Chapter 30
Chapter Thirty
SAUL
The drive drags.
I have hours to question every decision I’ve ever made. To rehearse conversations that fall apart the moment I try to imagine his responses. Hours to wonder what kind of man drives toward the person who could take everything from him.
A fool. That’s what kind.
Or someone so in love he’s lost the ability to protect himself.
I’m not sure there’s a difference anymore.
I have Dario’s address. U.S. Marshals have ways of locating people who’d rather stay hidden. I’ve known where he lives since the trial. Filed the information away the way I file everything away. Never thought I’d use it like this.
The neighborhood is nice. The kind of streets where people have money and manners and don’t ask questions about what their neighbors do for a living.
I park. Kill the engine. Sit there with my hands on the steering wheel and try to remember how to breathe.
I could drive back to Colorado, tell Stevie I couldn’t find him, let the chocolates be a one-time thing that fades into memory. But I’d be lying. And I don’t lie to her.
She deserves the truth. Deserves a choice. Even if that choice destroys me.
I get out of the car. Walk to his door. Stand there for ten seconds, fifteen, twenty, trying to find something solid to hold onto. Then I knock.
Footsteps inside. The door opens.
Dario Marchetti looks exactly like I expected and nothing like I wanted. Dark hair, expensive clothes even at home, that controlled composure I remember from the courtroom. The kind of man who’s never surprised by anything because he’s already planned for every possibility.
His eyes widen slightly when he sees me. Then the mask slides back into place. “Marshal Bennett.”
“We need to talk.”
“About Stevie.” Her name in his mouth. Her real name. Like he has any right to it.
My hands curl into fists at my sides. “Yes.”
He studies me for a moment. Whatever he sees makes him step back, hold the door open. “Come in.”
The house is clean. Every surface polished, every object in its place. The home of a man who controls everything.
I don’t sit when he gestures to a chair. Neither does he.
We stand on opposite sides of his living room, sizing each other up like fighters before the first punch.
“How is she?” he asks.
The question hits wrong. Too casual. “That’s not why I’m here.”
“Isn’t it?” He tilts his head slightly. “You’re standing in my living room looking like you want to kill me. This is about her.”
“I need to know what the situation is with Sal.” The words come out harder than I intended. The voice I use for threats, not conversations. “Is the family still looking for her? Is she safe or do I need to relocate her again?”
“Sal’s been handled. I vouched for her. Told him she’s with me, that she’s not a threat. He’s backed off.”
“For how long?” I demand.
“Permanently. As long as she’s under my protection.”
“Your protection.” The words taste bitter. “She doesn’t need your protection. She has mine.”
“Does she?” He steps closer. “Because from where I’m standing, your protection involved hiding her in Colorado and visiting a few days a month. Drive in, fuck her, drive out. That’s not being with someone. That’s not protection. That’s abandonment with good intentions.”
The rage hits so fast I don’t see it coming. One step. That’s all. One step and my knuckles meet his face and I ruin everything. I feel it like a reflex and hate myself for how much I want it.
“Don’t you dare.”
“Tell me I’m wrong.” He steps closer. Not threatening, challenging. “Tell me you’re there when she wakes up at 3 AM and can’t sleep. Tell me you’re present in her life instead of just passing through.”
“I’m doing the best I can. My job…”
“Your job.” He laughs, a bitter thing. “Your job is the reason she’s in Colorado. Your job’s the reason she had to disappear. And now your job keeps you away from her how many days out of thirty.”
“At least my job won’t get her killed.”
He flinches.
“You want to talk about danger?” I step toward him, getting in his space. “You’re the reason she’s in witness protection. Your world, your family, your choices. She testified against you and had to erase herself because your people would kill her for it.”
“I know what I am.”
“Do you? Because you sent her chocolates like that fixes anything. Like a box of candy makes up for the fact that loving you almost destroyed her.”
“I didn’t ask her to love me.” His composure cracks. “She came to me. Broke into my house. I tried to stay away. I left my door unlocked so she could come and go safely, but I didn’t pursue her. I gave her space. Gave her the choice.”
“And look where that got her.”
“Safe.” The word comes out sharp. “It got her safe. Away from Sal, away from the family, away from everything that could hurt her.”
“Away from you.”
“Yes.” He holds my gaze. “Away from me. And it’s killing me. But at least she’s alive. At least she’s not in a shallow grave because my uncle decided she was a liability.”
I want to hit him. Want to drive my fist into his perfect face and watch him bleed.
But I can see it now, the thing underneath the composure. The same devastation I feel. The same desperate love that drove me for hours to stand in his living room.
“Why are you really here?” Dario asks.
The question cuts through my rage. Forces me to think.
Why am I here? To protect her? To warn him off? To prove I’m the better man? Or something else entirely?
“She got your chocolates,” I say. “She fell apart. Called me crying, couldn’t breathe, asked me what she was supposed to do.”
“And what did you tell her?”
“I told her I’d come talk to you.”
He’s quiet for a moment. Processing. “You came to talk. Not to threaten.” His eyes narrow slightly. “Why?”
“Because she’s not okay.” The words hurt coming out.
Admitting it to him, of all people, feels like handing over a weapon.
“She’s building a life,” I continue. “She has the bakery, friends, a routine. She laughs, she bakes, she’s learning to be Zoey Carter.
And I love her. She loves me back. But she’s not whole. ”
“Because of us.”
“Yes.” The admission burns. “Because of you. Because of Enzo. Because she’s carrying both of you around like wounds that won’t heal, and I can’t fix it. I’ve tried. I’ve been there as much as I can, given her everything I know how to give, and it’s not enough.”
“So you came here to, what? Ask me to leave her alone so she can heal?”
“I came here to figure out what the hell we’re supposed to do.”
Dario goes very still, like hope is a gun he doesn’t trust. “We?”
“She loves you.” The words taste like poison but I say them anyway. “She loves Enzo. She wears your shirt to sleep. She keeps his mug in her cabinet. She can’t make peanut butter cookies because they remind her of him, can’t make amaretti because they remind her of you.”
“I know.”
“You don’t know. You don’t know what it’s like to watch her grieve you while she’s lying next to me. To see her flinch when something reminds her of what she lost. To know that no matter how much I love her, I can’t fill the space you left.” My voice cracks on the last word.
Fuck. I turn away. Can’t look at him while I’m falling apart.
“So you came here to tell me she still loves me.” His voice is strange. Rough. “Why?”
“Because I want her happy.” I force the words out. “More than I want her to myself. More than I want to win. I want her whole, and I can’t make her whole alone.”
Silence.
When I turn back around, Dario’s expression has changed. The composure is gone, replaced by something I recognize.
Hope. Desperate, terrified hope.
“What are you suggesting?” he asks quietly.
“I don’t know. I don’t know if there’s a version of this that works.” I run a hand through my hair. “But I know she’s not okay without you. And I know I can’t be there all the time. So either we figure something out, or we all lose her.”
He stares at me for a long moment. Then he moves to the bar. Pours two drinks. Holds one out to me. “Enzo needs to be part of this conversation,” he says.
My stomach drops. Because if Enzo walks in here with his grief and his hands, this stops being a conversation and starts being triage.
“I know.”
“He’s...” Dario pauses. “Not in good shape. Finding her, seeing her with you broke something in him.”
“He saw us?”
“He followed you to Colorado. Watched you together outside the bakery, kissing.” Dario straightens his cuffs. “I’ve never seen him like that.”
The image hits harder than expected.
Enzo, the enforcer, the weapon, broken because he watched the woman he loves kiss someone else.
“Call him,” I say.
Dario pulls out his phone.
Twenty minutes later, there’s a knock on the door.
The knock isn’t a knock. It’s a warning. The kind that says someone’s barely holding it together.
Dario opens it.
Enzo stands there looking like he’s been through a war. Bloodshot eyes. Jaw tight. Hands curled into fists at his sides.
His gaze lands on me.
Everything in the room goes sharp.
“What the fuck is he doing here?” Enzo’s voice is low.
“We’re talking,” Dario says calmly. “About Stevie. About what happens next.”
“What happens next?” Enzo steps inside. Doesn’t take his eyes off me. “I’ll tell you what happens next. He leaves. Gets in his car. Drives back to Colorado and tells her we stayed away like good little boys who know their place.”
“Enzo.”
“No.” He’s moving toward me. Each step controlled rage. “You took her. You swept in with your badge and your protocols and you erased her. Took her away from us without warning. Without letting us say goodbye.”
“I was protecting her.”
“You were stealing her.” His voice rises. “Son of a bitch. I came back to an empty apartment with cookies and a fucking note.”
He’s in my face now. Close enough that I can see the muscle twitching in his jaw. The barely controlled violence in every line of his body.
“I found her,” he says. Quiet. Deadly. “Had to. Because I love her. And you know what I saw?”
I don’t answer.
“I saw her happy. Laughing. Kissing you like.” His voice breaks. “Like I never existed. Like what we had was nothing.”
“It wasn’t nothing to her,” I say.
“Bullshit. She sure as fuck moved on, didn’t she?” He shoves my chest. Hard. “Why did she build a life with you while I was searching every fucking state for her?”
I don’t step back. Don’t react.
“Because I was there,” I say quietly. “Because she was alone and grieving and I showed up. That’s all I did. I showed up.”
“And I couldn’t.” His hands fist in my shirt. “I couldn’t because you snatched her away. I had no idea where she was.”
“Enzo.” Dario’s voice cuts through. “Let him go.”
“Why should I?”
“Because he came here. To us. To figure out how to share her instead of keep her.”
Enzo goes still. His grip loosens slightly. He looks from Dario to me. “Share her?” He laughs.
“That’s why I’m here,” I say. “Not to fight. Not to stake claim. To figure out if there’s a way we can all.” I stop. “If there’s a way she can have all of us.”
He releases me. Steps back. “You’re serious.”
“I’m serious.”
His eyes search my face. “You have her. You could keep her to yourself. Why bring us into it?”
“Because she’s not whole without you.” The admission costs me. “Because I love her enough to want her happy more than I want her exclusively mine.”
Enzo stares at me for a long moment. Then he turns away. Paces. “You’d share her.”
“I’d do anything for her. Even this.”
“Even watch her love me the way she loves you? Or more?”
“If that’s what she needs.”
He’s quiet for a long moment. “You’re either the most selfless man I’ve ever met,” he says finally, “or a fucking idiot.”
“Probably both.”
“Probably.” Dario agrees and moves to the bar. Pours two drinks. Holds one out to me. “I don’t trust you.”
“I don’t trust you either. Both of you,” I say.
“Good. We understand each other.” Dario raises his glass. “To Stevie. And to whatever the hell this is.”
I take the drink. Don’t toast. Just down it in one swallow, letting the burn replace the ache in my chest.
“I haven’t agreed to anything,” I say, setting down the glass. “And neither has she. I came here to talk. To see if there’s any world where this isn’t a complete disaster.”
“And?” Dario asks.
“And I still don’t know.” I look between them. “But I’m willing to try. If you are.”
Enzo’s quiet. Dario watches him.
Whatever happens next, whatever they decide, I’m not the man in control anymore. I’m just standing in the blast radius.
Dario moves to pour another round. I watch Enzo’s face and wonder if he’s capable of the kind of surrender this requires.