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Antonio narrows his eyes at the screens, always in his element when he has multiple monitors to examine. “Could be. Let’s head there, but I’ll keep an eye on her tracker to see if it changes course. Domani, take a left up here and hit the freeway. I was right; we might beat them there if we hurry.”
I take my phone back and text Brunello the address we are moving towards. Once he retrieves the thumb drive from the location Lance sent us, he will meet us there. If my woman is in danger, I want all four of us there to enact a reckoning.
Domani taps his finger to the steering wheel. “The city the thumb drive is in is almost half an hour away from where that address is.”
Antonio nods. “Then I think we’re headed to the right spot. Lance wants us far from him so he can have an uninterrupted reunion with Melissa.”
My stomach lurches. “I’m going to be sick. Don’t talk like that.”
Antonio grimaces. “Sorry. I wasn’t thinking.” He shakes his head. “First Brunello, and now you, Giovanni? The Moretti men are dropping like flies at the feet of these women. So much for Rule Number Three.”
I don’t care about Antonio’s commentary on my life. I want out of here. I can’t breathe, thinking of what Lance might want to do once he gets his hands on my girlfriend.
My girlfriend.That sure sneaked up on me.
“Faster, Domani.”
My brother steps on the gas, bringing us that much closer to Melissa.
12
“Fuck!” isn’t something you want to hear from your brother who is watching the tracker like a hawk. When Antonio peels his gaze from the phone and slides his focus to me, his neck shrinks. “Oops?”
My stomach hollows. “What happened?”
“Melissa’s tracker isn’t putting out a signal.”
“Are you joking? Why isn’t it giving a signal? What happened?” I grab Antonio’s phone to verify that the lone red dot connecting me to my woman is now gone. “Fix it, Antonio!”
My techie brother devolves into a stream of cussing, enough to make even the stoic Domani turn his head. “Is she dead?” he asks Antonio, carving out a gaping hole in my chest.
Antonio shakes his head. “That’s not what this means. It would still transmit from a dead body, no problem. It might mean that the device failed, which is a real possibility. That’s why I don’t use this particular model. Or it could mean that Lance found the tracker on her jeans and destroyed it.” He nods toward the steering wheel. “Gio’s right; you need to step on it.”
“Same destination?”
“It’s the only one we’ve got.”
I sit back in my seat. My chest is tight and my breath too shallow for comfort. “I said this was a bad idea. I told each one of you not to let her do this. No one listened to me, and now we may have lost the only woman I’ve ever…” There’s no point in finishing that sentence.
Dom drives faster than the car can safely take it without wearing out the engine. He doesn’t bother making a sneaky entrance when we arrive, either.
“There!” I shout, lurching forward with my hand pointing at a run-down shack of a house with the cab pulling up to it and stopping at the driveway.
Domani screeches the tires as he throws the car into park, jolting my body so hard that I nearly knock my head into the window.
Antonio shoves me back and throws his door open. He’s not the muscle of the group. He’s not the enforcer. He’s not the head of the family. He’s the pale genius who gets geeked out about hard drives and hacking into who knows what. While he can hold his own in a fight, this sort of thing is what Domani, Brunello and I were made for.
But Lance was on Antonio’s team. Antonio brought Lance into the family, trusting him with passwords and enough damning evidence to sink our organization. For Antonio, this isn’t about the excitement over pulling his gun in broad daylight; this is about cleaning up his mess.
Domani is equally motivated to protect our family. He attaches to so few people, but when he does, he can be a right monster if someone comes against them. Watching him interact with Melissa, I know that he is not about to lose another sister. He’s never forgiven himself for being on the watch when the Torros stole our baby sister from the house, then murdered her in cold blood to teach my father a lesson.
But when I emerge from the car, there is no way I am going to let either of my brothers deliver the first shot.
My Melissa is smart. She doesn’t get out of the cab but stays tucked inside so Antonio doesn’t hit her with his first shot aimed at Lance, who dashes toward the cab from his shithole of a house.
“He’s mine!” I warn Antonio, but I can tell my brother doesn’t care about pecking order, or whose vendetta is stronger. He fires off a second shot but misses his target.
Lance rips my woman out of the cab seconds before the driver speeds off with eyes wide, no doubt grateful to be fleeing the scene where three Moretti brothers descend on a house with weapons drawn.
