14. Renzo
I wasn’t surprised that Giulia left after I fucked her. She hadn’t exactly been expecting it. Neither was I.
I got caught in the heat of the moment and it just… happened. But I didn’t regret it. I lay in bed all night wishing she could have stayed, but I understood that she’d had to bolt. To hide. To get over the shock that we’d given in to each other in the most physical sense possible.
The morning after, I met with Gio in his office. Nursing another coffee, waiting for the caffeine to kick in and wake me up all the way, I watched as he tried to finish up with a phone call. Just as I was coming to learn, we were always in high demand. I didn’t think that I had to be on call constantly, but I would figure out a balance. It was early days yet.
I had to get a better grip on my time. Because I would be damned if I'd have another beautiful, sensual woman in my bed and have to be interrupted by a phone call about something that I didn’t really care about.
Luka had wanted to be in control of everything. I wasn’t like that. Delegation was key, and if someone proved themselves untrustworthy without my hovering over them, then they would be dead. Simple as that.
Gio disconnected the call and faced me. Since Luka died, Gio seemed to consider me in a new light. Half the time, he seemed bothered, like he couldn’t believe that his esteemed firstborn was gone. And the other half of the time, he seemed almost amused, as though he doubted I could ever step into my brother’s role or stay on top of as much as I had so far.
“Why did you take off from the club last night?” he asked as a greeting.
After Giulia left, I stayed home and tried to think through what I could do with her now.
She was the reason I’d left the club like I did, then had to deal with damage control for killing those guards. I wouldn’t mention her. I couldn’t. I didn’t return to the club because I hadn’t wanted to.
“We talked about the drug trade,” I replied. And that was expected.
What wasn’t expected was how different Giulia would be now. She was no longer the same. I stole her virginity and I wouldn’t apologize for it, but I had to contend with this deep, burning jealousy and possessiveness that I couldn’t shake.
I’d had her once. And I was now addicted to her, wanting her again.
I was stupid enough to wish I could have her forever.
But I couldn’t tell Gio that, either. It was bad that he somehow knew I’d taken off so abruptly from the club, but there was no way I’d share the whole truth with him.
“Before the conversation came to a close, I got a call about something I had to deal with.”
He nodded. “That’s how this business works. Never a moment of peace.”
That was bullshit. What was the point of having power and wealth if we couldn’t ever stop to enjoy it for a single moment? I felt a unique and deep peace when I came inside Giulia, and I knew that would never happen again.
“Did everything go well with your discussion with Nickolas?” he asked.
“Yeah. It did. It seemed like Luka and Nickolas had smoothed out all the details already.”
“Good.” He folded his hands together on his desk. “I also had a productive conversation with Marcus.”
That had been the plan. I went there to speak with Nickolas while he met with Marcus in another private room.
“About what?”
He stared at me for a long moment. “We discussed Cecilia.”
“Does he know where she is?”
He pursed his lips. “I think he might not. I didn’t come out and ask him that, specifically. We more or less spoke about what should happen to her now.”
I didn’t give a shit about what happened to my sister-in-law. It wasn’t as though I knew her. I’d be damned if they expected me to get involved.
“I proposed a potential situation to him, that she should just marry you now.”
Fuck. So much for not getting involved.
“Me? Why?”
“Marcus remained tight-lipped about where she might be. He wouldn’t directly admit it, but I got the impression that he didn’t know where she was and he wanted her to come home where he could control her. Where he could watch and see what she was up to.”
“And how the fuck would I play into that?”
He narrowed his eyes. “Don’t get that attitude with me.”
“I don’t have an ‘attitude’.” This was simply my blunt and honest reaction. Why me? The thought of marrying that boring, quiet woman seemed like a death sentence.
“Listen here. If I tell you to marry her, you will.”
“Like hell.” I stood, leaving my empty coffee cup on the table. “You actually put this into plans last night with him? Marcus is on board with this?”
He sighed. “No, not yet. Not officially. We were merely discussing ideas.”
“Then I don’t have anything to worry about.”
“Don’t act like you have any control here. Do not even think about having any right to say yes or no to anything I arrange for you.”
“Because it’s just another part of business,” I mocked. “Right?”
“It is. And we would be wise to align with the Romanos. I attempted that with Luka marrying her.”
His phrasing made me pause. “Do you think somebody killed Luka because they wanted an alliance with the Romanos instead of us having one?’
“Marcus spoke about that quite a bit. But he’s a shady asshole who never gives anything away.”
That was the truth. The Romanos were wealthy and had an old influence that couldn’t be contested. But they were sneaky cheats, too.
“I left with the impression that Cecilia won’t let her father know where she is. Marcus brought her up first, almost leaning on the idea of your marrying her to root out whether I knew anything about where she was.”
I wondered if Giulia would know. Isabella had been gossiping at Luka’s funeral.
Maybe I could ask Giulia to listen for more news. She’d report to me. She did willingly of her own accord when she made the connection between how Luka and Rocco died. It was just one of the many things about her that I admired. She could have kept that fact to herself, the similarity of the poisonings, but she’d openly shared it with me.
As soon as this thought about Giulia came, I tried to ignore it. I couldn’t be going on like this, acting like that sassy, smart woman was my ally. My friend.
My partner.
But it was all too easy to see her in that light. She was intelligent. Quick. Observant. If she didn’t know where Cecilia was hiding, she would have ideas about the woman’s motivations.
Why would Cecilia kill Luka, though?
Unless Cecilia was traumatized or too sensitive after losing her husband… Why run away and hide at all?
Luka had been killed at the wedding, and the timing of it stood out to me. Why not kill him before? Or later? I didn’t understand why Luka had been killed when he was.
Maybe the killer could only reach him in that big crowd? It warranted more thought.
If someone wanted to avoid a Bernardi-Romano union, they would’ve had to kill him before they shared their vows. The only likely enemy who’d want to stop the Romanos from aligning with us would have been the Acardis.
Maybe Rocco did kill Luca. And he killed himself afterward from the guilt and to escape justice.
That didn’t seem likely, though.
Could Cecilia have done it?
I considered the possibility of Luka’s timid, short-term wife killing him. Cecilia hadn’t been enthusiastic about marrying him, but no arranged couples were excited about their chosen partners.
Like Giulia. She dreaded the possibility of marrying Nickolas. I hated the thought of his having her too. It killed me that he’d seen her dancing last night. If I had any say in it, that fucker didn’t deserve a second of being in her presence.
Is Cecilia hiding out of guilt? She killed Luca and needs to lie low? But why?
If she hadn’t wanted to marry him, it would’ve made more sense to kill him before the wedding.
As I left the house after my talk with my father, I tried to figure out how I could reach Giulia and speak with her about this. I felt stuck in my head, both with the way she wouldn’t get out of my mind and with all these speculations that led nowhere. She’d have opinions. She’d be able to tell me what she thought of my guesses.
I no longer saw her as my enemy. I couldn’t when I was desperate to check on her and make sure she was all right after last night. She’d been so tight, so young and innocent, and I knew I’d taken her harder than she might have wished for her first time. My efforts were too late. But wasn’t it the thought that counted?
If she wasn’t my enemy, I couldn’t label her as some ordinary easy pussy, either. She wasn’t an average nobody I’d fucked on a whim.
Giulia was coming to be a true friend. Someone I instinctively knew I could count on.
She was…
An equal. A brilliant, brave woman I would be proud to call my own. And once again, I wished I could make that happen, to freely go to her whenever I wanted, for whatever reason.
Or even without one. I wanted access to her for good, for the hell of it. Because when she was near, when she welcomed me to touch her and drive her to the brink of an intense orgasm, I felt more alive than I’d ever been. And when she simply listened to me and shared ideas or intel, I felt like I wasn’t alone or struggling but one half of a true pair where one could always depend on the other.