gone, my men dead, the threat of torture… my mind is racing, and I need to be careful about what I say next.
But I can’t fuckingthink.
“It’s not what you’re thinking,” I manage, which is a stupid fucking thing to say. “Ronan?—”
"I thought I knew you." His voice breaks slightly. "I thought you were my brother. But my brother wouldn't have lied to me. Wouldn't have touched my sister. Wouldn't have?—"
He stops, pulling something from his pocket.
It's a small white stick. Plastic.
My heart stops as I realize what it is.
A pregnancy test.
He throws it at me, and it bounces off my chest and falls to the floor.
"What the fuck is that, Elio?" His voice is deadly quiet now. "Because my men found it in the guest room bathroom. Right next to an empty box. And it has one very clear word on it."
I stare at the test on the concrete floor, and the world tilts on its axis.
Pregnant.
Annie's pregnant.
"Oh God." The words come out as a whisper. "She's pregnant."
"Yeah, I can fucking see that!" Ronan's shouting again. "The question is—is it yours? Were youfuckingmy sister, Cattaneo? Do I need to cut your fucking dick off first?"
I can't speak. Can't think. I can't process what I'm seeing.
Annie's pregnant with my child.
Mychild.
And Desmond has her. Hasthem. It’s the only thing that makes sense.
"Answer me!" Ronan grabs my shirt again, swinging another punch at my jaw that rocks my head backwards. "Is that baby yours?"
"Yes." The word tears out of me. "Yes, it's mine. We—I married her. We got married. We?—”
Ronan stops and turns to look at me, his eyes colder than I’ve ever seen them before. “Start fucking talking, Cattaneo, while you still have a fucking tongue.”
So I do. There’s no reason not to, now. I tell him all of it—about Annie lying about going to a friend’s house to go to Desmond’s instead. About what he did to her. The wine glass that caused the wounds on his face. How she ran to me, begged me to hide her until she could think straight. How she begged me to kill Desmond for her—and keep her secrets, and why. That Desmond got to her anyway and dragged her to that church. That I married her.
The only thing that I don’t say is that I love her. Maybe it would help my case. Maybe it would make it all worse. But somehow I can’t bring myself to say it out loud to Ronan when I haven’t said it to her.
“This—we tried to be careful. I tried?—”
"But not careful enough." Ronan’s jaw works. "Jesus Christ, Elio. You got my sister pregnant. You married her, fucked her, knocked her up, and then what? Where is she?" He grabs ahandful of my hair, wrenching my head back. " Why are your guards dead? How did Desmond get to her?"
