“Of course.” Mercenary. Most people in this business are.
“The house he took them to is a few miles inland. Actually, I don’t think you could call it a house. I sent you some photos.”
“I got them.”
“The man took us there. It looks like they left in a hurry, whoever it was that was here. I’m guessing in the past they’ve held the women here before shipping them off to wherever they ship them off to.”
“Find out yet who owns the property?”
“Land is owned by a local. He rented out the shack to a man with an accent who paid cash a few days prior. The landowner made sure not to be anywhere near the property for the agreed upon amount of time. Same man every time who worked out the deal and paid him.”’
“Description?”
“Tall, dark hair, foreign.”
“That helps.” Not. “I can’t imagine it’s Felix or Marcus actually doing this part, though.”
“Last time they were here was a few months back, although they had rented the space but no-showed. Wherever they took their cargo this time, it wasn’t here.”
“Dead end, then.”
“Not quite. Our friend who transported the cargo heard them mention something more than once. They referred to it as the big auction. Some of the women, mostly the younger ones, were separated for this.”
“When’s this big auction?” I ask, thinking about what Scarlett said about the marked girls.
“Soon, I’d guess. This was to be the last shipment before it would be held. I do have a city although I’d like to do some checking. It’s not where I’d expect an auction like this to take place. I’ve already talked to Charlie about it, but I’ll use my own contacts, too.”
“I trust your instinct but where will the auction be held?”
“Rotterdam.”
“Rotterdam?” That surprises me. It shouldn’t though. Money is money and you can buy silence anywhere, even in highly developed Northern Europe.
“All right. Thanks Antonio. You’ve done well. Let me know when you know more.”
“You’re welcome.”
14
Scarlett
“Wake up, Scarlett.”
I groan, trying to swipe away the hands shaking me.
“Come on. This is serious.”
When I register that it’s Noah, I blink my eyes open, rubbing them. He’s in Cristiano’s bedroom and he looks anxious.
“Hey,” I sit up, looking at the clock. Eight in the morning. “You’re up early.” I pull the covers up. I’m naked underneath.
“This has been bugging me for days. I wasn’t sure and I don’t know, maybe I’m wrong but,” he stops mid-sentence shaking his head.
“What is it?”
He holds up the small framed photo of Elizabeth Grigori and her friend that had captured his attention the day of the wedding. God. That feels like a lifetime ago.
“What are you doing with that? Did you take it from Elizabeth’s room?”
He nods.
“I don’t think you should go in there.”
“I think I know her.”
“What? That’s impossible, Noah. She’s dead. She’s been dead for ten years.”
“No, not Elizabeth. The other girl.”
“The other girl?”
“I know. It sounds crazy. Do you remember when they first killed mom and dad?”
I nod. Of course, I do. I could never forget that.
“Remember they left me in Mexico at the beginning.” They’d brought me to Italy right away.
“You’re making me nervous.”
“She was there.”
I scratch my head. “That’s impossible.”
“I’m telling you I remember her. I don’t think I could ever forget her face. Jacob had me play with her because she wouldn’t stop crying. I remember staring at her and her staring back at me. We couldn’t understand each other. I get it now. I didn’t speak Italian and she didn’t speak Spanish.”
“Are you saying they brought her to Mexico?”
“Maybe? I thought her name was Lizzie. She kept saying something, but I couldn’t understand. But, I mean…it was ten years ago. I was five. I just…I remember how sad she was, and I didn’t understand what had happened to our parents, our family. I just knew they were gone, and you were gone, and everything was different. Then there was this little girl.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m not sure but I don’t know, I can’t shake the feeling. They told me her name was Elizabeth, Scarlett. And the girl kept saying something about a Lizzie. I remember that because it was such a strange sound, those z’s. She was only there for two weeks before she was gone.”
“Gone?”
“Yeah. I don’t know where or anything. I’m just thinking out loud here, but is it possible they thought they had taken Elizabeth but took her friend by mistake? I mean, I’m looking at their faces and this is the girl.” He points to Mara.
“You haven’t told Cristiano?”
He shakes his head. “I didn’t know what to do. I mean, what if I’m wrong?”
“Do you know where they took her?”
He shakes his head.
I chew my bottom lip. “Jacob brought her?”
He nods.
“Was she ever alone with him, do you know? With Jacob?”
“I don’t know,” he answers, and I see confusion on his face. He sees I’m suddenly anxious. Urgent in my questioning. “Why does that matter? I mean, I guess so.”
No. If she was only five, he wouldn’t have done anything. If they thought she was Elizabeth…I shake my head. “Okay. Let me think. We need to tell him.”
“What are you two doing?”
Both Noah and I startle, turn to find Dante standing in the doorway. He stalks inside.
“What are you up to?” he asks. “It looks like I interrupted something.”
“What would we be up to?” I ask, hating that I’m in bed, hating that I’m naked. It puts me at a disadvantage.
“You tell me, Scarlett.” I look at him now and it’s hard to reconcile him with the man who’d jumped into that dark sea to save my life.
But his gaze fixes on the photo in Noah’s hand and rage takes over. “What the hell are you doing with that?” he snags it away. For a moment, I see a shift in his expression, a tenderness in his eyes, but it’s gone the moment he turns his gaze back to me.
He’s the more emotional brother of the two. The more impulsive.
Noah opens his mouth, but I put my hand on his arm. “Nothing. He remembered that I had the same dress when I was little. That’s all.” It’s a bad lie but it’s all I can come up with.
He looks at me suspiciously then turns to Noah.
“I was coming in here to ask if you were okay,” he says to me. “But then I see you two whispering. Plotting.”
“We’re not plotting—”
“Don’t go in my sister’s room again,” he tells Noah. “Don’t touch anything of hers.” He shifts his gaze back to me, a warning in his eyes. “I hope my brother won’t regret choosing to save your life over avenging our family.”
With that, he walks out and slams the door behind him.
“What the fuck is wrong with him?” Noah asks.
I’m jolted by the last part of Dante’s comment. I’m still absorbing the shock of it. I want to tell Noah that he’s just an asshole, but I see the way he is with Cristiano. I see how he just looked at the photo. And even if he did just jump into the water to save me for his brother, it’s something. Can I blame him for hating me? Hating us?
“He’s just trying to protect himself and his brother,” I tell Noah, but I feel a sadness inside me. Because no matter what, I will always be the sister of the men who killed Cristiano’s family.
15
Cristiano
The expression on Charlie’s face is a grim one as he walks into my study.
“It’s late,” I say, looking at my watch although I know what time it is. He’s made a p
oint of arriving when no one else would be here. “Whiskey?”
“Yeah,” he says, surprising me. He doesn’t drink when doing business and there’s no doubt this is business. He sets the thick envelope he brought with him on the desk, unbuttons the button of his tailor-made suit and takes a seat. “A double.”
I study him as I pour a glass for him and refresh mine. Something has him ruffled. He was one of the people Dante called when he found us that morning after the massacre. I still think about that. About what it must have been like for my brother to be greeted by that horror.
He’d gone out the night before. Snuck off the island to meet a girl when he was supposed to be at home. He told me he hadn’t been able to make sense of what he was seeing because he wasn’t sure if it was all the alcohol. If he was still drunk. If that’s why he retched so badly.
I wonder if it’s the deaths themselves or finding us like we were that did the most damage. I’d bet the latter.
He doesn’t talk about it. He’s never talked about it.
“Is Dante around?” Charlie asks. The timing strikes me considering my thoughts.
I shake my head. “He went to bed.”
“That’s good.” His face is grave. Charlie is Dante’s godfather. He’s always been good to him. To both of us. I know he worries, too, about Dante’s state of mind at having been the one to find us. Sometimes I wonder what he’ll do when this is over. When revenge is taken. What’s next for my little brother? Is there anything? Or is he like me? Like I had been until only very recently.
“Here you go,” I hand Charlie a tumbler and take my seat behind the desk.
He holds his glass up in a toast that I know isn’t a happy one. Charlie’s in his late forties now. His thick dark hair has a single, wide gray patch at his temple. He’s had it as long as I can remember, and it makes him look distinguished.
“I’m not going to like this, am I?”
“No, you’re not.”
He opens the large envelope and pulls out the thick stack of papers inside. From here I can see bundles clipped together made up of photographs, sheets of paper and even some newspaper clippings.
“Don’t keep me in suspense.”
He smiles but it’s half-hearted. He extends the pages out to me and I reluctantly take them. I only glance down quickly before shifting my gaze back to his.
I feel the tattoo I’d drunkenly carved onto my arm burn. I knew this was coming, didn’t I? It’s why I asked in the first place.
“Those are the names you asked me to look into.”
I breathe. Try to manage the tension growing inside me.
I know what he’s going to say. I’ve suspected it on some level. But I’m still not ready for it.
“Those people,” he gestures to the stack. “They all have exactly one thing in common.”
I remain silent still.
“They’d made an enemy of your uncle.”
I drop the stack and get to my feet, shaking my head. “You’re wrong.”
Turning to the window, I look out onto the water. I wish I could be out there. Out there with her. I wish I could hold her and listen to the waves with her and not have any of this other shit going on.
“You’re wrong,” I repeat, turning to face him again. Although I’ve never thought Charlie and David enemies, they are not friends. They never were.
“I’m not wrong and you know it. It’s taken me over a year to get this together. I’ve been diligent, considering who he is to you.”
I turn to him. “You hate him. It’s no secret.”
“No, that’s not a secret.”
“Why?”
“Look through it, Cristiano.”
I pick up my whiskey and swallow the contents of the glass, feel it burn down my throat.
“Go on,” he insists. “You suspected it. It’s why you asked me to look into it. Look at them,” he says.
“My uncle saved my life. He could have let me die.”
“He’s using you. He’s always used you.”
I slam a fist into the desk. “He saved my fucking life!”
He stands, leans over the desk to reach the pages, turns them so he can sort through them.
“I’ll start at the most recent,” he says, unperturbed. Charlie isn’t a violent man. He’s an attorney. But he’s not afraid of me.
I don’t look directly at the bundles as he lays them out but the first set of names I recognize at quick glance. The latest couple.
“They were in business with David for some years, but that business came to an abrupt end when they realized he was stealing from them. Just putting a little aside every month.”
“Why would he do that? He has enough money.”
“He’s greedy. He’s always been greedy. Always had his eye on what didn’t belong to him.”
“What does that mean?”
He exhales, looks away like maybe he’s said too much.
“Charlie. What does that mean?”
He turns back to me. Studies me. “You weren’t that young. You had to have seen it.”
“Seen what?”
Charlie’s expression changes, emotions he is so good at keeping hidden creeping to the surface. Sadness, then anger. I recognize both.
“How he looked at your mother.”
“My mother?”
He grits his teeth. I watch his struggle to maintain control. He never mentions missing her or missing the family. David does. He tells me often that he misses them. But I see it in Charlie sometimes. He hides it well, but now and again, I’ll catch him looking at a photo or a painting or something of mom’s especially, and it’s been happening more since I came back to the house.
Charlie and my mom had a special connection from the beginning. I remember my uncle’s sneer when Dante mentioned it. When he told me the story of their friendship.
Charlie and my mom were good friends from university days. And at the time in his life when he’d been coming out, she’d been a support to him. I’d never known whether my uncle’s dislike of Charlie had to do with his sexual preference or his close relationship with my mother.
“No,” I say. Because if I’d seen that, even if I can’t remember it, wouldn’t I have some sort of muscle memory, some instinct to warn me against David?
“The next man, Fred Barnaby, this one got a little uglier. He blackmailed your uncle. Or attempted to until you took care of him.”
I remember Barnaby. Remember the comment he’d made asking me if that cheat had sent me, his thug.
“I could go on,” he says. “But I think you’re intelligent enough to do this yourself. It’s time you opened your eyes, Cristiano. The stakes are higher now.” There’s a pause. “There’s Scarlett to consider. Her life is in danger.”
Am I so obvious to him? Who else sees right through me? Sees this vulnerability?
“She’s under your protection now. As is her brother. And I know you take those things seriously.”
I don’t deny it. Instead, I nod, my gaze on those pages although I’ve unfocused my eyes so the words are a blur.
“You didn’t see his face when he told me they’d taken her, Charlie.”
He doesn’t comment, just holds my gaze, as if to say you and I both know that’s bullshit. And he’s right. My uncle has a different face for every occasion. I just never thought of him using them with me.
“He didn’t know Scarlett’s location. It couldn’t have been him who tipped off Jacob.”
“Couldn’t he have known? Didn’t he come get you from that strip club?”
I did have two soldiers with me who came from that house. Which ones were they? I can’t remember. I was too wrapped up in my own head to note their names or faces.
“I have one more thing for you.” He reaches into the breast pocket of his jacket and pulls out a single sheet.
“I don’t want anything else,” I say when he holds it out to me.
“The doctor who looked after you when you were in the coma, did you know he
died a few days after you woke?”
I glance up at him, confused. I hadn’t even thought about that. I’d been introduced to another doctor. I’d assumed he was the one who’d looked after me.
“Drove off a bridge in the middle of the night,” he says. “A bridge about eighty miles from his house in a town he had no ties to. Absolutely no connections, no reason to be there.”
“What are you saying? If you’re accusing David, you and I both know he doesn’t do that sort of work.”
“No, he has others do it for him. Why don’t you talk to Lenore?”
“What does Lenore have to do with anything?”
“She came to me once. Years ago. She was worried about the drugs they were giving you to keep you in the coma.”
“They did that so I would heal. It’s detailed in the medical reports.”
“By a doctor your uncle employed who was subsequently killed in a strange sort of accident.”
No. Uncle David wouldn’t have done that to me.
“I wish I were wrong, Cristiano.” He finishes his whiskey.
I bow my head, letting my eyes focus on the papers before me.
“You read through those. Let’s talk tomorrow, make a plan.”
I nod once, sit back down and skim one of the reports. Charlie’s thorough. He’s always been thorough. It’s the reason he worked for my father and one of the reasons he works for me. The other reason is that I trust him. He may not be blood, but I’ve always trusted him.
But if I believe him now, then my own blood has betrayed me.
No. It’s not possible. Uncle David’s been like a father to me since the murders.
Charlie walks to the door. “Cristiano,” he says.
I look up. I’m tired. I’m so fucking tired.
“I’m sorry,” he says.
I don’t say anything. I just let him walk out the door.
16
Cristiano
My steps are heavy as I make my way below ground. The flashlight illuminates the path ahead of me, but I don’t need it. I know the underground of this house. It’s not only the cells that are down here.
I Thee Take: To Have and To Hold Duet Book Two Page 7