Page 115 of Cara & Gian: The Guzzi Duet

“Not running, clearly. I made food. I want to fucking eat it, if you don’t mind.”

Gian’s jaw clenched. “And then what? Because Chicago is non-negotiable, Cara.”

She ignored him, grabbing a steak knife to cut into the slab of meat on her plate.

“You’re going to be on that flight tomorrow,” he said when she stayed quiet.

“Will you shut the fuck up and eat?”

Gian yanked the chair out from the table with more force than was necessary. The two of them ate like that, both irritated and angry with the other, silent and stewing in their frustrations. Cara barely looked at Gian, and she could feel his damn eyes burning into her.

She hated that he had been right. She understood shit was bad in Toronto right now for him and the Guzzi family as a whole. He had been going non-stop for days, on the phone, out of the penthouse, and then back at odd hours. She overheard some of his phone calls, though she knew better than to eavesdrop.

Shit was going down.

Or it was about to be going that way fast.

Gian was trying to prepare as best he could for it.

Cara was likely one of those things, but he was so fucking right. It was not that he was sending her away, but where he was sending her away to. It was Chicago, and all the hell and pain that was about to accompany her on a long trip down a memory lane she didn’t want to walk through.

Certainly not alone, anyhow.

And fuck him for knowing it would hurt her, and doing it anyway.

Fuck him for that.

It was only after they had finished the food, after she had cleared the table, that the yelling really got started between them. She had never fought with Gian, certainly not with raised voices and something to actually shout about. Not for something she was truly angry with him over.

This was not the same.

It was the first time Cara yelled in a long fucking time.

She raged.

She was pissed.

Gian let her.

She had the distinct feeling he did that because regardless of how much she screamed, fought, swore at him, and said no, she was still going.

And it was going to hurt.

A lot.