Page 118 of Luca
Luciano just grinned. “Buddy, we're gonna have to put these women in line. You’re too good looking to settle so young.”
Bianca and Grace sauntered in behind the children, smug grins on their faces.
“They can always force Matteo to marry him,” Bianca mused. “After all, isn’t that the on-going theme with y’all?”
Nico’s lips pulled into a half-smile. “But Cara Mia, look how good it worked out for us.”
My sister shook her head, but her expression softened as she sat on her husband’s lap. “It did but you could have wooed me and got down on one knee.” She blew out a wistful breath. “That would have been super romantic. Wouldn’t it, girls?”
Hannah and Arianna’s faces lit up. “Oh, yeah!” They both exclaimed at the same moment and their eyes turned to Matteo. “We’ll make Matteo get down on his knees.”
The clear terror on Matteo’s face said it all. He wasn’t up for it. He bolted before anyone registered what was happening, leaving us all in the dust. My nieces were clearly unhappy about that and unwilling to let him have his space.
“Your girls are savages,” Luciano muttered.
Grace chuckled, taking her own spot on his lap. “And your son keeps taunting them, playing hard to get.”
Fuck, if this scene didn’t make me jealous. Everybody had their own family, gushing over their children while my own fucking disappeared on me.
“Luca was the only one who actually wooed his lady into marrying him,” Bianca said, her expression softening as she flicked me a glance.
Except that didn’t make me feel any better. Unlike my friends, I’d done something worse. I used our child as a bargaining chip. Granted, it was to save her life but it didn’t make it any better.
“Well, he had to do something for Margaret to disappear,” Áine said, glaring at me as she strutted through with Nonno on her arm.
Nonno shook his head. “We miscalculated, that’s all. But we’ll get Margaret and Penelope back.”
I got to my feet, finished with this conversation.
My grandfather was right on one account.
I’d bring them back.
If I had to burn down the world, drain the oceans, or move the planets in this solar system, I’d bring them back and then I’d never let go.
ChapterForty-Five
LUCA
The metallic smell filled Nonno’s dungeon.
The floor was sticky under my combat boots. I had tortured Guido’s brother for a week straight now. Family was sacred in our world. Yet right now as my clothes soaked with blood and his cries filled the air, I didn’t give a fuck.
The only family that mattered to me were my wife and daughter.
It had been two years, seven months, three weeks, and five days since I had last seen them. I missed two birthdays. Two Halloweens. Two Christmases. Soon, it’d be three and then who knew… four, five, six, all of them.
My heart pounded as I beat him. My ears buzzed. And I relished in his screams more than was normal. The rage that filled me grew with each day without my wife.
She left me. She took my daughter. She left me.
Two men lay crumbled on the stone floor at my feet. Nonno sat in his chair by the door. He insisted on being here. Poor guy. He thought he’d get peace after I married. The only thing he got was war.
War with his family. Discontent with Marchetti.
At least it wasn’t war. I’d kept him at bay about my daughter. I played the game of words. For two years, he’d nagged me about seeing my daughter. For two years, I’d assured him the arranged marriage would proceed as planned, when both of our children are adults and my daughter turned twenty-one.
We were a step away from war with Marchetti. I knew that both Nonno and I would sleep better when Guido was dead.
