by Eden Summers
“That’s a pretty impressive mess you’ve made for yourself, brother. I guess the grass ain’t greener after all.”
I curl my lip, determined not to be distracted by violence. “Why are you really here? Why contact me after so long?”
“Because of her. Because of them. I came when I heard you were shot at because I thought you deserved to know her fucking family have been shooting at us, too. But evidently, I got it wrong if that bitch was with you yesterday.”
It’s hard to decipher what he says. Hard to hear anything other than him cutting her down.
“You’ve betrayed the family by sleeping with that whore, Dante. Uncle Lorenzo is going to be pissed when he finds out.”
“He already knows.” I stalk toward him, menacing and ready to slaughter, jabbing a finger at his chest. “And if you call her that again, or refer to me by that name, I’ll make you see stars. You hear me?”
He glowers, his lips pressed tight.
“Do you fucking hear me?” I repeat.
“Yeah, I fucking hear you.” He slaps my hand away. “But does he know you kept quiet, not telling us they were going to declare war after two years of radio silence?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“No?” He raises a defiant brow. “I call bullshit.”
“You can call whatever the fuck you want. But up until a few seconds ago, I had no clue about your connection to her. Let alone the depth of how low you could stoop by abducting a fucking child.”
“Wasn’t my decision, asshole. The point is—they shot Dad.”
I don’t respond.
There’s nothing more than a flinch at the memory of a man I despise.
“How can you have no loyalty?” He starts to pace, his face stark apart from the hatred in his eyes. “You’re sleeping with the enemy.”
“She’s no enemy of mine.” I grind my teeth, refusing to take the bait, refusing to care one iota about Emmanuel’s health just because my youngest brother demands it of me. “And I’m surprised you think your actions don’t justify their response.”
For the love of God. Abduction? They involved a child?
And to think Layla would’ve suffered every time I asked about her connection to the Costas. Each and every moment I attempted to find out if she was in a relationship with Remy or Salvatore.
Not once did she expose her past.
That beautiful, fucking unfathomably strong woman faked her way through continuous bluffs.
But he’s right. Lorenzo will be pissed if Emmanuel was shot and her family were to blame. I’ll need to prove I wasn’t involved, and do whatever possible to make it seem like she wasn’t either.
“That was two goddamn years in the past,” he argues. “The situation was dead and buried. Yet, they shot Dad three weeks ago.”
“It’s my turn to call bullshit. He was in Italy three weeks ago.”
“Was he? Or were those the rumors we had to start to hide our weakened position?” He mocks. “He’s currently in a makeshift hospital room at home, struggling to ditch a chest infection that stemmed from the bullet wound in his shoulder.”
“What a shame.” I pull my cell from my pocket and open a new text to Bishop. “I guess you learned the hard way that the only thing that gets dead and buried in the lifestyle you’ve chosen are the bodies. The need for revenge lives longer than any of us.”
“You’re judging me?” He raises a brow. “Your sins are far greater than mine.”
I type Get here now before pressing send. “I never abducted a child.”
“If the whispers are true, it’s the only thing you haven’t done.”
I huff a derisive laugh. “I guess you’ll never know, because I’m not explaining shit to you. Now get the fuck out.”
“I can’t believe you.” He starts for the hall, walking away from me. “We were brothers once. But you’re right on one thing—revenge lives longer than any of us. And I’m sure Dad will agree once I tell him she’s fucking you to get back at us.”
“You’re threatening her?” I shove my cell into my pocket and stalk after him. “You’d tell him?” I grab his shoulder and haul him around to face me.
“I’d take pleasure in it. Why wouldn’t I when you abandoned us? You fucking walked and left us with him. Now look where we are.” He throws his arms wide. “You caused this. You caused all of it—that kid’s abduction, her husband’s death. If you hadn’t left, he wouldn’t have spiraled.”
The accusations are sharply embedded into my chest, stabbing me with guilt. With truth. “I couldn’t stay—”
“Because you were humiliated that Grace left you?” he asks with incredulity. “I don’t know how you became the man you did, because the brother I knew was a fucking pussy. I overheard your plans to ditch town with her. But she didn’t wait for you, did she? She didn’t want to stick around to finish senior year because her dad was an abusive drunk and her mom was a junkie, so she took off, not giving a shit that you weren’t—”
I launch, striking my forearm into his throat, slamming him backward against the door. Not seeing. Only feeling.
I press harder, ignoring his rasped breath, not flinching as he claws at my arm. “She didn’t go missing, you pathetic piece of shit.” I lean close, sinking all my weight against his neck, so there’s nothing between us. Nothing apart from my ignorant baby brother and the facts. “He killed her. He slit her from throat to gut and showed me the pictures to make sure it sank in.”
Remy’s eyes bug as he continues to fight me off, his breath wheezing.
“He murdered her because he knew I’d made plans to move out,” I seethe in his face. “He slaughtered the girl I cared about, someone who was still a fucking child, because I wasn’t dedicated to becoming his perfect little minion like you were.”
Remy’s mouth works like a fish as I press and press. Open. Closed. Open.
“He took the one thing that was mine and made sure it no longer existed, because he wanted my attention all to himself.” I watch the panic build in his eyes, enjoying the victory through the devastation. “So yes, I fucking left. I ran away from money and prestige. I hitchhiked across this godforsaken country to put as much distance between us as I could.” Spittle bubbles from my lips, my fury uncontainable. “I lived on the streets. I stole to survive. And you have the fucking audacity to think you know what went down?”
I glare.
I glare so hard I sense an impending aneurism.
“Fuck you, Remy.” I pull my arm away, not giving a shit that his grown ass crumples to the floor before me. “You always were a naive little prick.”
I kick his shoes and step over him, pulling the door wide to find Bishop poised with his key in the air.
“Perfect timing?” He takes me in with caution, no doubt seeing the monster I’ve become—the clenched fists, the heaving chest. “What the hell is going on?”
“Get him out of here.” I turn for the living room. “Before I fucking kill him.”
30
Layla
I close myself in the bedroom, snatch my hair into a vicious ponytail, then dress in jeans, Chucks, and a white blouse. Everything else is shoved into my suitcase and zipped tight.
I spend minutes poised at the door, overhearing muffled shouts and heavy thuds.
They’re fighting again, and I don’t know who I’d prefer to suffer more pain—Remy or Matthew.
No, not Matthew. Dante.
A goddamn Costa.
I will the sickening disgust to the back of my mind, trying not to acknowledge how I fell for a man who shares the same DNA as my daughter’s abductors. My husband’s murderers.
There’ll be enough time to hate myself for it later.
Right now, there’s too much adrenaline to think, the hormone acting like venom in my veins.
I want to hurt him. To drag the vial of cyanide hidden in my jeans pocket and throw the powder in his face. But whenever I picture his death, the only sensation to consume
me is regret. Suffering.
I’d loved him.
I’d adored and admired every part of that man and now every memory is tainted and twisted by lies.
I open the door a crack as another one slams on the other side of the penthouse.
More shouting follows, but this time the voices aren’t raised in anger. Matthew’s tone holds frustration. Panic. And it’s Bishop’s responding aggression that brushes my ears as I inch the door wider.
“That little asshole is running back to Emmanuel as we speak,” Matthew yells. “They’re going to come after her.”
I take the news with a sharp breath.
I need to get out of here. To grab my cell from the coffee table and leave.
“What did you expect?” Bishop mutters. “And isn’t that why you got involved? You couldn’t let her be a target on her own, you had to pin a bull’s-eye on our backs, too.”
Matthew growls a reply too low to understand. A threat? A warning?
I pull the door wide enough to slip into the hall, cautiously wheeling my suitcase in delicately slow increments along the carpet behind me, the knife in my free hand.
I hold my breath with each step toward the conversation, the growing thunder of my pulse in my ears making it harder to hear.
Lorenzo’s name is spoken. Others’, too. Men I’m not familiar with.
“What are the options?” Bishop asks. “How confident are you of an outcome?”
“My only confidence comes from knowing Emmanuel won’t let this slide. He’ll do to her what he did to Grace. And not just Layla, but Stella, too.”
I gasp.
“Layla?” Matthew calls out.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
“Layla.”
This time my name is a command. An impatient warning.
I straighten my shoulders and raise my chin as I continue into view.
The two men stand at the dining table. Tall. Commanding. Aggressive.
Matthew has the sense to look somewhat apologetic beneath the frustration tightening his features. But Bishop, like always, isn’t welcoming.
He gives me a dismissive glance before returning his attention to the man who deceived me. “What are we going to do?”
Matthew ignores him and starts toward me. “Good, you’re dressed. We’ve got a big day ahead.” He speaks as if things between us are normal. As if he hasn’t pummeled the walls of our relationship and left the bricks to fall upon me.
“Don’t,” I warn. “Don’t you dare come near me.”
He complies, rooting his feet in place and raising his chin while I stride toward my cell on the coffee table.
“Your breakfast is on the counter. You need to eat.”
I maneuver the suitcase around the sofa, bumping into the armrest, and release the handle to snatch for my phone.
One call and Cole will make this right. Him, Hunter, Decker and Luca. They’ll fix this mess with blood and broken bones… and hate me more while doing it.
I shove the device in my pocket, the knife still at the ready, and wheel my suitcase out from where I came to make for the entry hall.
“You can’t leave.” Matthew’s gaze haunts me from my periphery.
I keep walking, striding out the distance to freedom.
“Layla, stop.”
My body wants to obey. There’s no rhyme or reason, but every muscle tenses at his command, including my heart.
“Let me explain what’s going on.”
He continues toward me, the dwindling space between us causing me to panic. Not from fear of physical pain, but from that of pure emotional torture.
I can’t be near him. Can’t let him get within reach.
I run, my black Converse Chucks squeaking against the tiles, my suitcase wheels clicking.
He gives chase, his heavy footfalls thunderous behind me as I reach the door and drop the knife to wrench at the dead bolt.
The metal clatters at my feet while I snatch at the handle. Twist. Pull.
The crack of freedom brings hope, the euphoria snatched away when his heavy palm slaps against the wood, slamming the door closed, his body caging me from behind.
“Let me leave.” I cling to the handle, twisting and tugging.
“I’m not that person,” he growls near my ear. “I’m not one of them.”
The words whisper over my neck, poking infected wounds. Memories of him speaking against my neck in better times haunt me, crawling under my skin like torturous bugs.
“You’re a monster.” I pull and yank and thrash at the handle, willing it to open.
He doesn’t move. Doesn’t lift his splayed hand from against the wood.
“I’ll explain everything later,” he vows. “Once it’s just the two of us.”
“Later?” I swing around to face him only to jerk back at the stifling proximity.
He’s there. Right there. Dark eyes manic. Stubble harsh. Face severe.
“You want to talk to me later?” I seethe. “Because it’s easier for you to lie when we’re alone?”
“I haven’t lied.”
“Not once have you told the whole truth,” I shriek.
We stare each other down, my chest rising and falling from a body demanding punishment, his warm breath taunting my lips.
He doesn’t move. Doesn’t free me from the cage of his arms. All he does is look at me as if he’ll tear the world to shreds if I escape. Like he’ll lose his mind if I walk from his life, never to return.
It hurts.
His confusing suffering. His unsettling battle.
I want to soothe him and stab him all at once.
“Leave the suitcase.” He straightens, his order blanketed with a subtle level of control. “Go eat breakfast.”
I rage, wanting to yell at the top of my lungs. To claw at the severity in his eyes. To steal the oxygen from the air to dispel his intoxicating aftershave while suffocating us both.
“I’m not staying.” I swing back to the door and snatch at the handle, turning the metal toward freedom, erupting with relief when it opens.
He steps into me, the wall of pressure smothering my spine as he slams the wood shut with a chest-rattling snarl.
“I’ll scream,” I warn.
“You don’t want to do that.” He presses into me, his hard body grazing my ass.
The threat is clear in his voice. The pure conviction. But my blood doesn’t react in fear.
It warms.
My pulse throbs.
My body still reacts to our chemistry. Succumbing. Yearning.
“You’re threatening me?” I turn again, this time concentrating on my hatred when I look him in the eye.
He’s even closer now, our noses almost brushing as he intimidates me in the cage of his arms.
“I’ll do whatever it takes,” he purrs. “We’re not done, Layla.”
So be it.
I force a smile. Bat my lashes. Pray to God I’m not making another mistake. Then launch my knee at his groin, making direct impact.
Shock splashes his face. Eyes wide. Mouth, too.
He grunts.
Crumples.
My regret hits just as fast, the remorse heavy enough to suffocate.
I don’t let it consume me. I scramble for the door, swinging it wide, leaving the suitcase behind. I’m one step over the threshold when I’m viciously yanked backward by a painful grip on my upper arm, then dragged into an entirely different body.
“My turn,” Bishop seethes. “And let me warn you, I’m far less patient.”
31
Layla
I’m shoved onto the sofa, my suitcase left at the door, my cell confiscated.
Bishop scowls at me from a few feet away, the minutes passing in silence until Matthew limps into the living room. His shoulders hunch as he makes his way to the kitchen to lean heavily into the island counter.
“I knew we had secrets, but I underestimated just how many.” His voice is graveled as he clings to the marble, his face now a paler shade of
sun-kissed beauty. “You should’ve told me your grievance with the Costas had nothing to do with dating Remy or Salvatore.”
I remain quiet, my hands in my lap, my eyes glaring in rage.
“What reason did you have to keep the details of your daughter’s abduction and husband’s murder from me?”
I flinch at the ease with which he relays my nightmares. The simplicity. The lack of emotion.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
I scoff, finding him sickeningly self-righteous for asking about my skeletons when his pile far higher.
“Why pretend you’d had a love affair?” he continues. “Why allude to being a past lover?”
“I didn’t allude to anything. You assumed.”
His eyes narrow with impatience. “I could’ve done something. I could’ve—”
“You couldn’t even tell me your real name.”
“Matthew is my real name.” He straightens, wincing with the movement. “They’re not my family.”
“No?” I raise a brow. “I think your DNA would argue.”
“My DNA doesn’t make them family.”
“That’s exactly what it does.”
His jaw ticks as Bishop takes one retreating step after another until he’s leaning against the far wall, arms crossed over his chest, watching us like a soap opera.
“I was born a Costa.” Matthew hobbles to the fridge, pulling out a bag of vegetables from the freezer drawer to hold against his crotch. “I didn’t stay one.”
“That doesn’t change a thing.”
“No?” He raises a brow as he settles back against the counter. “So you loved your father? You loved a man rumored to traffic sex slaves?”
I press my lips tight, refusing to answer.
“Families aren’t so clear cut are they, amore mio?”
I grind my teeth, scowl my fury, my jaw aching from the tension.
He’s undaunted by my hatred, not batting an eye while he repositions the makeshift ice pack against his crotch. “You could’ve at least told me your family had Emmanuel shot. Especially when I told you yesterday what would happen if I was associated with him being hurt.”