“I’m fine, Mom.”
“But you’re not.” She pushed out of her seat and stepped to my desk. “You haven’t gained back any of the weight you lost, and anyone who looks at you can see you’re exhausted all the time. You’re working yourself to the bone for nothing.”
She’d always thought I was too heavy before. Now I was too thin? I sighed. “I like my job.”
“Please. You can’t even get in a boat. We live in the tropics, and you zip around on a helicopter even though you run a company that builds luxury sailboats.”
“Who cares? I’m good at this. Our sales have gone through the roof since I took over.”
“Yes, but you’re not working this hard for you. Or even because you enjoy what you’re doing. You’re killing yourself to grow this company in the hopes of impressing the man who started it. But he’s never coming back, Natalie. He has a new life in Europe. He’s moved on. If he still wanted you, he would be here, and he’s not.” Her voice softened. “He made his choice, honey. He let you go. Now, it’s time for you to let him go.”
Tears filled my eyes, blurring my vision. I reached for the ring on my hand again, twirling it with my fingers, blinking rapidly to keep from giving in to the misery.
She was right. I knew she was right. But there was a part of me that would never be able to let him go.
I’d spent more time alone these last few months than I’d ever spent with Luc, yet he was imprinted on my heart, in my soul. How could I let go of that? How could I move on when everything I believed in told me we were meant to be together?
“I’m yours, and you’re mine. And we are unbreakable.”
I sniffled and swiped at the stupid tears on my cheeks. “I have to go. Haych is waiting with the helicopter.”
I made it as far as the door before my mother said, “I’m not trying to upset you, Natalie. I just want you to be happy. I hate seeing you like this.”
“I know.” I stopped in the doorway with my bag, but I couldn’t meet her gaze. “And I’m not upset with you, I’m just... I’m not you, Mom. I know I have to let him go, but I’m not ready. That doesn’t mean I’m unhappy, though. I love my life. It might not be the life you wanted for me, but it’s mine, and I’ve worked hard for it. And even with all the pain I’ve been through, I wouldn’t change it for anything in the world because if I did, I wouldn’t have what I do right now.”
Her eyes softened, and she moved toward me. “I know that, honey. I just... I love you, Natalie. I want to see you smile again.”
I did smile. Every day. She just wasn’t usually around to see it.
“I’m fine, Mom. I’ll be fine. You and I are very different people, but I’m tough, just like you. I can get through anything. I had an amazing role model growing up.”
My mother’s red lips curled in a smile, and her eyes softened even more as she reached for me, hugging me tight. “Well, that’s true. You did.”
I rolled my eyes and hugged her back. “Go have fun with your millionaire yachter. I need to get home.”
“Good night, honey.”
I thought about our conversation as I left the building and climbed into the helicopter where Haych was waiting. I thought about it the whole way out to the island.
My mother didn’t know this, but I’d been on a handful of dates the last few months with men I’d met through my business dealings for the company. It had been my feeble attempt at “moving on.” Every one had been a major disaster, though, and after the third one with a man who was as boring as the tablecloth at our dinner, I’d finally given up.
There was nothing wrong with being single. I had plenty to keep me busy. And I was happy, contrary to what my mother believed. In fact, just the thought of going home brought a smile to my face I’d been lacking all day.
It was dusk when I stepped into the house, bypassing the front and moving to the kitchen around back. The scents of Italian spices filled the air, and my stomach rumbled at the thought of Sela’s world famous lasagna for dinner. Closing the door, I called, “Sela?”
No voices answered my call. No sound echoed from anywhere in the house.
A note on the fridge drew my attention. Dropping my bag on the kitchen table, I crossed and read Sela’s message.
N—
We went back to my place to feed the dogs. They were barking up a storm. Come down when you get back. I have wine.
—S
I smiled and read the note again. Sela was crazy about her dogs. If they’d been barking like that, one of the native animals on this island must have wandered down toward the beach—a wild pig or goat. Her dogs were probably beside themselves with excitement.
I set the note on the counter and turned for the hall, moving toward the bedroom so I could change out of my slacks and sleeveless blouse and join her.
“Well now,” a very familiar voice said when I stepped past the living room archway. “Look who finally wandered in.”
I froze, and my heart jerked into my throat. Wide-eyed, I whipped around and stared at Giovanni, sitting in a chair across the room, his hands clutching the armrests, his long hair—longer than it had been the last time I’d seen him in that dungeon eighteen months ago—hanging around his face.
“It’s been a long time, bella.” His light eyes were as cold and soulless as they’d been that last day. And they were pinned solidly on me. “You have no idea how hard I’ve been looking for you. My brother was smart to hide you. But not all that smart to leave you unprotected. Pity.” He slowly pushed to his feet. “I really would have liked for him to be here for this, but I promise I’ll take pictures.”
He stepped toward me, and my adrenaline surged. I grasped the closest thing I could reach, a native stone carving of some South Pacific deity, and hurled it toward him. He dodged the object. It crashed into the coffee table, sending glass shattering over the floor.
“Dumb move,” he growled as he lurched around the couch toward me.
I turned to run, but he slammed into me before I could get two steps away.
My body struck the hall table. Objects went flying. Glass cracked. I hit the ground with a thud and kicked out, but he wrapped a hand around my ankle and pulled, jerking me back toward him.
“You can’t run from me,” he screamed. “Not any more! I’m going to make you pay for what you’ve done. Exactly as I made that slutty friend of yours pay.”
My throat closed, but I fought and clawed and kicked against him. There was no way he’d let me live this time. And if he found the others on the island...
Panic squeezed my lungs until I gasped. But somehow I managed to nail him in the balls. He grunted and fell back.
Scrambling to my feet, I raced into the kitchen, threw the back door open, and screamed when Giovanni grabbed me by the hair and hurled me into the counter.
Canisters went flying. The wooden cutting board flew up and hit me in the cheek. I bounced off the counter and smacked against the tile floor with a grunt. Pain ricocheted through my body.
Dazed, I tried to get up, but my vision wavered, my head grew light. The room seemed to swirl around me.
A looming shadow drew close. I managed to sit up, to scoot back against the counter and look up. Blinked several times.
Giovanni stalked toward me, his hair a wild tangle around his face, his chest rising and falling with his deep breaths. “I didn’t realize this was going to be so fun,” he sneered, glaring down at me. “My brother probably never told you I like a good fight. He knelt in front of me, and his lips curled in a sinister smile when he whispered, “Nothing gets me hard faster.”
I stared at him, my breaths fast and shallow, my vision coming and going. And out of nowhere I heard Luc’s voice whisper, “You are my salvation.”
It was time for me to be my own salvation.
“You like a good fight?” I asked in a low voice, knowing I was out of chances.
He chuckled.
“Then you should love this.” Grasping the handle of the knife that had f
allen off the cutting board, I swung out.
The blade sliced through Giovanni’s cheek, sending blood spraying across me and the kitchen.
The moment he howled and jerked back, I scrambled to my feet and ran.
12
Luc
“Porca troia,” I growled, tugging the cell away from my ear. “Answer the damn phone!”
The helicopter pilot I’d hired in Tahiti glanced my way with worried eyes. “Everything okay?’
No, goddammit, it wasn’t okay. Haych wasn’t answering. Natalie wasn’t answering. Sela wasn’t even picking up my call. It was as if none of them were there.
“Just hurry,” I said, trying to keep the panic at bay. “I need to get there as fast as I can.”
The pilot looked back out the windshield. As the helicopter cut through the air, I tried to convince myself everything would be okay, that I wasn’t too late. But every instinct inside me said Lady Luck had never been on my side.
I’d been tracking Giovanni for eighteen months—eighteen long, fucking months—and I’d nearly had a heart attack when he’d recently surfaced in Australia.
My brother had no allies in Australia, none that I knew of anyway, and Australia was too freakin’ close to Natalie and the island for my comfort. I’d dropped everything and flown to Sydney to find out what he was up to. But when I’d arrived, I’d been horrified to discover he’d already left. And that his next stop was Tahiti.
Natalie’s business was in Tahiti. It and the property—everything was registered under shell corporations—but it wouldn’t take Giovanni long to find her if he looked. If she was going back and forth from the island to the warehouse as my reports had verified the last few months, then people had seen her. Any local Giovanni showed a picture to would recognize her. It wouldn’t take him long to figure out where she was hiding.
I’d already checked the warehouse, only to learn she’d gone home for the day. I was sure I was about to have a heart attack by the time the helicopter landed on the grass not far from the house.
I thanked the pilot, slammed the chopper’s door, and raced toward the Balinese villa. Taking the porch steps in twos, I shoved my hip against the heavy wood door, bursting into the house as I yelled, “Natalie!”
No answer met my ears. Nothing but silence. But terror gripped my chest when I spotted the broken table in the hall, the objects littering the ground, and the shattered glass coffee table in the living room.
“No, per favore, no.” I rushed down the hall, only to skid to a stop in horror as I stared at the ransacked kitchen and the blood trailed across the floor.
Footsteps sounded on the back porch. I looked in that direction just as Haych, my long-time island caretaker and friend, appeared in the open doorway to the deck.
“Mister Luc!” His wide-eyed gaze shot from me to the mess around me. “Wh-what happened?”
“Where’s Natalie?”
“I... She was here. A few minutes ago. I flew her back to the island. Sh-she came into the house while I went to check on Sela. What...? Who did this?”
Fear threatened to pull me under, but I couldn’t let it.
“Giovanni.” I glanced over the kitchen and moved to the window. The blood trailed out the door and across the deck. “He’s here.”
“Your brother is here?”
I’d warned Haych all about Giovanni after I’d sent Natalie away from Italy. I’d told him to be on the lookout for Gio. Haych knew full well what he was capable of.
I raced to my office, where I pulled the cabinets behind my desk open and knelt to key in the combination to my safe. Once it was open, I pulled out two handguns and handed one to Haych, already standing at my back. “You didn’t see any sign of her when you rushed up here from your place?”
“No. I heard the helicopter and came right over. There was no sign. No blood like in the kitchen either.”
“She must have ran into the jungle.” Smart girl. She’d know the terrain of this island after a year and a half here. Gio wouldn’t.
I pushed to my feet and turned toward him, fighting to keep from panicking. “We need to find her. Before he kills her.”
Haych nodded, eyes as focused as I’d ever seen them. “We’ll find her.”
I followed him out into the jungle. Dusk was quickly turning to darkness. The island wasn’t big, only twenty or so acres, but there were many places to hide. I tried to think like Natalie. Would she hide and wait for help? Or would she try to lead Gio someplace where she had the upper hand?
She wouldn’t hide. She wouldn’t risk Gio finding Sela and Haych, putting them in danger. My stomach tightened when I realized my fighter would lead Gio to one of two places—either to the blowhole on the south end of the island where the tides were unpredictable and caused water to shoot up like a geyser into the air, knocking an unsuspecting person off their feet and into the ocean if they weren’t careful. Or she’d lead him to the highest point on the island where the cliffs overlooked the ocean and the ground dropped a hundred feet to jagged rocks below.
“Haych.” I grabbed him by the arm before he got too far ahead of me. “Go south. To the blowhole. I’ll check the cliffs. Those are the only two places she’d run to. She has to be at one of them.”
“Aye, Mister Luc.” He quickly shifted direction and raced off into the trees.
Heart in my throat, I headed in the other direction, pushing my muscles as hard as I could to reach the cliff before it was too late.
Sweat slicked my skin. Darkness gathered around me. Wind whipped my hair back from my face. Just as I neared the peak, I heard voices arguing.
A slap and a scream echoed on the wind. Followed by a thud.
My pulse pounded harder. I ran faster. Bursting through the foliage, I spotted them, standing near the edge of the cliff in the dark, Natalie’s hair wild around her face as she wrestled against Giovanni’s hold.
“You fucking bitch.” He drew his hand back and slapped her. She went spinning, but he hung onto her with his other hand and yanked her toward him again. “You’re gonna pay for that, cunt.”
I fired my weapon in the air. It echoed like a cannon in my ears.
Giovanni jerked toward the sound and stared at me with wide eyes.
Lowering the weapon, I yelled, “Let her go.”
Malice filled Giovanni’s light eyes. He jerked Natalie in front of him as a shield. “If I die, she dies.” He shuffled back a step as the wind whipped his hair around his face. “Are you willing to shoot both of us, fratello?”
Natalie’s shocked and terrified eyes locked on mine. I gripped the gun in both hands and kept the weapon trained on Giovanni as I stepped forward. “Let her go, Gio. This is between you and me.”
“You have a gun. Something tells me you have the upper hand.” He shuffled back another step.
Natalie’s eyes widened even more. Without moving her head, she looked down, and I knew she was searching for the edge of the cliff, that she knew they were close.
My heart beat double time, but I forced myself to stay calm. “Let her go, and I’ll go easy on you, Gio, I promise.”
“You’ll go easy on me?” he hissed. “You’re nothing but a fucking liar. I should be in charge of this House. I should be the one they all bow down to. You’re nothing. Father knew you were worthless, and so does everyone else. You’ve made me crawl and hide like a fucking rat these last few months, and I won’t do it anymore.” He tugged Natalie back another step. “You’re destroying everything Father built! I’m the heir to House Salvatici. I’m the one who should be in charge, not you! I’m the only one fit to lead this Hou—”
Natalie drew her arm forward and slammed her elbow straight back into Giovanni’s gut. His eyes flew wide, he grunted and jerked back. The second he eased his hold on her, she whipped around and faced him.
“You’re done, that’s what you are.” She slammed her hands into his chest, knocking him back another step.
I flew forward. Giovanni wobbled, suddenly realizing hi
s foot was on the edge of the cliff. Rocks broke free and fell over the side. He threw his hands out to grab Natalie, but I hooked my arm around her waist and jerked her back toward me, away from him.
The ground gave and crumbled. I hit the hard rocks on my butt, and Natalie crashed into me.
Giovanni screamed and flailed, but it was too late. His body toppled into the darkness, and his scream died out until there was nothing left but the sound of waves crashing hard against the rocks far below.
“Oh my God.” Natalie scrambled off me, breathing hard in the wind as she stared at me. “L-Luc?”
I dropped the gun at my side and pushed up, rushing to the edge of the cliff to look down. Giovanni was splayed across the rocks, motionless.
I felt nothing for my brother. Nothing but relief he was gone and that Natalie was safe.
My heart raced as I moved back to her. Crouching in front of her, I gently reached for her arms. “Are you hurt? Where did he hurt you?”
“I’m okay. I’m not hurt, I’m...” Her eyes filled with tears, and she reached out to touch me only to slowly draw her hand back. “Oh my God. Is that really y-you? Luc, is that you?”
“Yes, it’s me. I got here as fast as I could. When I found out he was heading for Tahiti, I—”
She threw herself at me, wrapping her arms around my neck in a fierce hug that knocked me back onto my butt again. Her body shook as she buried her face in my throat and whispered, “Luc...”
My adrenaline crashed, and my heart stuttered. Unable to hold back, I pulled her against me and held her just as tightly as she was holding me.
“I’m here,” I whispered, suddenly fighting my own tears that seemed to have come out of nowhere. “I’m right here. I’ve got you, angioletto.”
She sobbed against me. I had no idea what she was thinking, didn’t know if this reaction was relief she was alive, or relief I was here, but I didn’t care. I pressed my lips against her ear, closed my eyes, and breathed her in, unable to do anything but hold on tighter.
The Choice (House of Sin Book 6) Page 12