1
WOLFE
She cried on and off during the drive. Sometimes she would be silent with her arms crossed over her chest, and then at other moments, her head would rest against the window and she would cry as quietly as possible, like she didn’t want me to hear. The blood had dried on her skin and clothing, and she smelled like vomit because either she’d hurled or someone else had.
I didn’t notice the smell as much as I normally would have, not when my adrenaline was still through the roof. Two different instincts gnawed at me. The first was to drive to the vineyard and annihilate everyone who was there. And the other was to care for Francesca.
Francesca was obviously the priority.
My hand remained on her thigh, but I didn’t caress her gently like I normally would. I didn’t comfort her with words. My vision was tinted red, and I was just fucking mad. Mad that someone had touched her. Mad that her brother was so fucking stupid. Mad that Don Mancini was dead, a man I didn’t necessarily like but always respected.
He didn’t deserve to die like that.
My woman didn’t deserve to lose her father right in front of her eyes.
It was normally an hour-and-a-half drive, but I got there in fifty minutes, breaking the speed limit and navigating between cars and traffic to get there as fast as possible, to put as much distance between us and Warren’s crew so we wouldn’t be followed. After he ransacked my house in Caltanissetta and found I wasn’t there, he would check Palermo next, but finding me in a big city like this would be a challenge.
I pulled onto my property and parked the Range Rover in the small parking garage underground. It could only fit two cars. The place had cost me almost thirty million because of its proximity to the sea, but it felt cramped compared to the other homes I had.
After I parked the car, she continued to lean against the window like she couldn’t move.
She was fucking devastated. Her eyes were open and emotionless, like her tear ducts had run dry.
It was one of those situations where there was literally nothing I could say to make it better. I could relate to her because I’d watched my own father die, but that would only make her feel worse, not better. I could get angry and vent and seethe, but that wasn’t helpful. I could only offer one thing—revenge. “I’ll make them pay for this, Francesca. All of them. Every single last one—especially Leo.”
She continued to stare out the window at the concrete wall of the garage.
“I can’t believe he’s gone.” Her eyes started to water again, but she blinked back the tears. “All this time, he thought it was you…because Leo wanted him to believe that. Kept whispering in his ear, I’m sure. Undermined my personal relationship with you for his own gain. It’s unforgivable.”
Absolutely fucking unforgivable.
“I just… I don’t know how to process this.”
I knew exactly what she’d seen because I’d seen something similar myself. “It’ll take your entire life to process it.”
The tears welled up in her eyes until they formed drops and streaked down her cheeks. “When Warren shot up my house, Leo cried. He held me and literally cried. How…how can he do that and then, just a few weeks later, stab me in the back?”
It took me a second to figure that out. “That probably wasn’t in the plan.”
“If he’d just told me I better step aside or there would be hell to pay, I would have just…” Her voice cracked. “I would have just given him the damn thing.” She started to cry again, her little body trembling from the weight of guilt that she shouldn’t carry.
I didn’t want to continue this conversation in the car where I couldn’t hold her, where only my hand could reach her. “Let’s get inside and get you cleaned up.”
As if she’d forgotten how she looked, she dropped her chin, looking at all the blood and vomit that had soaked into her hair and clothing. She touched her shirt with her fingertips then stared at the blood on her hands. “I—I threw up. They shot him in the head, and I threw up.”
“A common reaction.”
“Have you ever done that?” She continued to stare out the window.
I gave a nod that she couldn’t see. “Yeah, when my mom was shot right in front of me.”
Her eyes started to water again. “I hate that we have this in common.”
I gave her thigh a gentle squeeze. “Come on, baby.”
We left the Range Rover and headed inside. The house was full of light because the sun didn’t set until eight in the evening in the summer. Francesca moved slowly, at a snail’s pace, and it took her a while to get to the top floor. Instead of dropping all her clothes and getting into the shower, she headed into the kitchen to pour a glass of water. She drank the entire thing in one go before she left the empty glass on the counter.
I turned on the water in the shower to let it warm up and helped her take off her clothes, shoving them into a trash bag since they were ruined. I ushered her into the shower, and the second she was under the water, she crossed her arms over her chest and stared at the walls.
