Page 30 of Make You Mine

“He’s supposed to go to Italy soon, so it will be interesting to see how that goes,” Micah adds, which he had shared with meover the phone. It eases my mind about Ashley’s safety in that house until we figure all this out. Now I just have to pray he actually goes.

Nico responds, “Don Amato thinks they may even request his presence sooner with all the strife going on because of him. Micah, while I have you here—Tony, the Soldati who guards the gate at Junior’s home, are you familiar with him?” He takes a puff of his cigar, and Micah nods.

“He’s working for me now on the inside, and I trust him. He’s the one who told me about witnessing Junior kill your father. Tony has no loyalty to Junior, but he spoke very highly of you and your father. He has no clue of your involvement in any of this, but if you would like to use him as an ally, I truly believe he would be loyal to you till the end.”

Micah swishes the brown liquid, staring into his glass. “At this point, I’m down with anyone who is against Junior, no matter the risks. I’ll talk to him.”

“Good, good,” Nico says. “Then it's settled, and I’ll let you all know as I find out more about this offshore account or any other intel.”

The mood is somber, no one wanting to continue the night with booze and cigars after the things we’ve discussed. So, we all finish our drinks and say our goodbyes.

“I didn’t think it was supposed to be cold tonight,” I say through chattering teeth to my brother, since we had the bright idea to walk home.

“Oh, come on, I figured you were used to the cold from your time in Europe. And this isn’t too bad. It will be much colder here by this time next month.”

His mention of Europe has my steps stuttering.

“What?” he asks, worry marring his face.

I turn to face him. “Did you tell Ashley I went to Europe with Amelia?”

Trevor faces me and bites out, “Who the fuck is Amelia?”

“A girl who was in a lot of my classes my freshmen year at NYU. We used to study together.”

“Okay, but why would I have said that…”

My annoyance rises at how oblivious he sounds. “Let’s start here… Why didn’t you tell me Ashley came to see you after I left?”

His eyes lower, and he shakes his head. “Fuck, Trent, I’m sorry, but you know it would have just made it worse if you had known she was looking for you.”

More sadness creeps in, because he’s right and part of this is my own guilt. It always felt wrong not to let her know what I was doing and that I was coming back. But at first, I convinced myself I was trying to give her a fair shot at being happy in the life that was chosen for her, and I didn’t want her to have thoughts of me holding her back from that.

Fuck, how wrong I was.

“I understand,” I mutter and begin walking again. Our steps are slow, my body feeling the heaviness of the past few days.

After a few minutes of silence other than the hustle and bustle of the city, Trevor speaks up. “Shit, I do remember now that she asked did you go with anyone, and I lied and said your study partner. I had no clue it was even a girl.” His face looks pain stricken at the sudden realization. “I remembernow how her face morphed from pain to fury. I’m so sorry. I’ll explain to her if I need to. I was just trying to protect you both.”

I shake my head. “It’s okay. Ashley believes me that I wasn’t with her, and I’m sure she knew you had your reasons for lying.”

Trevor throws his arm around me. “Damn, I never thought I’d look up to my baby brother. But the way you two have loved each other through everything and all the depths you have gone to for her…” He ruffles my hair like he used to do when we were kids. “I hope I can love someone like that one day.”

“You will.”

I barely hear his next words. “Or maybe I already have, but I’m just not allowing myself to feel that.”

“Take it from me, don’t hold back. If I had given up easily when Ashley told me she was promised to someone else, I would have missed out on the greatest love of my life.”

I’d rather be fighting for my happily ever after with her than going through the motions with someone else.

Ten

If I wasn’t already completely disgusted with this sick fuck, I certainly would be at this point.

Micah called my brother and me a few hours ago, saying that Junior was demanding our presence at his club to discuss Vito before he left for Italy. Apparently, Nico’s source was correct, because Junior is going sooner rather than later, which is a huge relief. I’ve barely slept since the day I found the bruises on Ashley.

The last thing I want to do is be near this son of a bitch unless I’m watching the air seep from his lungs…but here I am.

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