Page 119 of Last Shot

‘She’s right, Greyson,’ Frankie said. ‘You’re my big brother.’

‘I don’t have the same blood as you, Frank. You know my dad.’

‘I do. I had him shot about an hour ago.’

‘Giovanni’s not my—’

‘Your mum didn’t leave you, Greyson,’ she said, almost kindly. ‘She was forced out – surely that’s not a huge leap for you to make. You know what this family’s like.’

‘You’re wrong, sheabandonedus, she ... my dad said—’

‘That man was not your dad!’ Frankie screeched. ‘Giovanniis your dad. But the guy who raised you probably believed you were his.’

‘Vittoria said she knew how to hurt Giovanni,’ Max said. ‘I think she was insinuating it was the same way he’d hurt her – he had an affair.’

Grey swallowed, trying to make sense of it. ‘How do you know this, Frankie?’

‘Because of the money.’ She blinked. ‘Obviously.’

He shook his head. ‘None of this is obvious.’

‘She found the will,’ Max said. Frankie didn’t argue. ‘You needed to know the money was definitely coming to you before you went ahead with the bomb. That was Plan A, right?’

Frankie raised an eyebrow. ‘Libby said we had to have two plans, in case the cellar got screwed up.’

‘Yeah, sorry about that,’ Max said without feeling. ‘But at least I helped you with Plan B.’ Her gaze flickered to Skinner on the bed. ‘You’re not going to kill him, are you?’

‘He’s going to be responsible for the horrific murders of my family,’ Frankie said. ‘His fingerprints are already on the gun.’

Skinner moaned through his ties. Grey felt likehewas Skinner – hands, feet, mouth bound, wanting to scream, but not being able to find the words.

‘Libby fed me the story about Skinner,’ Max said. ‘All you had to do was wait for me to show up, pointing everyone in the wrong direction.’

‘You did it brilliantly,’ Frankie said. ‘It helped that Greyson was obviously so obsessed with you, he couldn’t think straight. That was a bonus I wasn’t anticipating – from what Libby told me, you really didn’t seem like his type.’

‘So I’ve heard,’ Max said.

Only silence from behind the door. Were they waiting for Frankie’s signal? Were they injecting the Barbaranis with the same stuff they’d neutralised the guards with?

Giovanni is your dad.

‘Dad’s been paying off your mum for thirty-two years,’ Frankie said. ‘It’s all there, in his financial stuff. I had to let ETR know how much they’ll be getting once this is done. I don’t think I’ll keep those payments going though – not really any point since you’ll be dead.’

‘It might surprise you to know that murder isn’t everyone’s first answer to their problems, Frankie,’ Max said.

Frankie shrugged. ‘It wasn’t supposed to get this messy. Like you said, the bomb in the cellar was meant to take care of everything. I left the note on Dad’s pillow that would make it look like a suicide because of the poisoned wine, and I was going to slip through the passageway and let it off, but you ruined that.’ She glared at Max.

‘Does Vittoria know?’ Grey said. But then he remembered her face as the door slammed. She knew. She’d always known.

‘I wouldn’t be surprised if she was the one who kicked your mum out.’

My dad is not my dad. Giovanni’s my dad.

Everything he’d been told about his mother ... about ‘women like her’ ... it ... it had all been ...

It was all a fucking lie.

Was that why Gio had always been so much harder on him than Jett? Was this why they’d taken him back after he’d deserted them for the army? Giovanni didn’t give second chances. But maybe he felt some sort of residual guilt at never claiming Grey as his own. Was it out of guilt or love or righteous duty that Gio had given Grey this job?

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