Page 140 of The Proposal

“Breakfast is almost ready.”

“Something’s come up, and I have to duck into town for a bit. I’ll eat when I get back.”

“Oh,” she says, frowning. “You can’t eat before you go?”

“No. This is important. I’d really like to get it sorted out straight away.” She doesn’t pry or ask questions because she knows the protocol. “Do me a favour, though; stay inside the house until I get back.”

She places the spatula in her hand on the countertop and turns in my arms. “Should I be concerned?”

“No. I’ll have some guards stationed outside just as a precaution.”

“I meant about you.”

I lean down and place my lips on hers because I don’t want her to be troubled by this. If there is, in fact, a threat, I’ll take care of it.

“You have nothing to worry about,Bellezza,” I reassure her, my voice calm and filled with conviction. Inside, though, I feel anything but confident.

It only took a little over an hour, but we’ve already got a name: Fabrizio Donato.

It’s not a name I recognise, and he’s not someone I know. Using CCTV footage, we identified the vehicle he was driving and pulled a license plate number. It turned out to be a rental car.

At first, the employee at the rental place wasn’t exactly cooperative. Romeo, clearly as invested in this as I am, was close to losing his temper when the guy refused to give us the details we needed. He even reached across the counter and grabbed hold of his tie, yanking him forward.

I didn’t feel like violence was the answer in this case. The last thing we needed was the cops involved. Time was of the essence and money talks. After sliding a stack of hundreds across the counter, we had everything we needed on that motherfucker within minutes, including a photocopy of his international licence and a grainy photograph. He looked shady as fuck.

As we suspected, he’s an Italian national. Unfortunately, he boarded a flight home earlier this morning. Did he leave with the information he was looking for? We can’t say for sure.

Everyone we spoke to in town insisted they played dumb—probably in fear of retribution from us—as they claimed not to recognise the young woman in the photo, who we now know was, in fact, Lucia.

Did someone else or a civilian in the street give her up? I’m going to assume they did until I find out otherwise. Why else would he return home after only being in the country for two days?

Lucia is not safe until I know for sure; neither are my wife and child.

I pull out my phone once we are back in the car. “I’m going to text one of my men in Italy and see if they can intercept this fucker at the airport. I need to know if anyone gaveLucia up, who sent him here to search for her, and most importantly, why.”

“Should we fly over there and interrogate him ourselves?”

“There’s no way I’m leaving Arabella and Lucia right now. My men will handle it.”

Me: We have an issue that I’ll need you guys to take care of.

Roberto: Sure, boss, whatever you need.

Me: Someone from Italy was here asking about Lucia. I’m going to presume he was one of Salvatori’s men. He’s currently in the air, on a flight back to Italy. I’m going to need him intercepted at the airport and interrogated.

Roberto: Do you have a name?

Me: Yes. Fabrizio Donato.

Roberto: It doesn’t sound familiar.

Me: I suspect he works for Salvatori.

Roberto: Send me all the information and the flight details, and I’ll make sure it’s handled.

Me: Thank you.

Roberto: I’ll keep you updated.

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