Page 87 of Vicious Vows

“You’re a risk I don’t need.” I turned onto the road that would eventually lead us out of the gated community and back to the penthouse.

“You don’t mean that.”

“I told you before, I can’t play these games with you. You’ve already stopped me from bringing my father home, and now you’ve… What else are you going to do to me?”

“I’m trying to?—”

“Don’t you fucking say you’re trying to help me. I don’t want your help.”

“Why? Because I’m a Gallanti? The daughter of your sworn enemy?”

I swerved onto a dirt road without taking my foot off the gas of my Porsche. Lissia screamed as we barreled into the woods. I hit the brakes, stopping inches from the tall, thick tree in our path, kicking up dirt and leaving a cloud of dust around the car.

“What is wrong with you?” She smacked my arm. “You almost wrapped us around that tree.”

“What is wrong with me?” I put the car in park and unbuckled my seatbelt. “I have a blind spot when it comes to you. That’s what’s wrong with me.”

“I don’t want you to blame me for your father having to stay away,” she said. “I didn’t make him leave.”

She may not have been responsible for him leaving, but if I hadn’t focused so much of my time and energy on her and fighting Collins and her father—and now dealing with Lorenzo and his cartel—I would be in a much better position to get my father home.

“Why were you there?” I asked. “What was so important that you had to sneak out of the penthouse and go to him?”

“I needed to see him.”

“Even after knowing he was the one who shot at us?”

“Knowing that was why I had to.” She tapped her hand on her thigh. “You might not want my help, but I had to help myself. I want peace.”

“How do you think you’re going to get that?”

“I don’t know.” When she didn’t make eye contact with me, it was clear she was plotting something irresponsible. “I went to see my dad on impulse. I didn’t think anything through, and I didn’t accomplish anything.”

“What did you want to accomplish?”

“I don’t want one of you to kill the other,” she said. “There has to be a way out of this.”

“When someone comes after an Accetti, we have to retaliate.”

Why couldn’t she get that? Why couldn’t she give me permission to finish this?

“Do you have to retaliate with guns?” She threw her hands in the air. “When will enough be enough?”

“When the war is over.”

“When will that be?” She rested her forehead in her hand. “You’ve already lost your mother and unborn brother to this brutal world. Ricardo lost his father. How many others are there? How many others have to die?”

“That’s not a question I can answer,” I said. “My mother didn’t deserve to die. My father carries that burden every day.”

“He didn’t have to pass that weight on to you and Milo.”

“I stand with my father because I want to.”

“You stand with your father out of duty.”

“Don’t!” I hit the steering wheel. “Don’t put this back on me. I didn’t come for your father. He was free to use the ports like all the other families, but he got greedy. He brought in Collins. He brought in Lorenzo’s cartel. He started this when he came after my family.”

“And now you have to finish it?”

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