"Fucking stop," he groaned through his clenched teeth, his dick throbbing painfully.
Rodrigo shouldn't have kissed her. That reckless moment of surrender had unleashed this torrent. It had blurred every line, shattered every carefully maintained barrier.
Rodrigo rolled onto his side, punching his pillow in a futile attempt to find a cool spot. He might be a monster, but he would not jerk himself off in a bed where she usually slept, no matter how much his dick ached.
He squeezed his eyes shut again, trying to banish the image of her touching herself, trying to focus on the cold calculus of security breaches and potential traitors.
Nothing worked. Giana was a siren song he had never learned how to silence. The monster wanted his queen, and the man was terrified of what that hunger might cost them both.
22
The hammering on Dario's door was the kind of insistent, rhythmic pounding that bypassed sleep and went straight for his fight-or-flight response.
He groaned, burying his face deeper into the pillow. He had barely managed to scrape together an hour of fitful sleep after the engagement dinner and the subsequent late-night security clusterfuck.
"Dario! Get your big ass up!" Leo's voice cut through the thick oak.
"Fuck off, Leo," Dario mumbled into the pillow, his voice thick with sleep. "It's the middle of the fucking night."
The pounding intensified. "Dario! Rodrigo is sending you on a mission. We know who was sneaking out."
Dario shoved himself upright, the sheets tangling around his waist as his brain caught up. The image of the shadowy figure slinking away like a thief flashed through his mind.
Cold rage momentarily burned away the exhaustion. Someone inside their walls was playing for the other side. Someone who had helped put Giana in that fucking dog crate in Izmir.
He swung his legs over the side of the bed, the cool stone floor a shock against his bare feet.
"All right! Keep your fucking panties on!" he yelled, scrubbing a hand over his face, feeling the rough stubble on his jaw. He grabbed the pair of worn black sweatpants discarded on the floor and yanked them on, padding to the door bare-chested.
He flung it open. Leo stood there, looking far too alert for whatever ungodly hour it was. His dark curls were messy, but his eyes were focused.
"Finally," Leo snapped, his gaze flicking over Dario's disheveled state with barely concealed impatience. "Get dressed. Fred's already gearing up, and I need you on the road."
Dario blinked. "Fred? As in, 'I killed your client while you were taking a piss in Rome, ' Frederica?"
"The very same," Leo confirmed, dark amusement in his eyes. "Rodrigo's orders. You're the tracker. She's the ghost. Only observe and report. No engagement unless you can extract them cleanly. Tranqs only. Target's on the move and heading northeast toward Treviso."
"Treviso?" Dario frowned, running a hand through his sleep-tousled curls. "What the fuck's in Treviso besides decent Prosecco and tourists getting lost?"
"That's what you're going to find out," Leo said, shoving a tablet toward him.
On the screen was a live GPS tracker, a pulsing red dot moving steadily along a highway. Below it, a dossier photo of Luca Moretti. Clean-cut, serious face, looking like he took his mercenary dutieswaytoo seriously.
"Luca left the villa via the East Wing service entrance, just like Giana spotted. He used the patrol gap to slip through. Iz and I are tracking his phone and vehicle. He's driving a dark blue Fiat Ducato van, registered to a shell company we use for low-profile logistics."
Dario studied the moving dot. "And Fred and I are supposed to… what? Follow him to his nonna's for Sunday lunch?"
"Follow him. See who he meets, where he goes, and why Treviso." Leo's gaze hardened. "Rodrigo wants to know who inside Falcone's organization Luca's feeding intel to."
"Right. Observe and report, blah blah blah. Got it." Dario handed the tablet back. "Ten minutes." He started to shut the door, but Leo stopped it with a hand.
"Dario." Leo's voice lowered, losing some of its overcaffeinated edge and sounding more like his little brother. "Rodrigo is wound tighter than usual. He needs a clean win here, so don't fuck it up, and try not to strangle Fred before you get them. You will only get one of her bullets in your ass, and we need you too much right now."
Dario managed a tired, lopsided grin. "No promises on the strangling. And Leo? Get Dante and go to bed. You look like shit. I can take it from here."
Fucking Frederica. Of all the mercenaries in the house, Rodrigo could have picked to go with him, it had to be her.
He could see the sense in it. Luca would have friends amongst the other men, and they didn't know who else was in on this shit with Falcone. Everything about Frederica got under his skin faster than a switchblade, and being stuck on a job together was going to be a pain in his ass.
