Page 1 of Savage Claim

CHAPTER 1

Lorenzo

Iwas fucking exhausted. The casino was beyond repair, and it was going to take weeks to clear the rubble. They were still pulling bodies—or body parts, rather—from the worst of it when we headed home.

Damian and I came in through the kitchen door, and all I wanted was to collapse into my bed. Preferably with Isabella tucked into my side, assuming she had stopped pouting.

But my plans changed when we found Cristian sitting at the counter, holding a towel against his head. “What the fuck?”

Cristian looked at me. “I need staples.”

Panic grabbed me by the neck. “Where is Isabella?”

“How the fuck would I know?” My younger brother scoffed and then winced. “Who do you think did this to me?” he asked.

Damian and I glanced at each other, and then he went for the first aid kid that we kept under the sink. I went to my brother’s side, taking the towel gently from his grasp. I lifted it up enough to see the gash underneath. I couldn’t see his skull, which wasgood, but it was still bleeding heavily. I held the towel back down. “Tell me what happened.”

“She hit me with a lamp.”

While Damian set up the skin stapler, Cristian recounted how Isabella grabbed a lamp and cracked him on his head. Anger burned in my chest. “Where did she go?”

Cristian gave me a deadpan look. “Ipassed out, Enzo. Her whereabouts when I woke up wasn’t at the top of my to-do list.”

Fucking Christ. I looked at Damian. “Can you handle this?” Myvicecaponodded, and I stomped out of the kitchen. I heard the firstthunkof the stapler, and Cristian swore out loud.

“Give me something to drink, first, Jesus.”

“You probably have a concussion,” I heard Damian say. “You can’t drink on top that.”

More swearing as the second staple was shot through his skin. My focus shifted to finding her. I marched up the stairs and made a quick sweep of the house. Isabella wasn’t there.

My vision went red and hazy. It felt like a hand had grabbed the inside of my throat and squeezed. It was the kind of anger that usually only surfaced when someone brought up Sienna.

Isabella left me. She actually fuckingleftme and took my child with her.

I lashed out, and my fist hit the wall. The drywall crushed under the hit, and dully, I realized that the skin across my knuckles had split. The small ache did nothing to quell the throbbing anger in my chest. Instead, I struck the wall again and again. Blood spattered down the wall and my wrist.

Still, I wasn’t satisfied.

The upstairs hallway became a ruin. Everything that I could get my hands on—tables, artwork, mirrors—exploded into fragments. Amalia was going to be furious when she got home, but I couldn’t bring myself to care.

I stomped back downstairs. Damian had finished with Cristian; there was a bandage covering part of his head now, and Cristian was rubbing at the dried blood on his face. “Enzo,” he said and then he saw my hands. “Jesus, let me bandage your knuckles.”

But my focus was completely on the key rack. I scoured it, but I couldn’t see what was missing. “What car did she take?”

Damian glanced behind him. His eyes scanned over the keys. “The Audi,” he said, and then his eyes met mine. “We can track it.”

“Do it,” I said.

“Bandages first,” Cristian insisted.

I didn’t want to, but I allowed them to bully me into a chair. While Damian went for a laptop to track the Audi, Cristian dabbed at my knuckles with alcohol and wrapped my hands with medical tape. “What are you going to do when you find her?”

“That’s not a question for a priest to ask.”

Cristian’s expression soured. “I’m not a priest,fratellone.”

“Semantics.”

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