She heard muted rumbling voices. Male voices. Quite a few of them. She forced her eyelids open, or tried to, and wanted to slide right back into that gray void when the past—how long had she been out?—slowly flitted disjointedly through her memory.
They had her. And if what had happened so far was any indication of what was to come, it wasn’t going to be pleasant.
Despite that ever-present fear that had dominated most of her week, she felt relieved. Glad it was over. They had her, and that meant they would stay away from Nika and Caleb, her father and his men, her cousin, Vincente and Maksim. And Gabriel.
The man she’d realized too late that she loved.
“Please tell him, Caleb,” she whispered through a tight throat.
Because she never would. She was going to die.
She was propped in the corner of a tattered sofa with a flat pillow tucked behind her back. She glanced around and saw the sparsely furnished room—a chipped and dust-coated coffee table directly in front of her, a beat-up chair that matched the sofa on the other side of it. The walls were nothing but peeling paint and a few faded old pictures, hanging at odd angles, of growling wolves and doe-eyed deer. There was a kitchenette off to the right, housing a rickety metal-and-vinyl dinette, and a stove and fridge that looked as if they should have been put out of their misery a few decades ago.
This was the hunting cabin Vincente had mentioned, for sure.
She shifted and the pain was so intense, she thought she might pass out. Her head was throbbing, but her shoulder was agonizing. Furio had slammed her against the wall good. But spitting in his face and slugging him had still been worth it.
There was a knock at the door. She carefully turned her aching head toward the sound, and saw Furio smirking at her from where he sat on a chair leaning on two legs against the wall. If he was here, who was at the door?
Eva tried to hide her shock when Alesio strode into the room. Gabriel’s cousin whom she’d met at school! She tried to think. Should she hide the fact that they knew one another?
Her sudden elation took a nosedive at the blank, emotionless look on his usually smiling face. He looked away. God, if she didn’t know better, she’d think they’d never met before. The small spark of optimism inside her died. Gabriel must have been wrong about him. He wasn’t here to help her. He was one of Stefano’s.
Then the man himself entered the space.
Alesio stayed by the door as Stefano dragged a vinyl chair over from the table and seated himself across from her. He put his ankle on his knee and rested his hands loosely in his expensively suited lap, looking to all the world as if the two of them were about to have an enjoyable visit. God she hated him.
“First, forgive me for not being prepared to offer you something for the pain I suspect you’re in. You were moaning, even unconscious,” he explained, adding with a dark look in Furio’s direction, “I hadn’t anticipated the need for meds.”
Eva’s hatred stalled, confused by the apology and Stefano’s seeming concern.
“There is no excuse for your condition. Isn’t that right, Furio? So if there is anything I can do for you, to ease you while we wait, please let me know.”
Was he serious? The sudden amicability was so oddly misplaced it was terrifying. Furio must have hit her harder than she’d originally thought because she was lost.
“Don’t be afraid, Eva.” He chuckled, the sound without humor. “Gabriel is feeling enough of that for the both of you. Oddly enough, that’s not affecting me as I’d anticipated.”
She shook her concussed head and swallowed a cry when the motion jarred her shoulder again. Jesus H! She ground her teeth through the wave of pain and wasn’t surprised when she felt sweat bead on her forehead. “I don’t understand what’s going on here,” she admitted, her voice hoarse. “Aren’t you supposed to kill me now? Or is making me suffer some long, drawn-out horror part of the scenario?”
She recoiled when he got to his feet, regretting her big mouth when he closed the distance between them in two strides, his face suddenly dark. He lifted the neckline of her shirt and looked at her shoulder. She tried to push his hand away and cursed at the movement. “Fucking hell,” he spat, glaring at Furio. “You dislocated her goddamned shoulder. Eva, you need to relax.”
“No, please,” she said, aghast. He was going to try to fix her? Touch her arm? The one that was being sawed off? “Can’t you just go ahead and kill me?”
He ignored her and waved Alesio over. “Hold her steady. Here and here. Tightly,” he stressed, pointing to her waist and good shoulder.
“Please, Stefano.” She didn’t care that she was pleading. “Just leave it. It’s—”
They ignored her, and Alesio did as he was told, holding her tight while Stefano grabbed her wrist and twisted her arm into an odd position.
“Fucking stop it, Stefano!” she shouted, pain overpowering her.
“Stay with me,” he murmured as he gripped her biceps and shifted it before bringing her arm back in just as slowly. She wailed through a sickening pop, and just when she thought she was going under, felt an instantaneous relief in her limb.
“Is it back in?” he asked.
She blinked. “Yes,” she breathed—her first full breath since coming to. She met his satisfied expression, hers unsure. “Thank you. That was . . . God, that’s much better.”
Alesio released her and walked off without a word as Gabriel’s brother propped the pillow behind her again.
She frowned suspiciously. “How did you know what to do?”
He gave her a droll look. “Most of us know a thing or two about in-the-field patch-ups. That one I’ve had to do twice on myself. It works a little differently, but the end result is the same. Relief. You’ll have to ice that first chance you get.”
Were they really having this conversation? And should she pack it before or after he killed her? “I will,” she settled with. I’ll be sure to ask Saint Peter for an ice pack the second I get to the pearly gates.
Bringing his hand up, he shook his head and brushed his thumb gently over the throbbing heat on her cheek. She jerked back, his touch foreign and completely unwanted.
“I truly am sorry for this, Eva.” His hand dropped away, and he moved back to his seat.
Eva tried to wrap her mind around the one-eighty she was witnessing. This was not the Stefano Gabriel had described the night he’d told her the truth about her life. She slowly brought her feet to the floor and straightened so that she didn’t feel so vulnerable.
She was Vasily Tarasov’s daughter, dammit. She wouldn’t show weakness to any of these goons.
Clearing her dry throat, she asked, “What did you mean when you said ‘while we wait’? Wait for what?”
“Gabriel.” His eyebrows rose when she blanched. “What? You didn’t think he’d come after you? Have you met him? The guy’s a study in loyalty and support when it comes to those he cares about. Why do you think he’s never taken me out?” He pointed a finger at her. “From the impression I’m getting, he’d level an army to get to you.”
Wait. Huh? “You sound like you respect that.” Lame. But she didn’t know what else to say.
“I do.”
“Yet, you hate him.”
Stefano looked down at his lap, but not before she saw confusion flash in the depths of his eyes. “Maybe. Maybe not.”
“I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean.”
Stefano turned and motioned to Alesio and Furio and then to the door.
Furio stood, his unhappiness at being asked to leave apparent on his twisted features. “You’re fucking serious?”
The expression on Stefano’s face shifted, and Eva saw just how scary he could be when pushed.
“I would say so.”
Scowling, Furio crossed to where Alesio was holding the door and walked out. Alesio followed.
“Are you going to kill me now?” Eva asked to fill the quiet in the room.
“No.”
“Are you going to tell me what you meant by ‘maybe, maybe not’?”
The corners of Stefano’s mouth quirked at her insistence. “Do you interrogate my brother like this?”
Yearning for Gabriel clogged her throat. “Sometimes.”
When Stefano went silent, she decided to regroup. He’d been about to say something but then censored himself. Direct questioning hadn’t worked, so she tried a different tactic. She’d make things personal.
Her mind flashed back to one of Caleb’s self-defense lessons.
Captors see their captives as objects, not as real people. So if you’re ever abducted, do everything you can to be seen as a human being with feelings. Someone with a past, a family. A fully realized life. Hopefully it will delay, maybe even avert, whatever those assholes who nabbed you have planned.
It couldn’t hurt to try.
She cleared her throat. “I can certainly understand hating a member of your family. I hated my father for years, thinking he abandoned me and my mother. There were days when the hatred was the only thing that motivated me to get out of bed in the morning. If only to prove I didn’t need him.”
Stefano nodded. “I can understand that.”
Eva took in the disheveled appearance of the man in front of her. Despite his elegant clothing, he seemed almost . . . defeated. He was only a few years older than Gabriel, but he looked considerably older. Tired.
“When I learned my father’s identity,” she continued, “I learned why he left me and my mother. It was nothing like I’d thought. Nothing. I’d been so, so wrong. Misjudged the situation completely. Can you relate?”
He shifted, leaning back in his chair. “Strangely enough I can. With me and Gabriel, I’ve . . . fuck.” He looked as stumped as she felt. He cleared his throat and carefully said, “Perhaps the position I put my brother in when we were growing up was unfair.”
A feather could have knocked her over. He seemed almost . . . genuine. Then again, so had Furio when he’d told her he was going to blow up the Crown Jewel earlier.
Better not be too trusting too soon, Eva. That’s what landed you in this cabin.
“Why did you do it?” she asked warily.
His shoulder rolled in a shrug. “Because I was sick of having him thrown in my face every goddamn day. Perfect Gabriel. My father’s favorite. Beloved by everyone. Maybe because I was dealing with shit a kid my age shouldn’t have to deal with. Maybe I made Gabriel hurt just because I was.” He shook his head again, a tic working his jaw. “And my one chance to get away from that goddamn family. My one chance to start a new life on my own terms, without Albert Moretti’s fucking shame hanging over me . . .”
“The explosion,” Eva whispered. She remembered the fear she’d felt when Furio threatened Gabriel’s life. Horrified she was going to be the reason he was killed. She’d had a firsthand taste of what Stefano must have felt all these years, even though she was loathe to admit it.
“Yes. That goddamn explosion.” He stood and started pacing the room, running his fingers through his hair. “He never even asked about the errand our father was sending him on,” Stefano continued in a tortured voice. “Just did it and damned the consequences.”
Overcome with unwelcome—and unwanted—sympathy, she shook her head sadly. She should hate this man. Part of her did hate him for what he’d put them all through. But she certainly understood his grief. His disappointment. His betrayal.
Had Stefano raged, denying his girlfriend was gone from him forever, as she had her mother? Had he continued to rage, just because it had made him feel better? Same as she. Had he begged for one more day with Adrianna, wallowed in his loss, only to finally accept that she was gone forever? Again, same as Eva.
“Your brother was young, too, Stefano,” she said, sounding older than her twenty-four years. “And we’ve all had to learn our lessons. Usually the hard way.”
He paused and looked at her, raw emotion on his face. “You were supposed to be my revenge for losing Adrianna. My way of making my brother suffer as I did. And it worked. I called him after you were taken, and I heard the abject fear in his voice when he realized he’d lost you. The anger. The desperation. The hopelessness.” He took a seat and rested his elbows on his knees, hanging his head so that she couldn’t see his expression anymore. “For the first time in my life, I heard agony in Gabriel’s voice. Over what I might do to you.”
Silence stretched between them.
“And?” Eva prompted when she couldn’t take it anymore.
“And it didn’t feel as fulfilling as I thought it would,” he admitted baldly.
She didn’t like hearing that Gabriel was in pain because of her. Hated it, in fact. Thinking of him hurting made her own heart ache. But she had to push that aside for the moment. Something was happening here—something with her and Stefano. He was talking to her. Opening up. Coming to logical realizations about his brother that he should have come to years ago.
Maybe this was finally a chance to bring this damaging vendetta to an end without any more bloodshed.
And I can see Gabriel again! her heart screamed.
Or maybe this was Stefano’s last confession before he let Furio have his way with her.
“I know that must have been difficult for you,” she offered around the shudder that rocked her.
Stefano slanted her a dark look.
She’d seen a similar look on Gabriel’s face any number of times. It almost made her want to roll her eyes out of habit. But then she remembered this was a life-or-death situation.
“I’m not patronizing you,” she added quickly. “I’m serious. I don’t know if you know this, but my mother—who I loved more than anything—was murdered because of some grudge against my father. You think I don’t know what it’s like to have your world crushed because of family ties? Well, I do. But deep down, I also know it wasn’t my father’s fault. He didn’t issue the order to kill my mother. Would have never issued the order to kill her. In fact, people are dead right now because they did kill her. And to be quite honest, I don’t think it’s any different with Gabriel. Your father was the one you should have blamed all these years.”
Stefano raised his head, a thoughtful look in his—Eva blinked. His eyes. They were . . . different. She remembered back to when she’d first met him in Caleb’s apartment. The most disturbing thing about him had been his empty, soulless stare. That was no longer the case.
He now looked . . . human.
“Gabriel opened his whole life to you, didn’t he? Even the unsavory part.”
She shrugged. “It was kind of hard to hide when there was a big target on my back. Thanks, by the way,” she added dryly. He had the decency to look sheepish.
“My brother was his father’s puppet. That’s what made so much of it so damn infuriating. His father was going to hand the family reins over to a puppet. Someone who took orders, not gave them, which is exactly what a Don can’t be. And I was right there all along.”
She thought of her anger for the last twenty-four years, blaming her own father for so much. Trying to be perfect so her mother would still love her. Granted, she’d never started a mafia war and killed people because of it, but it appeared they all had their issues.
She grunted, unladylike. “Sounds like we both need to put our childhoods and Daddy issues behind us.”
Much to her surprise, Stefano smiled at her. “Maybe so.” The action made him look years younger.
Something clicked in her brain. “Wait. You just said his father, not our father?”
His scowl returned. “That hateful overbearing asshole wasn’t my real father. Albert Moretti married my and Gabriel’s mother when she found out she was pregnant with another man’s child, promising he’d raise me as his own. Prick didn’t even wait until I was eight before letting me know the favor he was doing me by allowing me to be a part of ‘his’ family.”
Holy. Freaking. Hell.
This shit must have been sitting heavily on Stefano’s chest for years, because that’s the only reason Eva could think why he was unloading it all on her now. As fascinated as she was by everything she was learning, she almost wished he’d shut up. He was going to have to kill her after all of these confessions!
“That’s terrible. I’m sorry, Stefano,” she offered, hating that she felt even more sympathetic toward a man who’d just admitted to making Gabriel’s childhood less than perfect. When his mood shifted, would Evil Stefano return?
Furio and Alesio, however, did return.
They quietly came back into the room after Stefano nodded his agreement to Furio’s arrogantly raised brow. Her skin began to crawl, but she refused to show it. She kept her focus on Gabriel’s brother and the emotional bombs he was dropping on her.
Learning the reasons behind someone’s behavior sure went a long way toward understanding it. What child wouldn’t have lashed out when constantly reminded of the fact that they didn’t belong?
“I’ve only recently met my own father,” she admitted. “So I can identify. Have you looked him up? Your real father, I mean?”
“Didn’t have to. My mother told me he died when I was small,” he said dismissively. “You said you grew up without your old man in your life. Did you seek him out?”
“No. Gabriel actually brought us together.”
Stefano went still, his eyes rising to meet hers. “Explain that.”
“Well, my father is in the same . . . business?”—she shrugged—“as you, and he asked Gabriel to watch over me while he left the country. He needed to take care of something.” Was she supposed to be talking about their business so openly, even if Stefano lived that same life? She wasn’t sure, so she left it vague and felt a moment of satisfaction at the wary look that entered Stefano’s eyes.
“Who is your father, Eva?”
“Vasily Tarasov,” she said, pride clear in her voice.
Alesio, who was leaning against the door, made a choking sound. Furio, who was seated off to Stefano’s left, remained silent, because, according to what he’d said when he’d apprehended her, he’d already known.
A Love of Vengeance Page 33