Page 63 of Tortured Hearts
No one will ever protect her like me.
No one will ever die for her like me.
Because no one will ever love her like me.
Chapter Nineteen
BECCA
When you sit in the same place long enough, time becomes inconsequential. You stop wondering how many hours have passed. You even forget how long it’s been since your last sip of water. It all becomes one never-ending blur of nothingness.
That’s where I am when the door opens—caught in a spinning circle of nothing. No thought. No hope. Just me, a cold, dirty floor, and endless time.
I roll my cheek away from the wall to see Gianni standing there as stone-faced as he was when he left. He’s in different clothes now, the battle of his personalities bleeding outward. Johnny is present in the fitted dark jeans and boots, but from the waist up, it’s all Gianni wearing the expensive-looking gray button-up and slicked back hair.
I feel like the change of clothes should be important, butthe part of me that processes thought can’t bother to care. Maybe it’s because deep down, I know the criminality of the answer and hearing it would make me face my part in it.
Yet I still push away from the wall. I still rise to my feet. I still face him with my chin lifted and my shoulders straight. “You came back.”
“I told you I would.”
He did. Part of me didn’t believe him, or maybe it wanted to, but a lifetime of disappointment in men shifted it into protective mode.
My fingers twist by my side, the unspoken question hanging between us like a rusted hook. I want to voice it, but every time I open my mouth, nothing comes out.
For a woman so skilled with words, I’m dragging the barrel.
Gianni stalks toward me, his predatory nature swallowing all the air in the room as he moves. Once we’re inches apart, he doesn’t touch me. He holds me hostage with that lethal stare. The one that drags a woman so deep she begs to drown. “No mercy.”
That’s all he says. Two words that convey everything.
The shoulders I’ve been holding so proudly fold forward, my lungs deflating in a rush of air. I should be horrified at how little regard he has for human life. Instead, those feelings turn inward. I want to care, but the truth is I don’t.
I’m glad Henry Saddler is dead.
I close my eyes. “No mercy.”
Christ, who am I? What have I become?
I feel the warmth of Gianni’s palms on my cheeks. “Becca, look at me.”
My eyes flutter open to find a different look in his. He’s still all mobster, but there’s a brittle edge to it. One that’s red-rimmed and underlined with dark circles, almost asif there’s a burden on his shoulders that wasn’t there before.
“What?” I ask, my voice shallow. “What aren’t you telling me? Is Henry not dead?”
“He’s dead.” His hold on my face tightens. It’s as if he’s afraid I’m going to slip away and disappear. “There’s no way I’d risk him getting to you a third time.”
I stiffen. “A third?” My heart catapults into my throat as he steps back, his lips flattening in a tight line. “Gianni?”
He doesn’t respond. Instead, he pulls his phone from his pocket, his eyebrows knitting together as he stares at the screen.
“Gianni, answer me.”
There’s a beat of tangled silence, then he lifts his head, and my stomach drops. The conflict I see in his eyes is more frightening than his darkness ever was. “Henry was the one who attacked you in that parking garage,” he says, pocketing his phone.
“No.” I point a shaking finger at him. “You killed that man in Providence. I saw his face on the news.”
“I killedaman in Providence, but he wasn’t the one who hurt you.”
