Grace shook her head. “No, I thought the mob was more or less gone these days. You don’t hear that much about it.”
“It’s alive and well. Just not as blatantly bloody as it used to be. Let’s think about this, bella, put it into a timeline.”
“Vittorio, I insist you talk to me.”
He glanced over his shoulder and sent his mother a smile. “Please, do sit down, Eloisa. I’ll have Merry bring you whatever you want to eat, or I can pour you a drink if you’d like, from the bar. I can make just about anything. Give me a minute. This is important.”
“As if I’m not?” Eloisa snapped. “I insist that you speak to me now.”
Vittorio sighed and turned fully around. “You have my full attention, Eloisa.”
“Stop calling me that in that horrid tone. I despise the way you say my name.”
“Would you prefer Mrs. Ferraro? Or Ms. Ferraro?”
“Stop being sarcastic, Vittorio.” Eloisa all but gnashed her teeth. “You’re putting off the inevitable. I have a few things to say to this little money-chaser. She works for Katie Branscomb, although how Katie, coming from such a good family, ever met up with her I’ll never know.”
“She’s doesn’t work for Katie, Eloisa, she is a full partner as well as Katie’s friend, which you well know. You would never use a company without fully investigating them first. You pretended not to know because it suited you. Grace is my fiancée. We’re getting married whether you approve or not.” He kept his voice very calm. Very even. Compelling. “You may as well accept my decision because I won’t be changing it.”
“That’s ridiculous. Just because she meets the criteria . . .”
Behind him he felt Grace’s sudden stillness. He was aware she would demand a few explanations he wouldn’t be able to give her. He willed her to stay silent and not ask questions. “You knew.” It was a soft accusation. Anyone who knew him, other than his mother, would have tread lightly from that moment on.
“Of course I knew.” Eloisa threw her head up, her eyes blazing with anger.
“But you didn’t say anything.”
“Because I knew one of you would do exactly this. Make a fool of yourself over her. Convince yourself you were in love. It’s not real. She may meet the criteria, but she doesn’t meet our standards.”
“I would like you to leave, Eloisa. She’s my fiancée. I am going to marry her and have a family with her. That alone should demand a little respect for her. You’re insulting me and my intelligence by saying I don’t know the difference between real and fantasy. Since I’ve had to endure your ugliness my entire life, I’m immune to whatever venom you choose to spew. However, and you’d better hear me, Eloisa, I will not tolerate you doing the same thing to my woman. She’s my choice. She’s always going to be my choice. I would like you to leave now.”
“This is ridiculous. You can’t possibly be throwing me out.”
“I am politely asking you to leave my residence and not to return until you can be pleasant to Grace. The same Grace who saved my life.”
Eloisa rolled her eyes. “I suppose you’re very grateful to her. Write a check, don’t marry her. And if you want to throw that in my face and imply that I should be grateful to her as well, I remind you that if it wasn’t for her, no one would have been shooting at you.”
“And I would remind you that had you told us about her, she would have been safe, and no one would have been shot.” He leveled his gaze on his mother’s face. He was finished talking.
Even Eloisa knew him well enough to know that look. She threw her hands into the air. “Fine. Make a fool of yourself. You boys all seem to want to follow in Stefano’s footsteps. I haven’t seen his precious Francesca. She’s not working. She just spends her time like a princess in a tower. It makes me sick.”
He took a step toward her. He had no problem picking her up and putting her out the door, but she took one look at his face and turned and strode out, without looking back.
Vittorio turned slowly back to Grace. She had the icy glass pressed to her forehead and her eyes were closed. That was a bad sign. Grace was no pushover. And she was intelligent. She wouldn’t fail to miss his mother’s accusations.
She lifted her long lashes and he was staring into her very speculative eyes. There was pain on her face, sorrow in her eyes. She’d believed in him more than she realized. It was there on her face. There was satisfaction in that knowledge, but he really detested the sadness his mother’s revelations had caused her.
“Grace . . .”
“Just tell me, Vittorio. What criteria do I meet?”
“My mother is a very bitter, caustic woman. Don’t let her hurt you.”
“Eloisa Ferraro can’t hurt me, Vittorio. You can. I need you to explain to me what criteria I meet.”
“If I can’t explain it to you?”
“I suppose you want me to blindly follow you without any explanation whatsoever. That isn’t going to happen. I suggest you tell me what she meant.”
“I think, at this time, no matter what explanation I give you, your mind is closed.”
Grace was silent. Her gaze shifted from his face to the lake. She looked so sad he wanted to gather her close to him and hold her.
“That’s true. I think I’m overwhelmed with everything, and we’re moving far too fast.” Her gaze jumped back to his. “I don’t believe in fairy tales, Vittorio. I let myself believe for a few minutes there, because I wanted it so much to be real. You’ re . . . extraordinary. You really are. Some woman will be very lucky to have you in her life.”
There was no way for her to take the ring off and he was glad about that.
“Grace, don’t. My mother is very good at saying the things she knows will hurt others. It’s her special gift. She deliberately wanted you to feel as if you weren’t important or loved by me. Our life is ours, not anyone else’s. What we choose to do between us is for us alone. I’m telling you, stating it as a fact, that you’re my choice. I love everything about you. I can name a dozen of your traits right now, if that would convince you, but you have to believe in me. In us. I can’t give you that. You have to feel it.”
She tilted her head and looked up at him, her eyes meeting his. “Is there truth in what she said? Do I meet some important criteria for you? Something that made you notice me?”
“The gunshot wasn’t enough for me to notice you?”
She didn’t buy his diversion. She waited, her gaze steady.
Vittorio sighed and crouched down in front of her, eye level. “Yes, Grace, there are criteria that all of our women have to meet, and you do. Was it the first thing I noticed about you? Not even close. I saw you explode out of the trunk of that car. You nearly lit up the parking lot with your fury. There were two big men, both carrying weapons, enforcers for Miceli. There was Haydon Phillips, trying to sell you for payment of his debts. None of that mattered to you. You were willing to take all of them on at that point. It was the sexiest thing I’d ever seen.”
“I’m not going to let you distract me.”
“I’m not trying to distract you. I’m telling you the truth. I fell in love right there in that parking lot without ever having been introduced to you. I overhead that you had taken loans out to help Phillips. At the time, I thought it was because he was your friend, not because you feared him, but regardless, to me, that showed your loyalty. Knowing you now, I know you would do something like that for a friend. Right down the line, everything I learned about you or observed made me believe you were absolutely the woman for me.”
“And those all-important criteria that make me in the running to be married to a Ferraro?”
He sighed. “You’re not hearing a thing I say. You don’t want to hear me, Grace. Let’s get you back inside. You look tired.”
She didn’t protest, not even when he cradled her in his arms rather than walk with her. He needed to feel as if he held her to him, rather than watch her move away from him. He already could feel her slipping through his fin
gers.
CHAPTER NINE
I’m hoping Francesca can work her magic,” Vittorio confided to Stefano as the private elevator took them from the penthouse suite. “Otherwise I’m going to lose Grace.”
“What happened?”
“Eloisa. She deliberately said some things that she knew I couldn’t possibly explain to Grace right now. I wouldn’t mind so much, I could deal with that in time, but Grace is injured and that makes what Eloisa did reprehensible.”
“She’s got to be made to stop,” Stefano said. “Seriously, Vittorio, she’s getting worse, not better. If we don’t find a way to stop her behavior, she’s going to tear apart our family. What did she say to Grace?”
“She said it to me in front of her. She referred to Grace as meeting criteria and that’s the only reason I noticed her. She pointed out that I wouldn’t have looked at Grace for any other reason. I couldn’t explain about shadows or riding to her, or anything about what we do. She hasn’t committed to me. That could be disastrous.”
Stefano stepped out of the elevator. “Francesca is a huge asset to all of us. I’m going to text her and let her know there’s a problem. Hopefully, Grace brings it up to her, so she can help smooth things over.”
“Eloisa knew Grace was an untrained shadow rider for certain. I don’t know how long she’s known, but she did. I could see it on her face and she admitted it.” Vittorio scrubbed his hands over his shadowed jaw. “Sometimes I want to strangle her. Why does she want to make our lives miserable?”
“She’s miserable,” Stefano said as they crossed the lobby of the hotel. It was beautiful, an elegant, well-cared-for space, with high ceilings and crystal chandeliers. Both ignored the sudden hush as several guests ceased talking and stared at them as they made their way to the hallway that led to the conference rooms. “Eloisa wants everyone around her to be the same. She was raised in a cold, unfeeling environment. It was all about work. She knows no other way and that’s what she believes is the right way. The only way to stay safe.”
“We have to have something to live for,” Vittorio pointed out.
Stefano’s sharp gaze leapt to his face. “You’re my steady one, brother.”
Vittorio shrugged. “I still have to have a home and without Grace, I’m back to empty nothing. Walls. Silence. You know what it’s like.”
Stefano stopped walking abruptly, just before they reached the conference room where they were meeting with the Saldi family. “Are you absolutely certain that Grace is yours? She’s not just a woman who would be suitable because she carries the genetic code we need? Francesca is my world. Your woman needs to be yours.”
“Grace is my Francesca,” Vittorio assured. “If I lose her, I’ll allow them to initiate an arranged marriage. It won’t matter after she’s gone because I’ll never have what I need from anyone else. I feel that pull between us growing stronger with every moment I spend in her company. When I’m away from her, all I do is think about her. I want her happy and I know whatever it takes to achieve that, including letting her go, is what I’ll do.”
Stefano shook his head. “You don’t let her go, Vittorio. You find a way to make her happy so that she wants to stay with you no matter what. What we do isn’t easy to understand. For someone like Grace, a woman terrorized by a man who kills anyone who slights him, perceived or not, our way of life can be easily misunderstood.”
“I’m well aware,” Vittorio admitted. “Eloisa pushed my timetable up far too fast. Grace has just started physical therapy and I planned to slowly condition her to accept our way of life, not just blurt out explanations and force her to try to accept them.”
Vittorio knew it would be impossible to explain what his family did. He was born a shadow rider and trained from the time he was two. There was no other job or interest for him. It was considered a sacred duty and no rider, if he was capable, would ever walk away from it, no matter how difficult. The life was lonely, regimented, dangerous and formidable. Now that he’d had Grace in his life, even for a short few weeks, he wasn’t willing to go back to that stark, lonely existence.
Stefano pushed open the door and the two brothers stepped inside the huge room. “You might try explaining Eloisa. Grace seems a compassionate little thing. She might be distracted for a day or two.”
“At least we had a mother,” Vittorio groused. “If that’s what one would call Eloisa. Grace never had one. She had a crap childhood.” He detested that Grace had lived in terror. That she hadn’t had anyone to comfort her when she was young. That the only person who had ever stuck up for her was a serial killer who since had made her life a living hell.
“You’ll no doubt find a way to make up for it,” Stefano said.
“Did you talk to Teodosiu Giordano? I’m certain he’s the one loaning the money to Phillips.”
Stefano paused just inside the door of the conference room. “I did. Personally. He’s smooth, and he mixed lies with the truth. He admitted Phillips came to him and borrowed money on multiple occasions. He admitted he asked Grace out several times. He said he would again if given half a chance. He had no idea she was engaged to you, but for him that explained why she wouldn’t go out with him. Phillips had come to him with a harebrained scheme to allow Grace to pay his debt with sex. He explained that wasn’t what he wanted from her. I believed that much. I’m not so certain he wasn’t in on the kidnapping. On the other hand, he was cool under fire and seemed a little angry that anyone would do that to Grace. That came across as real. So, bottom line, he’s a question mark and someone we’ll keep an eye on.”
“Thanks, Stefano. I didn’t want to leave Grace, not now when she’s upset with me.”
Ricco sat at the table, Mariko by his side. The couple looked up when they walked in. “Everything all right?” Ricco asked Vittorio. “I saw your lady. She didn’t look happy.”
“Eloisa.”
“Of course. I should have known. Francesca will fix it,” Ricco said with absolute confidence.
Vittorio hoped his brothers were right. She’d told him, after the disastrous conversation with Eloisa, that she was all right now sleeping in her room alone, and she worried about him sitting up all night. He hadn’t protested, but he didn’t like her separating them. He knew she had it in her mind that she was going to get strong enough to leave. The word criteria was right there between them.
Stefano glanced at his watch. “Mariko, you will stay in the shadows. Anything goes wrong, you’re our ace in the hole. We’ll be asking them to leave their bodyguards outside of the room, so we’ll have to do the same. Sasha, Francesca and Grace are safe upstairs and I have four men on them. Giovanni is our most vulnerable, so you cover him, Mariko. He’s your first priority.”
She nodded solemnly. “Consider it done.”
“Speak of the devil,” Ricco said as Giovanni and Taviano sauntered in.
“Am I hearing my name being used in a bad way?” Giovanni asked.
“Always,” Stefano said and clapped his brother on the shoulder. “Sasha told Francesca the doctors are going to take the hardware out of your leg soon.”
Giovanni nodded. “I’ll have to go through therapy again before I can go back to work, but at least there’s an end to this. I held off scheduling the operation until we’re certain Grace is safe.”
Vittorio sent his brother a smile of thanks. For all the downsides to being a rider, there was his family. Always there. Always ready to help and watch out for one another. His family was one of the biggest gifts he had to offer Grace.
“I want you close to this door.” Stefano indicated the door that was secreted into the room on the wall just across from the head of the table. It was difficult to see the door and Giovanni would have to use his athleticism if anything went wrong to cross the short distance and dive to safety. “You’re armed?”
“Of course.” Giovanni looked offended.
It went without being said that all of them would be armed. The Saldis would be as well. Vittorio knew Stefano was going ov
er the plan much like a general before a battle. His older brother always planned everything step-by-step, especially matters of his family’s safety.
“Eloisa will also be in the shadows on the western side of the room. Mariko will cover the south. The New York cousins, Salvatore, Lucca and Geno, are here, and they will take east and north. Geno will find the fastest tube near Giuseppi and kill him first if they start anything.” Stefano glanced at the door. “If things go wrong, Val is my target. No matter what, he doesn’t get near Emmanuelle.”
Vittorio had thought the same thing. Val had done enough to hurt their sister. Chances were, she would never trust another man. He’d used her, getting close to her on orders from his father and even bragged about it to another woman. Emmanuelle had not only been heartbroken, but humiliated. Still, she was coming to the meeting. Head high. A true Ferraro. If the Saldis were out for blood, the tables would be turned, and Val was going to be the first to die.
The cousins from New York emerged from three separate shadows, each wearing the signature Ferraro rider pinstriped suit. They shook hands and once again, Stefano looked at his watch.
“Salvatore, Emmanuelle will be seated closest to where you will be secreted. If things go to hell, she’s your responsibility. She’s deadly, and she’ll be fighting her way to us, backing us up, but get her into the shadows. She’s going to be their number-two target after me. I’m counting on you to protect her.”
“On my life,” Salvatore said.
Stefano once again went over where he had positioned all the riders and who their targets would be.
Emmanuelle hurried into the room. “I’m sorry I’m late, Stefano. I was upstairs with Francesca and giving last-minute instructions to Sasha.” She sent Giovanni a smile. “Your wife is a woman to count on in a firefight.”
Giovanni laid his hand over his heart. Emmanuelle threw herself into Salvatore’s arms, hugging him hard. He kissed both her cheeks and then Geno followed suit. Lastly, Lucca hugged and kissed her.
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