Page 39 of Luca

“Are you the reason my father went to prison? Were you feeding the feds information? Was it part of your plan to make me trust you so you could somehow get information from me to give to the prosecutor’s office?”

“No,” I reply firmly. “You were never part of any of it. I won’t lie and tell you the thought didn’t cross my mind, but I couldn’t do that to you, Giada. The US attorney’s office built its own case. I didn’t want your father in prison. I wanted him to lose everything, and I wanted it to be because of me, because of what he did to my family.”

A knock sounds at my door, startling me and Giada.

“Luca, is Giada in there?” Nina asks from the other side.

Giada takes two long strides toward my door and pulls it open. Fuck, she’s going to tell Nina everything I just told her and Nina is going to run to one of the guards.

“Nina, I need a couple things before I leave. Would you mind running to the pharmacy for me and filling my birth control prescription? I don’t know when the doctor will be able to transfer the prescription to wherever I’m going.”

Nina looks between Giada and me with suspicion and question in her brown eyes.

“It could take days to transfer and I don’t have that kind of time, Nina. Please.”

Honestly I’m not sure if Nina believes Giada’s need for her to leave the house, but she nods her head and walks away before Giada closes the door.

“Hopefully my brother isn’t too hard on her when he finds out I’ve escaped.”

Ah, she gave the woman a reason for missing her walking out the door.

When she leans against the closed door, Giada’s eyes find mine and I see hurt warring with anger in them, but her gaze holds steady with mine. “I need you to be one-hundred-percent honest with me right now and look me dead in the eye when you answer, Luca. Was it part of your plan to get me to fall for you and use me as leverage against my father or brother?”

“No.” I shake my head and take a step toward her, but the way she fuses herself to the door halts me in my tracks. “You were never part of the plan, Giada. I just…I can’t watch your brother give you away to Petrov. He’s not a good man. I can’t stand by and watch another woman be sold.”

That’s why I’ve concocted this insane plan that hinges on her saying yes and leaving with me. Knowing what the Russians are capable of, knowing they view women similarly to her brother and father, there’s no way I can let her go from one prison to another with no one caring whether or not she’s safe. Here, I was able to keep an eye on her. There, she wouldn’t have anyone who cared about her, certainly not Nikolai, if the rumors about the Petrovs are true.

“It doesn’t seem I have much of a choice then.” Her eyes are filled with defeat. “I guess you’re the lesser of two evils.”

My head tilts to the side. “Giada—”

She lifts her hand to stop me from speaking. “It doesn’t matter, Luca. You offered me a way out and I don’t have a choice but to take it right now. I can’t be traded to the Russians so my brother has a partner in whatever plan he’s come up with. I won’t. But make no mistake, I won’t be a pawn for you to use, either. If you want to go through with this, if you truly want to help me, then you need to know I won’t be used for information for your family to take mine down. I may hate my brother and my father for what they’ve done, not just to you but to everyone else, including me, for God’s sake, but I deserve a chance. I deserve a shot at living a life where being the daughter or sister of a Mafia boss doesn’t define me. I’ll go with you because it’s my best choice at the moment, regardless of how angry I am. But don’t think for one minute you’ll control me and rob me of my freedom. If that’s even a thought in your head, then you’re no better than Carlo or my father.”

“I would never—”

“I never thought you would lie to me, and look where we are. I would’ve never guessed you were this entirely different person than what I believed. I’m going with you because I don’t see another way out.” Her eyes implore me to see her and listen to her. “Please don’t make me regret trusting you now.”

“I won’t, Giada. I swear to you, you’ll be safe.”

She lets out a sad huff of laughter. “I’m a girl born into a world ruled by men who only care about power and revenge, Luca. I’m beginning to realize I’ll never be safe.”

She opens the door, but before she takes her leave, she turns to me. “I’ll marry you, Luca, but I’ll never trust you.” Then she shuts the door behind her.

That fucking stings more than I have time to dissect at the moment. Right now, I need to figure out a way to get Giada off the property, and the only thing I can think of is not going to go over well with my soon-to-be wife.

“The trunk?” Giada hisses as we hurry to one of the cars parked inside the garage.

“It’s the only way to get you off the property. Who knows if Carlo already spoke to the guards at the gate? We have to assume he has and that he told them to expect a car in”—I look at my watch—“sixty-three minutes to take you. It’s a thirty-minute drive to my apartment. That gives us time to switch cars and be on the road to New Hampshire before the Russians get here. It’s not much of a head start, and the longer you stand here arguing with me, the more time we’re wasting.”

I want to reassure her that everything will be fine, that she can trust me to keep her safe, but I know such assurances will fall on deaf ears. And they’ll be worthless if she doesn’t get in the damn trunk.

She closes her eyes and her lips move as though she’s reciting some sort of prayer.

“Giada, I know you’re scared,” I begin, setting the duffel bag with her things in it between us. “But I just need you to trust me for thirty minutes until we get to my place.”

Her eyes open and her lips form a thin line. “Okay.”

She looks in the trunk, and I hold out my hand to help her climb in. The fear in her amber eyes when she looks up at me tears me apart inside. She doesn’t trust me at all, but she knows she’s backed into a corner with only an hour to be long gone before her brother and the Russians start ripping the place apart to find her. “Thirty minutes.” I shut the trunk of the sedan and send a prayer to whoever is listening that we make it out of this alive.

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