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FOUR
GIANCARLO
Oh shit...
Hiking up to Rebecca before she sat back down with her father, I said, “Walk with me.”
Rolling her eyes, she gripped my arm. “Do I look that shaken up?”
“You look like you need to smile.” I let my hand linger on the small of her back, just touching her did something to me. “Was dancing with Anthony that bad?”
“Does that oily charm work on other women?” She didn’t hesitate from my touch.
“Yes.” I led her to one of the patio doors overlooking the garden perfumed with lilacs and roses. “Did your call go okay?”
“No.” She swallowed and then raised her eyes to me.
The loneliness there rocked me to my core. “Wanna talk about it?”
Shaking her head, she said, “I’ll know more soon.”
“Word is Nate’s not gonna work for your father.” I folded my arms and spoke in a tone to remind her the Byrnes had risen from the ashes to be just as powerful as the Messinas. Something Giovanni obviously overlooked.
“If that’s the word about my brother,” she mumbled, hesitant to open up about the shaky status of her family’s dynasty.
Anger hummed through me. Nate staying in Los Angeles meant if Anthony actually married Rebecca, he’d be next in line to assume control of Domenico Holdings. I shuddered, thinking how the balance of power would shift from that alliance. Or how Anthony running Giovanni’s underground business connections would impact us all. Anthony was a loose cannon with a heart of stone.
Still, jealously stirred my gut picturing him fucking this gorgeous woman in his bed every night.
Who were we kidding? Anthony had separate bedrooms written all over him.
Christ, Rebecca was destined for a life of loneliness. And I just made it worse. I’d watched Bastien stare at her and saw the gut-wrenching emotions play out on his face. He loved Becca. I sensed something snap inside him as he charged for her and Anthony, ready to throw a punch at Messina.
That would fuck up a lot of our business dealings if those two were at each other’s throats any more than they already were.
“Is there anything I can do, Becca?” Take you up to my penthouse apartment and fuck you until we both can’t see straight? I was worse off than Bastien pining for a woman I’d never have.
At least Bastien had the memory of being inside Becca’s wet heat. Man, I bet she was so tight then and now. Since he’d broken up with her, she’d not been touched. As a promised woman, we all knew no one would go near her.
Such a waste.
“There’s nothing anyone can do for me,” she finally answered. She drew a sharp breath watching her father hobble toward us, his guard hovering behind him like he might fall.
“Did you give them our money yet?” Giovanni’s voice made my blood run cold.
I expected to see fury in his eyes for Becca being alone with me. No, the man barely looked my way. He must have had a lot of other things on his mind.
“Yes, Dad. I dropped off the check earlier.”
“Good. I want to leave.”
“I’ll be outside in a minute.”
“Not in a minute. Now, Rebecca.”
I stared the old man down. “Giovanni, she’s a grown woman. Give her some fucking space.”
His beady eyes widened as he opened his mouth to yell, but a painful-sounding cough came out instead.
“Thank you, I’ll be okay.” She held her dress’s skirt and brushed past me. Even in a plain black conservative gown, Becca stunned more than any other woman at this benefit with their plunging necklines, bare backs, and scandalous slits. “Come on, Dad. Let’s get our car and go home.”
Rebecca and her father left the ballroom, and I knew one of my concierge managers in the lobby would make sure they got into their limo. Frustrated as hell, I strutted to the private elevator that went straight up to my penthouse. I lived here at the Warwick while my parents owned the top three floors of a high-priced condo building further up Park Avenue.
Inside my sanctuary, I pulled off my bowtie and had no intention of going back downstairs since Becca had left. I strolled into my office and fired up my computers. The main terminal’s screensaver slowed my roll and choked me up. The picture of my brother Salvatore and me smiling, him in his Navy whites, always made me so proud of him. My brother the SEAL had gone MIA during a mission.
Everything I knew about cyber warfare, I learned from him. Now I was considered to be the best in our world, but I paled in comparison to what my brother could do.
My father sent Salvatore into the military. Free training to be a killer, he’d joked, although I’d always suspected he was deadly serious. I’d hidden in the shadow of my brother my whole life. Expectations for my success were low to near nonexistent. With news that Sal was missing, presumed dead, in a flash, my life had changed.
Since my mother was an only child because my grandmother could not give Angelo Bianco a son, technically, I was it. The sole Bianco heir.
Salvatore had known who’d he be one day. A legacy force Domenico would have to deal with, being both the Boston Byrne heir and the New York Bianco heir. Sal and my mother had plans for a complete re-takeover of New York.
Her dreams died when Salvatore didn’t come home.
I stared at my command center, the automated world I’d built. Tracking. Hacking. Trojan horses and email worms. All humming nicely. Filling my servers with data I used to destroy my enemies. No, I was better than Salvatore. The cyber-world changed while he’d been in the service.
In time, I would show everyone I was the force to be reckoned with.
My mother and brother had planned an extinction-level event, the war to end all wars that would take down Giovanni Domenico. Reclaim the throne.
All I had to do was seduce Rebecca...
