Page 126 of Isabella

Isabella and I walk into our penthouse expecting to be met with silence, but the opposite happens.

“Izzy!” comes the high-pitched voice of Liana as she runs through the foyer, her arms wide open while she all but jumps into Isabella’s arms. “Oh my gosh,” she cries out.

Tito and Gianni come rushing in behind her, each of them looking us over with wide eyes. “You good?” Gianni asks, and I give him a nod. He takes out his phone, presumably to call Matteo.

Pulling herself back, Liana looks Isabella and me up and down as if searching to make sure we’re okay and says, “What happened? Where were you guys? We’ve all been worried sick.”

“M-Mauricio took me when I was out back at the boutique. He and Giuseppe brought Nicco and I to some abandoned warehouse. They had us taped to chairs and were going to kill us,” she says softly. “What’re you doing here?”

“When I went to look for you and couldn’t find you, Gianni called Teo who said Nicco was also missing. Tito and Gianni brought me here to wait it out since it’s so close to my place while everyone else went out to look for you guys.” She looks at me. “Dante and Leo are out there looking too.”

Shit.

I need to let them know I’m okay, but I don’t have my fucking phone, thanks to my dad. I’ll have to grab one of my burners.

Gianni walks over to me, holding out his phone. “Boss wants to speak with you.”

Taking it, I bring it up to my ear while turning away from Isabella and Liana. “Yeah?”

“What the fuck happened?” Matteo’s irate voice comes through loudly. “Is Isabella okay?”

“Yes, she’s okay.”

Matteo lets out a relieved sigh. “We’re almost back to your place. I want to knoweverythingthat fucking happened.”

Without another word, Matteo hangs up, and I hand the phone back to Gianni. “Your boss will be back soon,” I say.

Turning back to Isabella, I place my hand at the curve of her back, which causes her to tense up. Her eyes snap toward mine before relaxing as if she wasn’t sure who was touching her. It kills me that tonight has caused that reaction from her. I want to wrap her up in my arms and tell her nothing like this will ever happen again.

“Your brothers are going to be here any minute,” I say. “I can tell them to leave so you can get some rest if you want.”

She shakes her head. “No, it’s fine. We should talk to them. Besides, I doubt they’d leave until they know every single detail about tonight.”

Nodding, I say, “We can meet them in the living room. Come on.”

Liana steps aside while I lead Isabella down the hall to the living room. We both sit on the loveseat while Liana sits in one of the chairs. Gianni and Tito stay back in the foyer, waiting for Matteo and Enzo to show up.

“Where is she?” a voice bellows through the penthouse. Footsteps get louder as they get closer to the living room.

Matteo and Enzo make eye contact with me first before sliding their concerned gazes over to their sister. Isabella pushes herself up from the sofa and hurries over to her brothers, throwing herself into both of their arms.

“Please tell me you’re all right,” Matteo says, holding Isabella’s hands out to look at her. She nods, but I can tell by how she’s holding the bunched fabric of her sleeve that she’s trying to hide the blood on her sweater.

Matteo runs his gaze over his sister, and just as I had expected him to, he stops on the sleeve in question. “What is that?” he barks out.

“What?” Isabella responds, feigning ignorance.

“Isabella,” he snaps, pulling up her sleeve in a rougher manner than I’d like. It has me jumping up and at her side in an instant.

“Matteo,” I growl out in warning as I wrap my arm around Isabella’s waist and tug her into me, forcing him to let go of her.

“What happened?” he demands.

“Your sister saved us by sneaking a knife under her sleeve, but she ended up cutting herself by accident in the process.”

“I didn’t really save us,” Isabella mutters, causing me to snap my gaze to her.

“Of course you did. Had it not been for that knife, I would’ve never gotten out of the zip ties, and there’s only so much I could’ve done with my hands tied behind my back. We would’ve both ended up dead had it not been for your quick thinking.”

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