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FORTY-TWO
GIANCARLO
No. No. Fucking No.
He knew. Julian goddamn knew.
The secret I hadn’t told anyone, not even Rebecca.
“That’s quite a leap, Julian.” Rebecca sat in one of the wicker chairs and crossed her legs, looking so fucking regal it made me rock hard.
“Not really.” Julian eyed me, searching to see if I knew what he was about to tell everyone in the room.
The small detail that no one dared to talk about after all these years. Decades, even.
The arrangement that meant I never would have been born.
Who my mother had been promised to before she ran off and married my father.
Philip Russo.
“Shall I tell her?” Julian said, offering me the floor.
I wanted to kill him right here, right now. Making me say the words.
“What’s going on?” Rebecca stood and placed herself between Julian and me.
Bastien straightened, inching toward us like Rebecca wouldn’t be safe if I lunged for Julian. I’d never in a million years hurt Becca.
Becca...
We were in my safehouse because she needed to be protected. And now she slammed us with this shocking move that she was considering giving up ruling Manhattan. How brave of her. It only hit me in this moment, all that she’d gone through to secure her place as queen. Letting me, Bastien, and Messina parade her all over town. Shame her. Ruin her.
Until we all fell in love with her and bent the knee to her.
But we needed this background information about our families out there because we really needed to get on with our lives and that included making sure Rebecca kept breathing.
With dread in my soul, I said, “My mother had been promised to Julian’s father.”
“No shit,” Anthony said, wiping his mouth, his olive skin losing a shade or two.
I couldn’t believe Julian thought a marriage that never happened gave him a legitimate claim. Even if his father was destined to be king because my mother was the princess. My mother, the legitimate heir, chose my father. Gave birth to my brother and me. Full. Stop.
“I always wondered who Angelo Bianco had chosen for your mother, Giancarlo,” Rebecca said and then turned to Julian. “That must have been very hard for your father. Did he love Francesca?”
Julian eyed me. “He never said and I never asked him.” Shifting his weight from side to side he added, “I’m not sure he even loved my mother. She loved him, at least she would have loved the kind of life your mother had, Becca. After my father left her, she dumped me with my grandmother and last I heard she was a waitress in Vegas.”
Clearly that wasn’t a bloodline who deserved elevation to the throne. But I kept that to myself.
