Sienna POV
I waited for the heavy thud of the front door.
Luca was gone to meet his "contact."
I knew exactly who he was meeting.
I slid the laptop out from its hiding place under the pillow again.
With trembling fingers, I refreshed the forum page.
There was a new update from RatKing88.
The naive canary agreed. Easier than I thought. Papers are being drawn up tonight.
I stared at the screen.
My hands were shaking, but not from sorrow.
They shook from a cold, vibrating rage.
I scrolled down to the comments.
Smart move, someone replied. What about the money?
RatKing88 replied instantly.
Cleaning out the safe before I leave. She won't check until I'm gone. I'll be in Madrid before she realizes she's broke.
I felt the blood drain from my face, leaving me cold.
The safe.
It held three hundred thousand dollars.
It was the Family savings, blood money meant for emergencies, for medical bills, for bribes to keep us out of prison.
It was not his money to take.
Another comment caught my eye.
When do you go back?
RatKing88: Never. Unless the Old Man kicks the bucket. Then I come back for the inheritance. Until then, I'm a ghost.
He was planning to wait for his own father to die.
He wasn't just a thief; he was a vulture circling a dying beast.
I wanted to type a reply.
I wanted to scream at him through the screen, to shatter his arrogance.
I typed: Omertà is not a suggestion. Traitors bleed.
My finger hovered over the enter key.
My heart hammered against my ribs.
I took a deep breath.
No.
If I posted that, he would know I knew.
He might panic.
He might hurt me before he left.
Or worse, he might stay and try to silence me permanently.
I deleted the comment character by character.
I needed to be smarter than him.
I needed to be patient.
I closed the laptop and walked to the window.
The Vitiello estate stretched out below me, dark and imposing.
This was a world of wolves.
Luca was prey trying to wear a predator's skin, but he lacked the teeth.
I, however, had spent three years watching the wolves.
I knew how they hunted.
I went back to bed, but I did not sleep.
When Luca returned hours later, he slid into bed beside me.
He draped his arm over my waist, pulling me close.
I felt his breath on my neck.
A wave of revulsion crashed over me.
I turned over sharply, my hand flailing out, striking him hard across the face.
Smack.
"What the hell!" he yelled, sitting up.
I sat up, gasping, clutching my chest as I feigned a panic attack.
"I'm sorry," I sobbed. "I had a nightmare. You were dead. They killed you in Sicily."
He rubbed his cheek, his annoyance fading into a smug satisfaction.
He bought it. He believed I was terrified for him.
"It is okay," he said, soothingly. "I am here. I am alive."
I looked at him in the shadows.
"Promise me something," I said.
"Anything."
"Promise me you will never come back to this house until it is safe," I said. "Promise me you will not step foot on this territory while there is danger."
"I promise," he said.
He thought he was comforting me.
He didn't realize I was cursing him.
I was binding him to his own lie.
If he ever came back, I would make sure the danger he invented became very real.
