Page 85 of Sinner's Vows

“God. It must have been building in my head, ever since—” Oh, God. I’m going to spill it out now.

“Ever since?”

Dominic stands closer, his hands on his hips, and with the way the light falls, I see exactly what every other person must see when he is in hisIl Consiglioheadspace. His tall frame, his muscles carved ruthlessly in the shadows, and his tattoos menacing in all black ink, the veins on his arms only hinting at the strength he wields with his mere hands.

But it’s his face that makes me want to cower back. Eyes dark and hollow, blinking in the little light, the shadows falling under his cheekbones, his lips pursed in a thin line, and the tick of his jaw spelling out that I shouldn’t fuck with him.

“Your mom’s journals. I know where they are.” I swallow as he reaches for a T-shirt and gruffly pulls it on. “Promise me you won’t be angry, please.”

“Portia knew exactly where they were, didn’t she?” he says, his tone laced with budding fury. “Fucking knew it.”

“Promise me you won’t punish her. Please?—”

“Don’t fucking insult me, sweetheart,” he hisses. “Don’t you know me at all? Or is everything between us fake? You’re just playing a character in this little skit you’re doing in Boston?”

Cold dread wraps me in its icy fingers, but I swallow down my emotions.

“Nothing’s been fake, Dominic,” I whisper. Nothing between us has been fake at all. “It’s only that she begged me not to tell you. Just for one night.”

“Why?”

“Because she knows the man who probably took care of your sister after she was born. Until she went to live in Italy. She went to see him last night—” I struggle to my knees and scramble over to where he is standing by the edge of the bed. “Please, Dominic,” I beg, reaching for his arms. “She’s only protecting her own. It’s Rosalia’s father.”

“Jesus fucking Christ.”

He steps away from my touch and paces the room. Eventually, he drags his hands through his hair, and with a grunt, comes to stand right in front of me. For a few painful seconds, he eats into my gaze with eyes that have been stripped from everything they held last night.

“What else haven’t you been telling me?”

Heat swarms to my face, and I pray he won’t notice in the little light. “Nothing. That’s everything I know. There’snothingmore. As for Gabi being in Italy…I don’t know more than what I’ve just told you. I was just a kid, and the memories are so vague?—”

“Is that fucker of an uncle still alive?” he cuts in. “Franco’s uncle? Antonio Mancuso? In the place where you grew up after your mom died?”

“Yes.”

“If Gabriella was there, he’ll talk. Have no fear, sweetheart, I’ll make him. I make anybody talk.”

And I just lied to him. I haven’t told him everything. Nothing about what I was doing in my real life back in Italy before Franco took me to that dungeon. How I could ruin them if ever I get away and back to my team with all the information I’ve gathered. How I literally—if unexpectedly and totally unintentionally—turned into a Trojan horse, entering their most sacred Mafia inner circle.

Dominic makes anybody talk. I bet once he knows my truth, he’ll do anything to make me shut up. Permanently.

“I’ll have to take you there,” I say, grabbing at this last straw. Once I’m back on home ground, it would be easy for me to disappear. “His house is hard to find, and it doesn’t exactly have an address.”

“Oh, sweetheart. We’ll go to Italy. You’ll get what you’ve wanted from the start. And en route, we’ll figure out how this fucking ends. Because end it will as it must.”

His words chill me to the bone as goosebumps ride over my skin. He’s known all along that I want to go back to Italy at all costs.

Dominic gives me a slow, all-seeing rake down with his gaze, then reaches into his closet for a T-shirt.

“Put this on,” he instructs as he hands it to me. “You’re too much of a freaking distraction in those scraps of pink satin and lace and shit.”

I do as he asks, my heart heavy at his harsh words.

“Now go show me where these journals are, and then, sweetheart, we’ll call for Portia.”

46

DOMINIC

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