Chapter 8
Lorenzo
“We have eyes on her. She was out eating at a trendy place.”
I grip the phone so tightly I’m surprised it doesn’t crack in my hand.
“You’re sure?”
“It’s her, Boss. And she was with Il Macellaio.” A beat of hesitation. “She looked… happy.”
The word hits me like a blade between the ribs.
Happy.
I’ve been looking for Elizabeth for nearly four months. Four months of dead ends, lies, and men too stupid or too scared to tell me what I wanted to know. And all this time, she’s been with him.
A cold, murderous calm settles over me.
Someone is going to die.
Russo’s name rises first in my mind. He’ll make a fine beginning—but not until I get answers. I want to know how. How in the fuck did Il Macellaio manage to pull this off right under my nose?
A knock sounds at the door.
I drag in a slow breath and say into the phone, “Anything else?”
“Yes… they left together.”
“Keep watching. The second anything changes, you call me.”
“Yes, Boss.”
I end the call and turn as Cesaro steps into the room. “Yes?”
“Mrs. Conti is asking for you.”
The title slices through me.
Mrs. Conti.
Jesus Christ. Every time I hear Fran called that, something black and rotten twists deeper inside my chest. That name was supposed to belong to Elizabeth. My sweet Elizabeth.
Elizabeth, who now seems to be warming another man’s bed.
“Boss?”
I rise from behind the desk, already reaching for my coat. “I’m leaving town for a few days.”
“Boss, I really—”
He doesn’t get to finish.
One second he’s standing in the doorway, and the next I have him slammed against the wall, my hand fisted in the front of his shirt as his head cracks back against the plaster. Fear flashes across his face.
“Your job,” I say, my voice low and lethal, “is to do as I say. Is it not?”
His throat bobs. “Yes, Boss.”
“Then make sure my wife knows I’ll be gone for a few fucking days.”
I shove him away and turn toward the door, but the idiot finds the courage to speak again.
“She’s not doing well, sir.” His voice is tight, careful. “And if you have any decency, you’ll tell her yourself.”
I stop. Slowly, I look back at him. For a second, the room goes dead quiet.
Cesaro pales like he’s only now realizing exactly what he said and who he said it to. Smart man. Too late, but smart.
“Decency,” I repeat, the word sounding foreign in my mouth. “Is that what you think this house runs on?”
“No, Boss, I just—”
“You just what?”
He swallows hard. “She’s been asking for you all day.”
I stare at him, anger still prowling beneath my skin, hot and wild and looking for somewhere to land. Four months. Four fucking months of searching for Elizabeth, and now that I finally have something real, I’m supposed to stop and play the attentive husband to a woman I never wanted?
My jaw clenches.
But Fran is still my wife. On paper. In the eyes of God, the law, and every asshole watching my moves for weakness. And weakness is expensive.
I brush imaginary dust from my cuff and straighten it. “Where is she?”
“In her sitting room.”
I walk past him without another word, and this time he has the good sense not to follow too closely.
The halls of the house feel suffocating tonight. By the time I reach Fran’s sitting room, I’ve forced the worst of my rage back under control. Not because I’m calm. Because rage is only useful when it’s aimed properly.
I knock once and step inside without waiting.
Fran is seated by the window, a blanket draped over her legs despite the warmth of the room. She turns at the sound of the door, and for one fleeting second her face lights with hope.
It dies the second she sees me.
I know that look. She was hoping for someone else. Her mother, maybe. A friend. Anyone but the husband who treats her like an obligation.
“Lorenzo,” she says softly.
I close the door behind me. “Cesaro said you were asking for me.”
She studies me for a moment, taking in the coat in my hand, the tension in my shoulders, and the fact that I’m clearly on my way out. Her mouth curves, but there’s no humor in it.
“You’re leaving.”
It isn’t a question.
“For a few days.”
She looks down at her hands, turning her wedding ring slowly around her finger. “Do I get to know why?”
“No.”
The answer comes sharp and automatic.
She nods once like she expected nothing else. “Of course.”
Guilt should feel sharper than this. It doesn’t. Not tonight. Tonight there’s only Elizabeth in my head, Elizabeth in Bari, Elizabeth with Russo, Elizabeth happy.
Happy.
The thought makes my blood turn poisonous all over again.
Fran lifts her eyes back to mine. “Will it be dangerous?”
I almost laugh.
“Yes.”
She exhales and leans back against the chair, looking suddenly exhausted. “Then I suppose this is the part where I ask you to be careful.”
“And do you mean it?”
Her gaze doesn’t waver. “Would it matter, Lorenzo?”
The words should sting. Instead, they settle somewhere low in my chest like a quiet verdict.
She’s right. It doesn’t matter.
“Get some rest,” I say.
A faint crease forms between her brows. “That’s all?”
I glance at the door, already feeling my patience fray. “What exactly would you like from me, Fran?”
She flinches.
“I don’t know,” she whispers. “A lie, maybe. Something pretty enough to make being trapped here feel less like punishment.”
For a moment, I just look at her.
She’s paler than she was a month ago. Smaller somehow even though her stomach grows every day. There are shadows under her eyes that no amount of money or medicine has managed to fix. But to suggest that she is trapped here when she was the one who pushed the wedding is laughable.
“You have free will. Use it. Because you’re certainly not trapped. And, if you feel that way, perhaps we can get you your own place.”
Her eyes widen. “My own place? Lorenzo, no. People would talk.”
“Fuck people. You’re clearly unhappy. If living away from me will change that, then so be it.”
Her eyes fill with unshed tears. “You have no idea what will make me happy, do you?” She shakes her head. “Go.”
I don’t wait to be told twice.
Cesaro is waiting near the elevator, tense and silent.
“The car,” I say.
“It’s ready.”
“Good.”
He hesitates. “Do you want me to come with you?”
“No. You stay and make sure Fran is okay. Help her find an apartment if she asks.”
“An apartment?”
I don’t explain anything to him. Instead, I step onto the elevator, my mind racing. Russo may have hidden Elizabeth and fed her lies. He may have even convinced her she’s safe.
But I’m coming.
And when I get to Bari, one way or another, Elizabeth is going to remember exactly who she belongs to.
Ten hours later, I’m in Naples, Italy—close enough to move when I need to but far enough that Dante Russo doesn’t know I’m here.
That was the point.
Russo controls Bari. Naples gives me shadows to work from.
My men are waiting for me the second I step into the hotel suite, and one look at their faces is enough to tell me whatever they’ve learned isn’t good.
I drop my bag by the door. “What is it?”
The room goes still.
Then one of them says, “Sir… she’s engaged.”
For a second, I feel the ground shift beneath me and then everything in me locks.
“Say that again.”
His throat bobs before he forces the words out. “Miss Miller is engaged to Russo.” He lifts his phone with a careful hand, like he knows I might break more than the device. “It was announced today. The wedding is in two weeks.”
I snatch the phone from him.
There it is. A formal announcement dressed up like celebration, like this is something holy instead of a declaration of war.
In the photo, he’d holding her hand showing off an engagement ring.
I notice the name she’s going by. Juliette.
Is that why I couldn’t find her? Because he helped her get a new identity.
My vision blurs at the edges.
Engaged.
Elizabeth is engaged to Dante fucking Russo.
A violent, black rage tears through me so fast it nearly splits me open. I’ve crossed an ocean for her. Burned through men, money, and blood trying to find her. And now I find out she isn’t hiding.
She’s wearing another man’s ring.
I stare at the screen until my reflection fractures in the glass.
Two weeks.
In two weeks, Russo plans to put my woman on his arm and make the whole world watch while he gives her his name.
The phone cracks in my grip, but no one in the room says a word. Good. Because if someone speaks right now, I may kill him just to hear something else break.
“Find out everything about the wedding.”
My man hesitates. “Sir?”
I lift my gaze, and whatever he sees in my face wipes the question right out of him.
“You heard me. Date. Time. Location. Guest list. Security. Florist, priest, caterer—I want every last detail dragged into the light and laid at my feet. I want to know what song will be playing when she walks down the aisle. I want to know what color dress she’ll be wearing when she stands beside him and lets him put his ring on her finger. ”
Because that is not going to happen.
Not while I’m still breathing.
My jaw locks so hard it aches. Across from me, my men stay perfectly still, waiting for the rest.
And there is more. So much more. Because this isn’t just some engagement announcement. It’s a message. Russo is planting his flag. Telling the world Elizabeth belongs to him now. Telling every family with eyes and ears that he took what was mine and plans to make it permanent.
A muscle jumps in my cheek. He thinks a ring and a ceremony and two weeks of planning will be enough to keep me out.
He doesn’t know me at all.
“Sir,” one of my men says carefully, “if Russo announced it publicly, the security will be heavy.”
I turn to him slowly. “Then they’ll have witnesses.”
He goes pale and wisely says nothing else.
I walk to the window and stare out over Naples, the city glowing beyond the glass, all heat and gold and old stone. Somewhere south of here, Elizabeth is celebrating her engagement to another man.
I try to picture it.
Her smiling.