Chapter Twelve #3
He had probably seen Sean’s truck, and now he was going to lose his shit.
Gabriel sighed, and pulled his apron off. So much for a really good day.
By the time he made it around the truck to stand face to face with Luca, it was clear that he had already lost his shit.
His jaw was tight, his arms crossed over his chest, wearing one of those ridiculously tight t-shirts that showed off the biceps and pectorals that he’d worked so hard for.
Personally, Gabriel thought he looked stupid, showing off like that, but that was Luca for you.
Always in your face. Never surrendering.
Gabriel had told Sean that he’d left Napa and the family businesses because it had felt like he was lost in the midst of so many people who all wanted to tell him what he should do, but mostly, he’d left because of Luca.
Luca didn’t want to just interfere in that friendly, familial way that so many of his brothers and sisters and various family members did. He wanted to tell Gabriel what to do, and exactly how to do it.
“Gabriel,” Luca said, inclining his head a fraction.
A hug was out of the question; they were much more likely to start brawling than embracing.
Gabe wasn’t proud of how bad the relationship with his brother had gotten, but he also refused to take any responsibility for it.
If Luca wanted them to be friends, then he’d need to be a lot less Luca-like.
It seemed, from the way he’d shown up today, without announcing he was coming, that kind of change was not forthcoming.
“Luca,” Gabe responded tightly. “I didn’t know you were coming.”
“I wanted to surprise you,” Luca said.
Except they both knew that Luca showing up, out of the blue, was hardly a good surprise. It was much more likely that he’d decided not to tell Gabriel because he hadn’t wanted to be talked out of coming.
“We’re busy this week,” Gabe said, which was not a lie, because they were busy every week.
“I’m only here for the day,” Luca said. “And I’m glad I came, because this”—he thrust out a hand, gesturing in the direction of Sean’s truck—“is what I’ve found.”
Gabriel did not even try to explain, because the explanation wasn’t something that Luca would ever accept.
Luca had come out on his eighteenth birthday, almost belligerently, like he’d halfway expected the family to kick him out, even though he’d spent the prior eighteen years being an absolutely model Italian son.
But even after that, Gabe had never heard even a whiff of him dating anyone.
Luca was too contained to fall in love. He would drive whoever he fell in love with absolutely insane within the first week.
And none of that would even matter anyway, because Luca would never make time for a relationship in the first place. He’d dedicated his whole life to running the family restaurants. He worked from dawn to midnight, nearly every day, without a single complaint, acting like that was normal.
Gabe knew he could never comprehend him putting business aside, or not changing the name because he’d been afraid of losing Sean.
“You’re not even going to try to explain this?” Luca challenged, the edge of his steely tone growing impossibly harder. “I cannot believe you have let this go, for at least six months.”
“Two years,” Gabriel said, because the problem was that he’d always enjoyed waving the red flag in front of Luca’s face.
Maybe that might be why they didn’t get along.
That was definitely why Ren had seen his brother and then run.
He’d grown up with them; he knew the kind of damage they inflicted on each other.
“Two years?” Luca stared at him in disbelief. “Are you insane?”
“It’s not a big deal,” Gabriel said, even though it was impossible now to downplay it. It had been impossible from the moment Luca had spotted Sean’s truck. “We’re working it out.”
“That was what he said,” Luca said. “But I couldn’t believe you would be that stupid to not immediately take action to deal with the situation. To deal with him.”
“I did take action. I threw a meatball at him.”
Luca stared at him, unbelievably stunned into at least a momentary silence. “You threw a meatball at him. What are you? Ten years old? This is a business, Gabriel, which I have tried very hard to remind you of, over and over again. You have to take it seriously. Morettis don’t play around.”
Whenever Luca said that—and he said it often—Gabriel wanted to punch him in the face.
They were not all the same. Just because they had the same last name did not make them identical.
He was not, thank God, the same as Luca.
Every single time Luca assumed he was, he wanted to kill his older brother slowly.
Painfully. Or maybe just so spectacularly that Luca never made the same mistake again.
“I wasn’t playing around,” Gabriel said, hating the defensive tone he heard in his own voice. “I was serious. I took it seriously. I even came up with a new name. Registered it and everything. But it’s complicated. I couldn’t just . . . I couldn’t just do it, not like that.”
“Not like what?” Luca said in a hard voice. “Not like the smart, intelligent businessman I know you’re capable of being?”
It hurt. It always hurt. The biggest reason that Gabriel had left Napa was that there was never any wiggle room. You were either a clone of Luca—and his brother Marco was on his way there—or you were nothing.
Gabriel had been so sick of being nothing.
But even being nothing didn’t hurt as much as Sean’s voice, breaking through the red haze in his head. “You had a new name?”
Gabriel looked up and wanted to punch his brother more than he’d ever wanted to in his whole life. Because the betrayal on Sean’s face cut deep. “You had a new name,” he repeated, “and you didn’t bother changing it? Not all this time?”
It was the last thing that Gabe had ever wanted Sean to find out. That he could have circumvented this whole problem, almost from the very beginning.
But without the problem, he’d always reasoned, what purpose would there be for Sean to talk to him?
To bicker with him? They’d go back to being passing acquaintances, and Gabriel had never known how to face that.
Which was why, instead of doing something about it, he’d let the situation fester for so long.
Why the paperwork had sat, unused, in his desk drawer.
“I . . .” Gabriel didn’t know what to say. How to say it. He’d imagined this going so differently. He’d imagined telling Sean that he loved him, that he wanted to be with him, and that, hey, by the way, on a completely unrelated note, he’d decided to rebrand his own truck.
But now Sean was staring at him, anger blooming in his expression, and Luca was staring aghast at both of them.
It was terrible.
“I was right all along,” Sean said unsteadily, “you were just . . . you’re just the selfish asshole I always thought you were.” He turned and stalked off, almost certainly satisfied that his parting bomb had hit Gabriel with as much destructive force as possible.
Because Sean knew him now, and he had to know that the thing he dreaded most, the person he tried so hard not to be, was the selfish asshole. Was Luca.
“Good,” Luca said, straightening. “Then you will change your name and put all this behind you.”
Gabriel just gaped at him. “No,” he said. “This conversation is over. I don’t care where you came from, hell maybe, but I’m done talking to you about this.”
Luca’s brow furrowed. “What? You can’t . . .”
“I can.” Through the hurt, Gabriel at least felt a strength of purpose. He’d messed up with Sean, maybe forever. But he could still tell Luca to fuck off. Save a tiny fraction of self-respect.
“I still . . .”
Gabriel didn’t let him finish. “I’ve got the money in the bank to pay your investment off. I’ll write you a check today.”
“But I don’t . . .” Luca trailed off. For a moment, for only a split second, he actually looked human.
Like he might care. Like he might actually give a shit about Gabriel, the person, his brother, and not just what Gabriel might bring to the family name.
But then that all disappeared, and that cold, hard asshole mask was back in place.
“Fine,” he said. “Fine, if that will make you happy, I will take the money and go. I was just trying to protect the family. You know that.”
Gabriel rolled his eyes. “Someday,” he said, “you’re going to wake up and it’s gonna be a real bad day for you, because you’ll realize that the only one who’s ever failed to protect the family is you.”