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“Gian doesn’t want me to tell you,” she said with a heavy sigh. “Mil, I’m so sorry I haven’t called before now. Things have been kind of crazy. Yesterday, we went into town, and I had another ultrasound. Both babies are doing really well, and then I had a dizzy spell. Again. I see what you were talking about before. It’s scary as hell. Gian wouldn’t let me out of bed all day. But when I woke up this morning, I told him he either got me a phone to call you, or I was locking him out of the bedroom.”
“Just tell me where you are, Monroe!” I heard the sound of running feet and looked up as Barrick and Lyric came down the stairs. Even as he came into the room, Barrick made a motion, telling me to keep her talking. “Mon, there’s something I have to tell you. Lyric’s cousins have been looking into Gian, trying to find you. They found out some serious, OMG shit.”
“Like what?” she asked, sounding distracted.
“Like the fact that he’s not Enzo Fontana’s biological son,” I told her while Barrick put something on my phone and then started pressing buttons on his own.
“What?” she shouted in shock. “How do you know that?”
“It’s complicated. And I’m sure whatever Barrick and Braxton did to get the information wasn’t exactly legal. But before Enzo died, he’d had a DNA test done. From what the lab said, no one ever contacted them for the results.”
There was a loud noise on Monroe’s end, like something crashing against a wall or the floor, followed by glass breaking. “Mon!” I yelled when she remained quiet. “Mon? Talk to me!”
But there was no answer, and then I heard a male shouting and cursing in Italian, followed by a loud, clomping sound, like running feet, before the phone went silent.
“No!” I cried. Tears burning my eyes, I tried to call her back. “Answer, damn it. Monroe, please answer.” The phone rang and rang, but there was no answer.
With a sob, I tossed the phone on the couch beside me. “I think she fell.”
Lyric wrapped his arms around me and pulled me onto his lap as he sat beside me. “She will be okay, baby,” he tried to reassure me.
“Good news,” Barrick said as he looked down grimly at his phone’s screen. “I got her location.”
Chapter 19
Gian
I took Monroe’s threat to lock me out of our room seriously and finally gave her a phone so she could call her sister. As much as I dreaded Mila trying to convince Monroe to leave me and come home, I knew I wouldn’t ever let that happen.
But I didn’t go far after I promised her some privacy. I closed the door behind me and then walked a few feet from our bedroom, but that was all the space I was willing to give her.
Minutes passed, and I started pacing, silently praying that she didn’t want to leave me after she spoke to her family.
“What?” I heard her cry out suddenly.
There was distress in her voice, and I took off running. But before I even got to the door, I heard a loud crash. When I opened the door, my heart stopped.
I’d left Mila sitting in a chair by the window, had made her promise she wouldn’t get up unless I was there to help her. She’d had several dizzy spells over the last few days, and she’d scared the hell out of me every time.
She must have gotten up too quickly and fallen, because she was lying facedown on the floor. The small table where she’d placed the mug of herbal tea Mrs. Borsa brought her earlier was broken beside her, alongside the cell phone I’d given her to call her sister.
Cursing, I rushed to her. “Monroe.” I turned her over carefully. There was a huge knot already forming on the side of her head. I pushed her hair back from her face, careful not to touch the painful-looking bruise that was starting to discolor her skin. “Precious, wake up.”
She didn’t even flinch when I lightly tapped her cheek. “Please, open your eyes,” I begged her in a choked voice.
Holding her against my chest, I grabbed the phone on the floor and called Ugo. No sooner had he answered than I was yelling for him to get Khan up to my room. With a shaking hand, I felt for a pulse and released the breath I was holding when I felt it beating rapidly. Her chest lifted and fell steadily.
I heard running feet and looked up as Ugo and Dr. Khan rushed into the room.
Khan ran over to us and dropped to his knees beside me. “What happened?”
I shook my head. “She must have stood too quickly. I heard the crash and found her facedown on the floor.”
He pulled a penlight from his pocket and lifted each of her eyelids, shining the light into her eyes.
Monroe moaned and then swatted weakly at his hand. “Stop,” she whined, but he continued to shine his light on her. “Gian, make him stop.”
I shoved the man away from her with one arm before standing with her in my arms. Careful of the mess on the floor, I carried her to the bed and placed her head carefully on the pillows.
