Chapter 21
The back door slammed. Marcus winced. He’d meant to tell her. He’d even started to. Then she wanted to go first. And—
The pounding on the manor door rattled the frame, jerking him back to the reason she’d left in the first place. His glass hit the mantel harder than he meant, amber sloshing over the rim. “Damn it.”
He wanted to go after Frankie. To fix…his mess.
And it stank worse than cheap whiskey. Instead, he had an uninvited visitor.
If this was Harriet with another fake owl update, he’d lose it.
Everyone knew she just wanted to gossip…
probably about the ghost sighting in the town square.
Harriet swore she’d caught it on camera this time.
Scowling, he stomped to the door and yanked it open.
Four brothers. Grim faces. Bad news written all over them.
“What the hell are you doing in Gi Gi’s Crossing?
” They’d all agreed that at any given time, only one of them would be in town.
At the reading of Gi Gi’s will, Marcus had drawn the short straw and had been the first to move to the small town to complete his Gi Gi task.
When the manor was fully restored, he’d return to Manhattan and one of the other four would take his place.
“Not out here,” Giovanni said, his tone sharp as one of his chef’s knives.
Marcus stepped back. They swept inside in a wave of leather, cologne, and tension. Wordless, he led them to the living room.
Luca slung his Vancouver Vortex jacket across a chair. His posture said casual, but his eyes didn’t. Antonio paced like a caged wolf, restless energy snapping off him. Lorenzo didn’t look up from the blue glow of his phone.
“We’ve got a problem,” Giovanni said.
“Not we. Him,” Antonio shot back. “He’s got a fucking problem.”
“That’s not how it works,” Luca said, dropping onto the sofa with too much charm for the moment. “One brother’s problem is all our problem. At least, that’s the sermon I get every damn holiday.”
Marcus’s patience thinned. “Would someone tell me what the hell is going on?”
“Your project,” Antonio snapped. “She’s the problem.”
Marcus’s stomach dropped. Frankie. “What about her?”
Lorenzo finally looked up, face pale in the phone’s glow.
“I picked up chatter this afternoon. Journalist Melanie Carter has a tip Frankie lied about why she threw the stiletto. She’s chasing it like it’s royal scandal season.
” He glanced back at his phone. “She’s pinging every contact she has, testing networks like she’s running a full systems scan. ”
“And this prompted all of you to drop everything and come here?” What was he missing?
“She’s also after the identity of the man who took the hit,” Giovanni said. “Which means she’s after you.”
Marcus swore. For thirty years, journalists had been poison. One slip and the past could rise from the ashes.
“In case you’ve been living in a cave and don’t know who she is,” Giovanni said, “Carter doesn’t chase gossip. She buries people with it. If she’s circling, it’s because she’s already chosen her prey.”
Antonio spun mid-pace and leveled Marcus with a stare. “Which means if she connects the dots back to you…”
“She connects them to all of us,” Giovanni finished.
Silence fell, heavy with the echo of fire, their mother’s death, and the years of hiding under new names. Witness protection wasn’t a program for them. It was a pact. And it only worked if no one ever looked too closely.
Marcus’s chest tightened. Frankie’s laugh rang in his head, messy and real. Her hope when she said he might be different. Her face when he’d crushed that hope.
“I didn’t plan for this,” he said quietly. “She wasn’t supposed to…”
“To what?” Antonio snapped. “Matter? Is that what you’re saying? Because if it is, this is a hell of a lot more complicated than we imagined.”
Marcus’s gaze locked with his brother’s, guilt hollowing him out. “She wasn’t supposed to affect us.”
Giovanni’s eyes stayed hard. “Well, she has. The truth is you let her in. You got sloppy. And now Carter’s got a trail.”
The fire cracked, a cruel reminder.
Marcus scrubbed a hand down his face. “Fine. I’ll handle it. I’ll tell her everything.”
“No.” Giovanni’s tone was iron.
Marcus’s head snapped up. “Why the hell not?”
“Because you’re Mr. Uptight. If Frankie finds that out, she’ll come after you. And how better to set that revenge into motion than to give up your name to Carter so you can be a part of the media circus she had to endure?”
“She deserves honesty,” Marcus insisted.
Antonio barked a humorless laugh. “Honesty died with Mom. If we’d played it straight back then, we’d be in graves beside her. Lies are our survival language, brother. Don’t forget that.”
Lorenzo lifted his gaze from his phone. “Antonio’s right. What Frankie deserves…none of us can give. That ship went down with Papà, and it’s never coming back.”
The words hit like gut punches. Marcus didn’t argue. They were right. There was a reason they were all single. They all knew better than to fall in love. He ran a hand over his face. “You had four hours in the car together to get here. I’m assuming you’ve come up with a plan on how to handle this?”
“Get rid of her,” they said in unison.
Marcus’s blood chilled, and goosebumps multiplied on his arms. He remembered his father once saying those exact words about a man known to the boys as Uncle Alberto.
No one had ever seen or talked about Uncle Alberto after that.
The memory stung like the smoke that had filled Marcus’s lungs after the explosion.
“Look, man,” Luca said, the easy grin gone from his face. “You tried to play hero for Lola by playing God with Frankie. Your plan blew up. Lesson learned. Move on.”
Antonio crossed his arms. “I still don’t get what you were thinking, bringing her here of all places. Gi Gi’s Crossing isn’t just some random town. It’s sacred. Her last gift to us.”
“And the longer she stays,” Lorenzo added, “the greater the chance we lose it. Maybe not forever, but it’ll never be safe again. Gi Gi adopted us and gave us a good life. We can’t screw up her final wishes over some fashion editor with a temper.”
Marcus stared into the fire, watching the flames claw higher, as if mocking him.
Frankie wasn’t just some woman. Not anymore.
He’d been ready, damn it. He’d been prepared to tell her another of his truths.
That he was Mr. Uptight. Not out of some moral high ground but out of hope of what might follow.
How would his brothers react if he admitted he’d already told her about Gi Gi’s Crossing and the tasks they’d all been assigned? All because this was a girl he wanted the freedom to pursue with the hope of a future.
Would they rally around him and help him formulate a safe plan for falling in love? Or would they see it as betrayal? Who was he to get love and not any of them?
Frankie’s voice echoed in his mind. Risk it, she’d said. Say it. Put it on the table.
But risking it meant gambling with more than his heart. Because if his brothers said put the girl first, it would mean gambling with their lives. And if one thing had been carved into him the night their mother died, it was this: Enemies exist in the shadows, and family comes first, always.
The DeLuca brothers had grown into adulthood because no one knew they’d survived.
Because they’d been moved to the States and hidden.
Because they didn’t get careless. If he let Frankie in, she could blow thirty years of silence apart with one wrong word.
One slip, and the man who still carried a vendetta against their father wouldn’t hesitate to finish what the explosion hadn’t.
Marcus poured another drink, this time vodka, and the clear liquid burned like guilt down his throat.
“I’ll call Ms. Birdie,” he muttered. “She’ll get Frankie back to Manhattan.
She’ll keep my name quiet. And we all know she’ll take that secret to her grave just like all our others.
” The words tasted like ash, but there was no other way.
Wanting Frankie was easy. Having her was impossible. Family came first. Always.