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He’d found something out. Something important. Otherwise why would he want to call her parents personally? Why would he be so determined to speak to them, introduce himself, meet them personally?
Instinct and self-preservation told her that this wasn’t a courtesy call. This phone call had nothing to do with playing the gracious bridegroom. He was cementing his power.
He was ensuring security.
He was going after the truth. And he was going after the truth because he didn’t trust her.
Smart man, she thought, swallowing around the lump in her throat.
Blinking back hot tears, she stared blindly out the car onto the fields dotted with stone walls as they drove the rest of the distance in agonizing silence.
Pulling up before the castle, Vittorio shifted into Park even as Jillian was throwing open the car door and jumping out. “You’re down to forty minutes, Jill. You have forty minutes to decide what you want to do. I’ll be in the library waiting for you.”
“I’ve nothing to tell you!”
“That’s a shame. Because you have so much to lose.”
Jillian turned and ran up the steps into the house, and didn’t stop running until she’d reached the nursery where Joe was sleeping.
Maria put a finger to her lips when Jillian burst into the room. The shades were down, darkening the room and Jillian nodded as she continued to the crib. She had to see Joe, had to see him as only then could she believe everything would be okay.
Jillian stared down at him, taking in his flushed cheeks and his rosy lips. He’d never looked more angelic. “Did he have a good day?” she whispered to Maria.
“Yes. He played and played and he ate a lot and we also went for walks.”
Jillian’s chest squeezed. She longed to reach out and touch him but she didn’t dare wake him. Instead she smiled at Maria and went to her room, where she changed from her navy striped top and slacks into a simple white linen dress. She ran a comb through her hair and then turned away from the mirror. Don’t be scared, she told herself, heading for the stairs.
Reaching the library on the second floor, Jillian wiped her now damp palms on the sides of her dress before opening the library door. “What do you want to know?” she asked.
“Everything,” he said as she stepped into the room.
She closed the door behind her before approaching his desk where he’d been typing something on his laptop computer. “But you know everything.”
“Do I, Jill?”
“Yes. I have no secrets. My dad’s a jerk. My mom’s weak. My sister’s dead. What else is there?”
“Then who, cara, is Anne? And Carol? And Lee?” He caught her expression and smiled grimly. “Yes, my wife of many identities. Who are you really?”
“How long have you known about the different identities?”
“Since yesterday. But I had suspicions before.”
She nodded. “Then you know everything…”
“I don’t know why, and I don’t know who you were before you went into the government’s witness protection program, but I have my suspicions.”
Jillian startled and he nodded. “I’d wager this castle that your father is linked to organized crime,” Vitt continued, “and I’d bet my Lancia that he’s a mob boss from Detroit, a man who confessed everything he knew to the FBI to save himself from going to prison.”
He smiled and gestured to the phone. “Now I just need you to confirm it for me.”
She swayed on her feet. “I can’t, Vitt.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Both.”
“Then I will, and once I call them, and let them know you’re here with me, I’m confident they’ll tell me what I need to know—”
