I slide into the driver's seat, my knuckles white on the wheel. I have a war to fight, a sister to save, and a wife I can't decide whether to kill or keep.
Fucking De Lucas.
I drive back to the estate, the sun setting behind the trees, casting long, bloody shadows across the road. The countdown is over, the lines are drawn, and the only thing I know for sure is that when the smoke clears, the world is never going to be the same.
I reach the gates and see the extra guards I ordered. I see the house where the she is waiting.
"Damn it," I mutter, slamming my hand against the steering wheel.
I’m the Butcher. I shouldn't be this afraid of a girl in a silk dress.
But as I park the car and look up at our bedroom window, I realize the truth. I’m not afraid of her.
I’m afraid of what I’ll do to keep her.
CHAPTER 37
GIA
"He’s back."
The words from the guard at the door shouldn't make my heart stop, but they do. I’ve spent the last twelve hours in this room, watching the sun crawl across the floorboards, counting the seconds until the man I betrayed walks back through that door. I haven't changed out of the slip I was wearing when I dismantled our life together.
I stand up as the heavy oak door creaks open.
Rafael looks like he’s been carved out of granite. He’s still in his suit, but the tie is gone, his collar open, his eyes shadowed with a fatigue that has nothing to do with sleep. He doesn't look at me at first. He walks to the sideboard, pours a glass of scotch, and swallows it in one jagged motion.
"Rafael," I whisper. My voice sounds thin, like it’s coming from a different room.
He sets the glass down with a preciseclackand finally turns his head. His green eyes are flat, devoid of the warmth that was there just last night. There’s no "little Gia" in his gaze. There’s only a commander looking at a liability.
"The location is verified," he says. His voice is a low, toneless rasp. "Matteo’s units are in position. Laura’s compound has been identified. It is not far from here. It’s a secondary target for the extraction team."
I feel a rush of relief so violent I have to grab the back of a chair to stay upright. He brought her back from Sicily. "You’re going to get her? You’re really going to get her out?"
"I would never put a child’s life at risk," he says, his tone distant. He starts to unbutton his cuffs, his movements mechanical. "The attack begins before the summit. We move for her while the O'Rourkes are busy walking into the trap you set."
"Thank you," I breathe, stepping toward him, my hands reaching out instinctively. "Rafael, I?—"
"Don't."
The word is a whip-crack. I freeze, my fingers inches from his arm. He doesn't move away, but the space between us feels like a canyon. He looks down at my hand, then back at my face, and the coldness in his expression is worse than any blow.
"Don't thank me," he mutters. "I'm doing this for the girl in the video. Not for you. And you will help us. You will come so your sister sees you when we enter."
He moves past me. I watch him go, the silence of the room pressing in on me until I can't breathe. I’ve spent my whole lifebeing managed, being hit, being traded. I know how to handle violence. I know how to handle rage. But this? This clinical, frozen distance is killing me.
"Scream at me!" I shout, the words tearing out of my throat before I can stop them.
He stops at the threshold, his back to me.
"Scream at me, Rafael! Punish me! Put me in the basement, hit me, tell me I’m a lying De Luca bitch! Do something besides looking through me like that… please," I’m shaking now, my stubbornness turning into a frantic, jagged desperation. "I betrayed you. I spied on you. I used the only man who ever loved me as a pawn for my father. Why aren't you angry?"
He turns around then. Slowly. His face is no longer a mask. It’s a storm.
“You want angry, Gia?” He walks toward me, his pace predatory, closing the gap until he’s towering over me. The heat radiating off him is suffocating, a physical wall of fury. “You want me to scream? You want me to tell you how it feels to realize the woman I let into my bed and my heart was photographing my life for a man who wants me dead?”
“Yes,” I sob, my hands finding his chest, bunching the fabric of his shirt, feeling the hard muscle beneath. “Anything but this silence.”
