Chapter 40
Marcus slammed the manor’s front door and reached for the bolt, then froze. Locking it felt pointless. Frankie wouldn’t knock. Not if she was coming for blood…and he deserved every drop she spilled.
He left the bolt and stalked to the kitchen.
Boards protested. The fridge offered nothing but cold light.
He slammed it shut. He had walked away when the camera turned.
Old training took the wheel. Family first. Always.
The words made his gut corkscrew. Gi Gi had drilled that into them from the start, long before the papers made them a family.
Protect each other first or risk losing everything.
If Melanie connected dots, the fallout wouldn’t stop at him. It would jump the line to his brothers. He could hear Gi Gi’s warning. Protect each other or prepare for death. His mouth tasted like metal.
He hadn’t even said goodbye. Left her alone in the blast radius and ran.
The door crashed. The house flinched. His gut dropped.
“Marcus!” Her voice cracked through the hall, sharp, furious, impossible to ignore.
Footsteps charged toward the kitchen.
She appeared in the doorway, cheeks flushed, eyes blazing, one arm raised like Lady Vengeance with a dangerously elegant T-strap heel from Gatsby’s personal collection clutched like a weapon.
She leveled the heel, a threat and a period. “You left me.” The words hit like gravel.
His mouth opened. Nothing.
“You left me,” she said again, stalking closer. “You bailed the second a vulture shoved a mic in my face.”
“I—”
She lifted the heel an inch. “Unless the next word is a damn good excuse, I’m testing this point on your throat.”
Upstairs, the cat let out a noise that sounded disturbingly like bloodthirsty glee.
“I left because I couldn’t risk landing on Melanie Carter’s radar,” he said.
Frankie, to her credit, took the time to mull over his words before frowning.
“Because you thought I’d throw you and your brothers under the Melanie-needs-a-story bus?
That I’d tell her Gi Gi bought half this town and left it to her sons in her will?
That I would spill your secret to save my own pride?
” Hurt flickered under the fury. He hated that he’d put it there.
“Not that.” He met her eyes. “Something else.”
“Such as?”
“Melanie finds what others can’t.” He swallowed.
“And?”
“There are things about me, about us, I worried she might know.”
Her gaze narrowed. “I’m listening.”
The moment of truth. The moment that would turn whatever she felt for him into hate. He exhaled hard. “Frankie—”
“No.” She raised the second heel, dual wielding like a stiletto gunslinger. “You don’t get to Frankie me until you talk.”
The cat sauntered in and curled up to watch.
His heartbeat thundered in his ears like a countdown. “I thought she might know who the shoe hit.”
“Mr. Uptight?”
Again, he nodded, waiting for her to piece it all together.
“How does his identity have anything to do with you?”
“Me.” He forced it out. “I’m Mr. Uptight.”
The kitchen went very quiet. Fridge hum, cat tail swish, her breathing slicing in and out. She blinked once. Twice. “You!” The one-syllable response detonated out of her, causing the cat to scurry off.
He didn’t move. “Yeah.”
“You’re the anonymous crybaby who’s been playing God with my life?”
“I stayed anonymous because…I don’t do public. I avoid cameras and reporters at all costs.”
She stared like he’d rearranged the floor under her feet. “You brought me here. You kissed me here. While you were him—every minute.” Betrayal bloomed behind her eyes. “And tonight, I was the cost for your dodging a little airtime?”
Silence felt safer than the wrong truth.
“If you don’t like reporters, why in the hell were you at Fashion Week? They’re everywhere.”
“I was there to support a family friend. And I disguised myself to avoid cameras.”
She came at him so fast he stepped back. “Show me this damn legendary scar I keep hearing about.”
He bent, pointed.
She squinted. “That? I’ve had hangnails with more narrative arc.” She looked up. “And you made me go to therapy over it?”
“It wasn’t the cut,” he said, hating how thin it sounded. “It was how furious you were. And loyalty pushed me to have my friend’s back.”
“Which friend did my actions supposedly affect?”
“Lola. The designer scheduled after Naked Runway. Her brother’s my best friend. We all grew up together.”
Color drained from her face. “Does she know what you did to me?”
“No. She doesn’t. My choices are mine.”
Her laugh came out like glass. “So, therapy for my anger and exile to Gi Gi’s Crossing was, what? Friend revenge? Bring me here, keep me close, sleep in my bed, get me to like you, then leak my location so I can shatter on Channel 8 while you watch?”
“No. None of that was a plan. I didn’t tell Lola anything. I told you—”
“You told me you ran to keep your secret while I got exposed on live TV,” she cut in, heat rising. “You hid. I burned.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Newsflash: apologies are for the lily-livered. Revenge is for survivors of the asinine.”
He dragged a hand down his face. “I never wanted to break you.”
Her jaw ticked. “First of all. You did not break me. Second of all. Intent doesn’t glue anything back together. And if you think I’m going to let this slide. If you think you get to walk back to your no-spotlight life without consequences. If—”
“Frankie,” he said, taking a step, plea rough in his throat. “Don’t—” About to say act irrationally, he clamped down on the comment.
“When I’m done, everyone will know exactly who Mr. Uptight is. The manipulative coward who wrecks lives while hiding behind a woman.”
“Don’t torch your future just to scorch mine.”
Her laugh was pure ice. “I’ll take that under advisement.” She opened the back door. “Right after I light the match.”
The door slammed, the echo landing like a verdict.
This was bad. Really bad. She knew he’d left for privacy, and what better revenge than handing him to Melanie on a silver platter? Fuck. Why hadn’t he had a cover story locked and ready?
Bile rose in his throat. The math was simple. He’d just endangered them all.
The desire to chase her was crushed by his responsibilities. Family first. Always.
The only thing that could save him now was a miracle—and he and his brothers were long out of stock.
His gaze snagged on Frankie’s purse. The same bag he’d saved from a mud puddle death the day she’d blown into town like a hurricane in leather pants. It sat on the chair like an accusation. She’d notice soon. Maybe she’d come back…for the bag, for murder.
He searched his brain for a way to fix what he’d done before it brought danger to his family. And, if he was being honest, before it destroyed any feelings Frankie might have left for him.
How do you win back the woman you had just taught not to trust you?
Short of the whole truth, nothing else came to mind. And there was no universe in which his brothers would sign off on that truth.
As if summoned by his thoughts, his phone buzzed. Group chat.
Antonio: Just saw Channel 8.
Luca: How bad is the fallout?
Giovanni: Does she know you’re Mr. Uptight?
Lorenzo: Maybe you shouldn’t tell her.
Marcus stared at the screen, throat tight. Too late.
Marcus: She knows. And if I don’t move, Channel 8 will know by morning.
Dots blinked.
Antonio: Ideas on neutralizing the situation?
Marcus: She’s not the type to be neutralized.
A memory of a date night conversation tugged at his brain.
Marcus: She once mentioned hoping to be the recipient of a grand gesture someday.
Luca: We can work with that.
Lorenzo: What do you have in mind?
He let his gaze settle on the Birkin, the first thing she’d ever trusted him with, and a plan formed.
Marcus: Hear me out on this.