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I’m seconds from slitting his throat when my phone vibrates in my pocket. Stepping away, I check the caller I.D. to see Marco’s name flash across the screen, and my stomach drops. There’s only one reason he’d be disturbing meright now.
“What is it?” I cut tothe chase.
“Padrone, she’s gone!” Marco huffs breathlessly.
My vision goes red, and my need to kill is like a hit of cocaine in my bloodstream. “What do you mean ‘she’s gone!’”
“There was a fire,Signore. We escorted both women from the apartment but lost her in the rush of the crowd. We’ve been searching the area for over an hour, and there’s no sign of her. ButSignore…” Marco trails off, and my patience has cometo an end.
“Speak!” I command with a tremble of rage in my voice. At least I tell myself it’s rage and not panic or worse… Fear.
“When we got the all-clear to go back into the apartment, they told us that the cause of the fire was intentional. Someone lit dish rags on fire in the sink, and Camil was asleep at the time, so that only leavesSignorinaWhite.”
Silence echoes around the room louder than any gunshot or scream of torture as I take in Marco’s words.
Intentional.
The word holds a powerful punch and one that lands hard and brutal on my chest. “You’re sure she wasn’t taken?” I choke out, but I already know the answer.
“There was no one else in the apartment,Signore. Camil said she came out and found Greta standing by your bedroom door. We escorted them through the stairwell and got separated by the crowd. She didn’t even try to respond when I called for her in the crowd.”
She ran.
The part of me that has come to care for Greta is relieved that she wasn’t taken while the beast inside me beats its chest and howls inbetrayal.
She left me.Betrayed me.
I give her a piece of me I’ve never given anyone else, and she spits on it like it’s nothing, a piece of filth on the bottom ofher shoe.
“I want every man we have on the streets searching for her! Now. I’ll be at the penthouse shortly, and I want an update,” I order before disconnecting and heading for the basement stairs. “Have Matteo stay with him. You two are coming back to the penthouse with me,” I tell Lorenzo and Boian. Both nod and follow me to the waiting SUV, where Alto sits waiting for us. The second my car door is shut, I order Alto to take us to the penthouse, and the look of murder in my eyes has the SUV squealing out of the parking lot as Alto stomps on the gas.
I burst through the penthouse doors to the acrid smell of smoke. Marco stands in the foyer, back ramrod straight, hands behind his back. He knows what’s coming, so when my fist lands hard on his jaw, he doesn’t try toblock it.
My hand goes around his throat, and his back hits the wall. But it’s still not enough, so I jerk him forward and slam him against the stone wall again. His head makes a loudthunksound. Still, he barely lets out a grunt of pain. “You were to watch over them both, and you will be punished for your failure,” I growl inhis face.
“Sì, Signore,” he chokes around my crushing hold. I release him from my grip, and he gasps, then straightens and schools hisfeatures.
“Where’s Camil?” I ask.
“She was given a sedative and sleeping comfortably in her room. Victor has the camera feed readyfor you.”
Without another word, I head to my office, where Victor stands with his laptop on the now-righted desk, ready for me to watch the feedback. I sit at my desk and hit the space bar to bring the feed to life. I watch as Lorenzo, Boian, and I stand and study the information they brought me, then the moment I find out the disgusting truth about my father. The desk goes flying, and we all stomp fromthe room.
For minutes, nothing happens. Then I see her. Greta sticks her head in through the cracked door––the fucking door I forgot to shut and lock in my rage. Her eyes take in the mess, then she steps inside and begins to clean up, first grabbing my useless laptop from the floor and placing it on the chair, then gathers the papers off the floor, and I don’t need to watch to know what happens next. Still, my eyes remain glued to the feedback. She drops the other papers but keeps the ledger in her hands. The ledger with my name and family crest on it. The ledger with my forged initials next to the date of sale of women and children. I see the moment Greta figures out what she’s seeing. How she deciphered it, I donot know.
Greta shakes her head, and the paper quakes in her hand as she visibly trembles. “No, no, no, no. Emil, please no,” she pleas with a sob, and my chest splits open, my heart ripped out.
I’m close to launching the laptop across the room when Greta turns the paper over and studies something on the back before dropping it and bolting from my office. I stand swiftly and take in the papers still littering the floor. When I find what I’m looking for, I round the desk and sweep up the paper Greta dropped. Turning it over, I see what sent her running.
Greta White - €2,000,000 - USA – 01/ 01/ 2021
“Son of a bitch!” I roar and pummel my fist into the wall. My knuckles split, and blood paints the wall as I keeppunching.
“Emil!” Lorenzo shouts, but I ignore him and keep throwing punishing blows. But I can’t decide who I want to punish more: myself for being so careless or Greta for believing I was capable of such monstrosities?
Perhaps both.
“Calvano, enough!” Boian booms and has me in a triangle hold seconds later. I deliver an elbow to his gut, and when his hold loosens, I twist around and deliver a punch to his jaw. The big bastard barely flinches, then wipes the blood from his lip. “Areyou done?”
