Page 42 of Reckless Sinner

Another, third part of me simply whispered,wait. Don’t move too soon.

Wait.

When I didn’t respond, Dad nodded. “Good girl.”

Hearing him say that, after hearing and loving Dante say that earlier, made my stomach churn.

Dad turned and went to the door—and then, to my horror, produced a key and inserted it into the outer lock on my bedroom door handle.

This was an old house and so most of the doors had locks on them, but I had never seen a key for anything other than the front and back doors.

“I’ll give you the night to think it over,” my father said.

A terrified noise escaped me and I scrambled forward, but it was too late—the door swung shut and I heard the key turning in the lock.

Panic settled in me and I clawed at the door, trying to yank it open. “Dad—Dad please, please no—Dad! Dad please, please—please let me out, please—please—”

There was no response.

There was no response all night.

CHAPTER19

Dante

Iexpected it to take a few days to hear back from my father. Instead, I got a call late that night.

“Hello?”

“There’s a car pulling up.” I didn’t recognize the voice but assumed it was one of my father’s men. “Get in it.”

Unlike what my father might claim, I knew when not to argue.

I just had time to throw on my shoes, grab my keys and wallet, and head downstairs before a plain black town car pulled up. I got inside.

My father sat on the opposite side. Up front was a driver—and Vincent.

“I’m just here to keep you two from killing each other,” my eldest brother announced.

“How’s Marco?” I asked.

“He’s handling it. He’ll be home in a month or so.”

“It’s good to see you. How’s married life?”

A genuinely happy smile spilled across Vincent’s face. “Great.”

He sounded fuckingdreamy. My brother, dreamy. Jesus Christ.

My father cleared his throat. “We were fortunate. We were able to get something for you far sooner than we expected. It seems your little lady caused quite a stir today.”

I frowned at that. “What are you talking about?”

My father produced a slim file and passed it to me. “We thought that printing them up for the most high-definition impact would be best.”

I opened the file and was met with several pictures. Most of them were just of the insides of a fancy brownstone, with cleaning supplies scattered throughout. I thought I recognized the place. When had I been here before?

Then I got to the final pictures in the stack, and before I knew it, my fingers were nearly tearing the photos from how tightly I was gripping them.

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