Chapter Twenty-Three
He doesn’t like my answer.
I saw the urgency in his face when Jude, his friend, mentioned taking care of Jared—and I knew Luca would be on a plane to take care of it the moment he could… But I don’t want that. And maybe as fucked up as it is, above the fact of people dying, I just really don’t want him to leave me alone again.
Bile rises up the back of my throat as I think about the moment Manny, Luca’s partner, touched me. I bury it, shifting my gaze to the Vans on my feet, the black skinny jeans I have on, and the white T-shirt unstained because he won’t let me clean up the blood. I don’t know why he won’t. Just like I don’t know how he knew what size of clothing to buy for me. However, I don’t question it.
I’m tired of questioning everything.
I’m tired in general, right now actually. We’re going on twelve hours of clean up, and I don’t know what happened to the body. I don’t want to know. But I know the sun has gone and come back, just like Manny’s body being loaded in the back of Jude’s car—only he didn’t come back.
“Are you hungry?” Luca breaks the long, drawn-out silence that’s settled between us ever since Jude had shown up. There was tension between the two, and I saw the way Jude looked at me.
I’m a problem, and I was relieved when he left for good.
“Not really,” I tell him, my stomach rolling.
“Okay,” Luca’s voice is tinged with disappointment.
“Who was he?” I ask as I follow Luca up the basement steps.
“Who?” Luca turns to me as he flips the stairwell light off, and then closes the basement door.
“Manny,” I say carefully, forcing the name out. “You said he was your partner for a long time…”
“You just answered your question,” he chuckles, raking his fingers through his hair. He’s changed and showered twice now, and his hair is still damp from the final time.
“No, I mean like, who is he?” I don’t know if I’m making any sense, but Luca seems to pick up on what I’m asking.
“My mentor, Victor, had a brother—well, I don’t know if Ivan was his brother by blood or not—but his brother had a protégé, too, and it was Manny. Our partnership was decided for us. I’ve known him since I was a kid. He was kind of like a brother, I guess.” He frowns, and then shrugs.
“And you…” my voice trails off, because I still haven’t come to terms with how easily Luca killed his brother.
“Look, there are things about myself that I don’t understand,” he says, letting out a sigh. “I’m dangerous, Emma.”
I nod, not sure why I’m not alarmed by what he’s saying. “So, you get angry, and you just… kill someone.”
“Okay, well yeah, but Manny had it coming,” Luca reasons, like I’m crazy for thinking anything else about it. “He tried to touch what’s mine, and I don’t appreciate that. Not to mention, he royally fucked the video on your camera, so the right kind of eyes will know that we fudged it. It’s messy. He’s always been messy. It’s probably for the best.”
He talks like this is seriously not a big deal.
I roll my lips against each other. “And me? What about me?”
“What about you?” He laughs, tilting his head at me.
“What happens after twenty-nine days?” I force the question out because we never came back to it in the cleanup. I said I didn’t want to kill Jared, and then that was that, but no one has talked about what happens to me when the time runs out.
Luca’s jaw sets. “I guess you’ll show your pretty face off to the world and give them all the middle finger.”
That’s not the answer I expected. “And you? What will you do?”
“You, if you’re in the mood,” Luca chuckles, his eyes lighting up in a way that makes my heart flutter. “You’ll have to show face without me though. I don’t want the glitz and glam that you’ll get reappearing like you have.”
My lip curls. “I don’t want that. Maybe I should tell someone—”
“No.” He cuts me off. “That’s a bad idea. You need to stay gone for the next twenty-nine days. The hit can be offered to someone else, and I have a bigger problem to solve right now.”
“Manny’s death?”
“Yeah.”
“Is someone going to try to kill you for it?” I ask, not even phased by the fact murder is seeming to come up in daily conversation. I’m not sure anything could phase me at this point.
“Ivan will want blood if he finds out the truth.” His bluntness is appreciated, and something has shifted in the way he looks at me—and I’m not sure if it’s a good or bad thing. But maybe it’s just the fact he doesn’t have to kill me anymore. “He already hates me.”
“Why?”
“He thinks I’m responsible for my mentor’s death, and he’s hated me ever since. I think he’s already tried to off me a couple of times through the…” He stops. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll take care of that, and it won’t be an issue. We just have to lay low and stay hidden until we tie up the loose ends.” He makes it sound so easy.
And I don’t keep picking it apart, because I’m too tired. I already know now that my husband, a man that I never thought was capable of being violent, hired someone to kill me so he could have my inheritance.
I don’t show it externally, but it feels like I’m finding his texts to Melanie all over again, and I don’t want Luca to know how bad it hurts. I don’t love Jared, but it doesn’t change the shock of what happened—and maybe that’s why I don’t want him to die yet.
Maybe I do want to rub myself in his face and make him live a long, pathetic life knowing that he failed… Or maybe I want him to die at the hands of the man who kidnapped me.
But I want to make the decision. When I’m ready.
“So, not hungry?” Luca says when I realize how lost I am in my own thoughts.
“No,” I repeat myself. “Sorry. It’s just been a long day.” The words sound just like the ones I used to tell Jared when he’d get home, and I’d be lost in my grief.
But this is different.
I’m not grieving, I’m just… processing the last twelve hours.
Luca crosses the kitchen to me, and I instinctively step away from him—just like I did when he first approached me afterward. I brace for a negative reaction, but his expression doesn’t change. It doesn’t fall with disappointment.
“I have an idea,” he says, his voice soft. “Come on.” He doesn’t reach for my hand, but turns away, heading across the kitchen to the other door, which I’ve learned is the garage.
“You said we have to lay low,” I say carefully, as I step into the three-car area.
“I know.” Luca smashes the opener, the early morning sun peeking through as it opens. There’s a black SUV and a Ducati motorcycle parked there. Jared always said he was going to ride a motorcycle, but he never had the balls.
Just like he didn’t have the balls to kill me himself.
“Here,” Luca retrieves a black full-faced helmet hanging on the wall. “Put this on.”
“Where are we going?”
“You and your questions.” He eyes me as I take it from him. “Just trust me on this.”
“Says the man who tried to kill me,” I joke, but Luca’s frown only deepens. I fumble with the chin strap and then freeze as Luca is suddenly standing behind me, his fingers in my hair. Excitement, fear, and… confusion thrum through me. “What’re you doing?”
“Braiding your hair,” he answers flatly. “It’ll keep it from getting too windblown.” I stand there, somewhat awestruck as he finishes. I didn’t even know the man had a hair-tie, let alone the ability to braid.
And the thought makes me wonder who came before me.
“Where’d you learn to braid hair?” I ask as he walks back to the bike and leans over it, turning the ignition on.
“Group home when I was a kid—before all this. I haven’t since then, and you can tell,” he chuckles. “So maybe avoid mirrors until we get back.”
I run my fingers over it. “It feels fine to me.”
“Because it is fine.” He shoves his own full-faced helmet over his head and swings his leg over the bike. “Come here.”
I hesitate for a couple of beats, but then slide the helmet he gave me over my head. He grabs my hand when I’m in reach and then tightens the chin strap and snaps it in place. The warmth of his fingers and the closeness of him sends a shiver down my spine.
Maybe I’m not ruined.
He pats the seat behind him and then starts the motor. My heart skips a beat as I climb onto the back, sliding up against him. I wrap my arms around his torso, and he wastes no time taking off from the garage.
I turn my head to look behind us, and see the door is closing. Luca navigates the driveway to the gate, and as he pulls out, I peer around, taking in the scenery. It’s clearly secluded, which makes me wonder where the hell we are, but as he takes a left and zips down the road, more and more houses come into view. But it’s the rolling mountainous hills, the thick trees, and the fresh air that makes breathing suddenly a little easier.
Where are we?
Luca continues to navigate the roads, and I recognize something about the place. I know we’re in the southern half of California—somewhere just north of Los Angeles if I had to guess. However, I don’t nitpick past that and choose to close my eyes, resting my head against him. His hand slides down my thigh, gripping my leg as we cruise at highway speeds.
My body relaxes against him, and the chaos of the day slips away. I don’t think about Manny or all the blood—or the strange friend, Jude, who looked at me like I was an alien. I just breathe, and when I do finally choose to see where we are, I catch sight of the Pacific Ocean, rolling and crashing into the beach under overcast skies.
I stare out across the waves, realizing I have a beach house probably only fifteen minutes from where we are. How long have we been riding? I know the place doesn’t have cameras. We could stop there. I hadn’t been in years, and it was even a place Jared had never touched.
I tap Luca’s shoulder, and he turns his head to glance back at me, before turning off into a small parking lot along the beach. It’s so early that no one is out, so the beach is desolate, and we’re just as alone as we were out in the wooded hills.
He parks the bike, and then turns to me, flipping up the visor. “Yeah?”
I follow his lead and flip mine up as well. “I have somewhere I want to show you. I didn’t realize how close we were to one of my favorite places.” He studies my gaze, and I realize what I’m asking—and what it might sound like. “And there are no cameras, and the cleaning crew that keep up with it won’t be there…”
“Your family’s beach house?”
I nod, not sure why I’m surprised he knows. “It was my grandmother’s then my mother’s, and I haven’t been there since she passed away.”
He takes a deep breath, holding my gaze. “I can’t take you there. More than likely there’ll be eyes on it.”
“Can’t you tell somehow?” I reason, my heart sinking in my chest. “I just want to show you my favorite place.”
His expression shifts to one that I can’t read. “I’m sorry, Little—Emma.” He doesn’t use the nickname, and part of me wonders if it’s because I told him Manny said it. “I can’t risk you being seen right now.”
I nod. “Maybe someday then.”
“In twenty-nine days, I’ll take you straight there,” he says, his eyes flashing with emotion. However, before I can dissect it, he flips the visor back down and whips out of the parking lot, taking off in the direction we came.