My eyebrows slammed down. She was sent away. That’s what he had said. Sent. It made me think she didn't have a choice. That Gio had made her leave me.
Had I been wrong all of these years? Had it all been him, not her, and not because he thought she was in danger?
Had he sent her away to keep her away from me?
“Guess he wanted her to behave herself for once and keep her legs closed. I mean, she was screwing you, so who knows who else she wasfucking. Maybe that was the reason her parents were murdered. Maybe it was some jilted lover…”
I launched myself at him with so much force that I sent the chair and both of us crashing to the floor. Curling one hand around his throat, I smashed my other fist down into his face over and over again.
Bone crunched under my attack, blood splattered, and my knuckles split open wide, but I didn’t stop. How could I when he had talked about Sophia that way? Like she was nothing more than a common whore.
“Don’t fucking…” Blow after blow landed on his face until it looked like raw hamburger meat, and then I was being yanked away. “Don’t talk about her like that. I’ll kill you.” Breathing heavy, I straightened, watching as he was helped to his feet.
The look he shot at me from his swollen eyes was full of hatred. “You want to know why your precious woman was sent away? It was because she was a slut, and,” he spat blood at my feet, “her brother knew it. Gio knew that you had fucked his sister and he…”
I moved toward him again, the skin of my split knuckles stinging as I clenched them back into fists.
Some people just didn’t learn, and this man was one of them.
Around him, the others bristled. Their shoulders straightened, but not one of them moved to save their friend from the beating I was going to give him.
Again.
Although he hadn’t learned from the first one, so maybe I needed something more to hammer my point home.
Something more lasting that he would remember forever and prove to those wannabes once and for all that I wasn’t someone to mess with.
I’d taken two steps before he fell silent, although I hadn’t heard a word he had said, so it didn’t really matter.
Two steps was all it took for the words to die on his lips and his eyes to fill with fear.
The whole club seemed to fall silent. The only thing I could hear was the blood rushing in my ears as I let the rage take over.
Moving without really thinking, I pulled the gun from the holster under my arm and let off one loud, echoing shot.
The silence was shattered as the man fell to the floor, screaming. His hands were clutching at his right knee, which I had just blown off with one well-placed bullet.
“Maybe now you will think twice before you try and stand up to me.” Leaning over him, I pressed the muzzle to his mouth, pushing it against the shattered remnants of his teeth. “I think I have made myself clear?”
I didn’t take my eyes from him, but I heard the others murmur their agreement.
“Keep Sophia’s name out of your mouths, or the next bullet I put in one of you will be one you have to swallow.”
Turning on my heel, I walked away. There was nothing else to be learned here from them, and honestly, I already knew enough.
Gio had known. I wasn’t sure for how long, but he had, and he had sent her away to some aunt. Not because he thought she was in danger, but to keep her away from me.
He had torn us apart.
But what else had he done? And why had he forced her away in the first place?
I didn’t know the answers to those questions, but I had somewhere to start looking again. The aunt in England. If I could find her, I could find out the truth.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Sophia
He had left, kissing me on the forehead before he went, and saying the words I’d thought I would never hear again.
