Page 179 of Ruthless Claim

That’s a possibility. And now that I think about it, it was odd that Connor all of a sudden knew exactly how to storm the Santoro estate. But I’m not about to give him that.

“We don’t have proof it’s the Corsicans,” I point out.

Leo shakes his head. “We don’t need proof. It’s obvious it’s them.” He pours himself another finger of whiskey. “The question is—what do we do about it?”

“Who are you asking?” I ask dryly. “Me or Connor? Because Connor wants blood.”

That’s an understatement. My mind drifts back to the phone call I got from Connor soon after we got back to the penthouse. I’d been dreading that call and rightfully so. He had berated me harshly—“You had her. You had her sitting right there and you let her walk out? What the fuck were you thinking, going to a public place with no backup, no exit covered?”—before he hung up, but not before placing the blame squarely on me.

I surface back to the present to see Leo watching me.

“Connor only seems to know violence,” Leo says testily and I know he’s thinking about his brother, the one Connor murdered in cold blood all those years ago.

“Connor’s not wrong in how he talked to me,” I point out, knowing I deserved it. “He was right, which makes it worse.”

“He’s not right about all of it either,” Leo says peevishly.

The fact that Leo Santoro is actually defending me is strange enough that I pinch myself.

Leo turns the glass in his hand, “But Connor’s not the one who almost lost his wife today, even though I still think Connor wouldn’t give a shit if Teresa died.” He looks at me, his gaze serious. “What do you want?”

I pause. What do I want?

I want to find Claire Murphy and make her pay for what she’d done. I want to find whoever hired her and destroy them. I want revenge for the weeks of hell they’d put me and Valentina through.

But more than any of that, I want my wife back. I want to repair the damage I’ve done. I want to rebuild the life we’d been creating before all this happened.

“I want Valentina safe,” I finally say. “Everything else can wait.”

Leo is quiet for a moment, studying me. Then he nods. “You’ve changed.”

I chuckle and set the glass down. “Valentina changed me.”

“Good.” Leo stands up. “I’ll keep investigating. I’m sure Connor will throw resources at it too. But Cillian.” He fixes me with a heavy look. “Focus on your marriage. Focus on your wife and baby. The rest of us will handle the conspiracy.”

I nod. I can do that.

“Good.” Leo picks up the half-empty whiskey bottle. “And get that shoulder looked at. It looks disgusting.”

I bark out a laugh, shaking my head, “Goodnight, Leo. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”

Once Leo leaves, I head toward our bedroom. I open it to find Valentina sitting on the edge of the bed, staring at nothing.

The lamp on her side is on, the light catching the side of her face and the large bump above her temple.

God, I hate seeing it because it reminds me of my own failure. Her hair is still damp from her shower and she’s in her pajamas, but she doesn’t seem to notice I’ve come in.

She doesn’t look sad, she just looks…empty.

“Hey,” I say gently, snapping her out of her thoughts.

“Is she really gone?” she asks. “Really?”

It takes me a moment to figure out who she is, then I nod. It makes sense Valentina wants to be reassured even though we had this conversation earlier. “Yes,” I lean against the doorframe. “She’s really gone.”

Valentina nods, taking in a deep breath, her breasts rising. “We’ll never know for sure, will we? Who hired her? Why they wanted to destroy us.”

“Probably not,” I admit, sitting down next to her on the bed, the mattress dipping beneath my weight. She doesn’t move away and I’m grateful for it.