64. Luca
Chapter 64
Luca
I t took two days for Francis North to show up at Rose Hall. He came like we’d all expected, furious and full of bluster. He slammed the door open with so much force it rattled the house, but I didn’t have it in me to flinch. I closed the book I was reading, a tattered copy of Hamlet that belonged to Gideon. I’d picked it up the night we’d all been together last, reading it slower than normal to drag it out. It had been impossible to pay attention in class, so I’d given up trying, instead choosing to focus on the way the paper of Gideon’s book was rough and worn against my fingertips.
Sometimes, I wondered what they’d both been like as kids, he and Fletcher. Had Gideon always been so quiet? Had Fletcher always been such an asshole? I’d only known Daren as an adult, and he’d only known me as the same. What must it be like to have that much history bearing down on your heart at all times?
Maybe one day, I’d know.
“Where is Gideon?” Francis asked from behind me, the door still swinging open.
I shifted my positioning on the couch so I could get a look at him, his face red and his hair falling out of place. He looked positively frantic.
“He’s at the pool,” I answered, closing my book.
“I need to speak with him; he’s not answering his calls.”
“Probably because he’s at the pool.”
“You’re terribly insolent for a bastard,” he spat, shoving his hair away from his face.
As if he’d somehow been summoned, my cell phone started to vibrate across the coffee table, an incoming call from my father.
“He agrees,” I said, swinging my legs around and picking up the phone. “If you’ll excuse me. My father doesn’t take kindly to being ignored.”
Francis North huffed an indignant noise in the back of his throat, and I answered the call on my way upstairs to my bedroom.
“Hello?”
“Where is Gideon?” my father asked.
I sighed, closing the door to my room behind me and resting my back against the sturdy and cool wood. “He’s at the pool,” I said. “Why?”
“There’s been…some revelations as of recent.”
“Like what?” I asked.
“Just…just stay away from him for a few days.”
I laughed, the suggestion the most ridiculous thing he’d ever said to me. The tattoo in the center of my chest burned like it was a brand. “I can’t just stay away from him , Father.”
“I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“I didn’t think you cared.” I rubbed my palm across my sternum, trying to imagine it was Daren’s hand, or Bellamy’s…their touch replacing the permanent mark of a loyalty my father had forced me to wear.
“There’s been revelations,” he said again.
“Is one of them that you care about me after all?”
“Watch your tone with me, Luca.”
“Francis North is downstairs right now looking for his son. He also looks like he just ran a marathon. If there’s something I need to know, I suggest you tell me now.”
My father was quiet on the other end of the line, and I wondered how much he knew, how much he was willing to tell me. We’d wagered, even with Vince in on the game, there was a chance the Angelini family would descend like vultures, ready to pick Francis off at first sight. There was a chance, albeit small, that Gideon was going to get caught in the crossfire, though we all hoped it wouldn’t come to that. The timing was everything.
“Keep your distance from Gideon until Francis is gone,” he finally said. It wasn’t an answer, but it was a hint. Someone was after Francis North, they were close, and he’d brought them right to our front door.
Adjusting my glasses and pushing off the door, I made a promise to myself.
I’d spent weeks trying to get Gideon into bed because I was bored, because I thought it would benefit me somehow in the end to have his loyalty in m y pocket. Gideon was a smart man, a calculating man, and he had to have seen right through me. Had to have understood my intentions were…selfish at best.
My father had taught me at a very young age that sex equaled power, whether you were the one having sex or orchestrating it. And that wasn’t the same kind of thing as what I had with Daren, with Bellamy. What Fletcher had with Gideon. There was love in it, and…that changed my loyalty entirely. Even if Gideon never wanted to take me to bed, he had those feelings for people I had those feelings for, so somehow…that left us tied.
“I don’t think I will,” I said to my father, opening the bedroom door and heading back down the stairs.
“You’re making a mistake,” my father warned.
“I don’t think I am.”
I disconnected the call and slid my phone back into my pocket. Francis was still in the living room, staring down at his phone and tapping out a message. His brow was knit tight above his nose, and he looked so different from how I remembered him, so much smaller than how he’d always existed in my mind. I wasn’t bloodthirsty. He hadn’t harmed me in any direct way, but I had the fleeting thought of killing him myself. It would be a gift to the men I cared for, but no…there was too much to say between Francis and Gideon, and I would never take that away from him.
“Can I get you a drink, Francis?” I asked, giving him my most insincere smile. “I should have asked upon your arrival. My manners must have left me.”
“Did your father talk some sense into you on that call?”
“He made sure I was aware of where my loyalty belonged.”
That made Francis look proud in a sick and twisted way I never wanted to see again.
“No drink,” he said, palming his phone and stepping back. “I’ll go find him at the pool.”