“Has he been checked for weapons?” Massimo asks when they come closer.
“He is clean. He had a Glock on him, but we have it in our possession,” a short stocky guy says, gripping Renzo’s arm tight as he shoves him forward.
“Ree-ree, get away from him,” Renzo yells, jabbing his finger in Massimo’s direction. “He’s going to kill you! It’s all been a trap. Please.”
Prickles of apprehension climb up my spine as I instinctively move away from Massimo. I stare at my husband. “What’s he talking about?”
“The Russians put out a hit on you, Ree-ree, and he took the contract. He accepted payment to kill you!” Renzo shouts, his tone borderline hysterical, his eyes manic and darting wildly about. “Run now! Get away from him before he ends you!”
ChapterForty-Five
Massimo
Rina’s shoulders collapse, and she takes a step forward, leaning into me. Thank fuck for that. For a second, I thought she might believe the misguided crazy man in the wetsuit on my lawn. I hate Renzo Dutti with the intensity of a thousand suns, but looking at him now, it’s hard not to feel a smidgeon of sympathy.
He’s a broken man. His attempts to manipulate the situation to protect the woman he loves has failed spectacularly. If I was in his shoes, I’d be desperate and reckless too. He’s screaming at Rina to get away from me, and I can practically feel her heart breaking. I wrap my arm around her. “What can I do for you?”
She looks up at me with tears in her eyes. “Just hold me?”
“Always.”
She reaches up, dragging her fingers through the trimmed hair on the side of my face. “Jacobi came through.”
I nod. “He did. I was going to tell you, but this all happened when that shit went down with the Russians, and you were under enough stress. I know you have pushed everything aside to get through this past week, but you’re human, sweetheart. There is only so much one person can handle. I just wanted to shield you for a while. I would have told you when things calmed down.”
“I know that.” Turning around, she hugs me, clinging to me tightly. “Give me some of your strength, Massimo,” she whispers in my ear as she holds on to me. “I know you have some to spare.”
“I will be your strength.” I kiss her, conscious of the madman screaming and shouting in the background. The longer this goes on, the more it’ll hurt my wife. “Ask him, sweetheart. Ask him to tell you what he’s done.”
If he won’t tell her, I’ll shoot him myself and fill her in afterward. I wish our surveillance had discovered the truth sooner, and we might have been able to avoid some of the recent events.
Catarina turns around in my arms, and I hold her against my body, offering her the silent support she asked for.
“What have you done, Renzo?”
He continues to shout warnings, and I’m not even sure he heard her. Rina walks toward him, and my instinct is to pull her back, but he’s not a threat to her. Not in a physical sense, anyway, so I let her go, remaining close in case I need to intervene.
“Renzo, you need to take a breath and start at the beginning,” she says in a soft voice, the kind you would use with a child or someone mentally impaired, which her underboss appears to be at this time. “Massimo isn’t going to kill me. He bought the contract so no one else would come after me.”
“He’s lying!” Renzo’s eyes are dark as night as he glares at me.
“No, he isn’t. I was with him when he made the deal with the man who organizes the contract killings. He isn’t going to kill me, Ren. He loves me as much as I love him.”
Renzo slumps against my men, but they keep him propped up. “I came to warn you, but it was for nothing. He has brainwashed you.” He turns pleading eyes on her. “The girl I knew, the woman I fell in love with, is gone. You have changed. He has changed you.”
“Yes, I have changed. I’m not the same person I was. I couldn’t be. Not after everything I have discovered about the past and myself. I wish you could see my life is changing for the better. I wish you would have come and talked to me about whatever went down. All of this could’ve been avoided.”
“I don’t see how,” he says in a dejected voice. All of the fight has left him, and sympathy rears its head again. “I tried to protect you. You and Maria. But I failed.”
“What has Maria got to do with this?” Rina asks.
“Everything,” Renzo replies. He pulls himself upright and looks a little bit more lucid as he starts explaining. “I found out a couple of months ago that Maria was cheating on me. It’s not the first time. A year ago, I told her I was leaving and taking the kids with me, and she promised she would stop and recommit to me.” He shakes his head. “I should never have believed her. She ruined everything.”
“What did she do?” Rina asks.
“She started up with a Russian guy, a mobster. Anton placed him in her path. He had her spying on me. She was passing him intel.”
“Anton was always planning to betray me,” Rina says, and I know she’s beating herself up for not seeing it. For trusting him when he didn’t deserve it.
