She threw up her hands. “Yes!” When I gave her a skeptical look, she added, “I could’ve handled Luigi.”
I shook my head. “You’re delusional if you believe that.” He would’ve beaten her down until that spirit that lit her up from the inside was extinguished forever.
Sarcasm dripped from her voice when she said, “Believe it or not, I actually have some experience dealing with psychotic old men.”
“At least your father didn’t fuck you.”
“Who I fuck or don’t fuck isn’t any of your business anymore.”
My hand shot out and grabbed her wrist. I yanked her toward me as far as the seatbelt would allow until her face was only inches from mine. “That’s where you’re wrong, baby girl.Iam the only man who will fuck you.”
“You didn’t want me,” she spit out. Her blue-gray eyes shiny with tears.
“I just killed a man to save you!”
“I don’t need you to save me,” she sneered. “I can save myself.” She yanked her wrist out of my grip, and I let her go.
“Sera…”
But she shook her head. “Don’t, Enzo.”
I sighed deeply. I’d deal with her attitude later. Right now, I needed to concentrate on getting her somewhere safe.
We made the rest of the trip in silence. When we arrived at Luca’s, I pulled off the side of the road and texted him, waiting until he gave me the all clear before going up to the house.
He was waiting for us when we arrived back at the lake house. When we walked into the house, he was there in the middle of the great room, standing all alone, his hands fisted at his sides. But when he spoke, his tone was even. “Where is the car you used?”
“In the garage.”
His blue eyes took a quick assessment of us both. Sera, in the black see-through gown, a dress shirt, and my jacket, her mouth smeared with blood from my hand. And me, with blood covering my hands and shirt from the broken glass. “Whose phone is that?” he asked her.
Phone? What phone?
Sera held it out to him. “Your father’s. I’m sorry. I tend to steal things when I’m upset. It’s like a nervous tic I can’t get rid of.”
Luca took it from her, turning it this way and that. He tucked it into his inside jacket pocket. “Thank you, Sera. Would you please excuse us? I believe if you go upstairs, Veda is waiting for you in our bedroom. She’ll help you get cleaned up and into some decent clothes if you wish.” He nodded toward my hand, once again clasped around her wrist. “Let her go, Enzo.”
I took a steadying breath and did as he ordered. Then I watched as she climbed the stairs in her bare feet, only looking back at me once before she disappeared down the hall toward Luca and Veda’s room.
“Is she a flight risk?”
My eyes flicked back to my friend. “Yes.”
He nodded, unsurprised. “I’ll let the guards know no one is to leave this house without my permission. We’ll need to be cautious until the question of my father’s death and his replacement is settled.” He turned his father’s cell phone around in his hands and tapped the screen, trying a few passwords. “As soon as Tristan gets back, we’ll have him break into this phone and see what we can find.” His eyes rose to mine, and he smiled, but it was strained. “Maybe we’ll get lucky.”
“I’m sorry,” I told him sincerely.
He met my gaze, and his eyes searched mine for a long time.
“I tried to stay away,” I said. “I did. I just wanted to make sure she was okay.”
A strange look crossed his features. “I assume my father was wooing her into his bed with his usual manner of brutality.”
“He was beating her with a thick leather belt.”
Luca was silent for a moment, but I saw the rage in his eyes. A rage that came nowhere near to matching mine. “I can’t blame you for what you did, Enzo. If it had been Veda, I would’ve done the same. What happened has happened. There’s no going back now. All we can do is try to control the fallout.”
“It was yourfather,” I insisted, as if that meant something. And it should. I’d lost both of my parents when I was very young, but I would think it should mean something.
