Page 8 of Lies like Rubies, Part Two (Savage Jewels)

“Can you sign this paperwork for me, sweet Sofia?”

His voice was soft and gentle, placating, as if I were a wild animal that would bolt at the slightest provocation. Maybe I was.

“What is it?” I asked, shaking my head, trying to clear the fuzziness from the drugs he’d given me.

“Just some papers to make sure that Lizzie’s taken care of if anything happens to you.”

“No,” I whispered, horror washing over me. Sergio’s cruel smile was the last thing I saw before I lost consciousness again.

5

LORENZO

Dante and Lucaglared at each other over Lizzie’s head as they pushed her back and forth on the swing, Dante behind her, and Luca catching her feet on each upswing, before letting her go.

Lizzie giggled, unaware of the tension as they pushed her to and fro.

“They’re assholes,” Nick muttered.

“Yep.”

“She’d hate this.”

Sofia would hate Dante and Luca refusing to play nice in front of Lizzie. She’d hate the barely suppressed violence that neither of them bothered to disguise or put away. Most of all, she’d hate that we only had Lizzie for an hour. When our time was up, Luca would sweep her away and take her back to the Russo compound for Miss Carolina to dote on while we continued our hunt.

Dante would swing by again to read her a story before bed, and then he’d be gone, raining violence down on Yorkfield. Nick would stop by in the morning to have breakfastwith her, but we’d betrayed Sofia entirely by leaving her daughter with her parents.

“Lorenzo,” Nick said, censure in his voice.

“Yeah, I fucking know she’d hate it,” I snapped, fucking tired, fucking worried, fucking wanting Sofia back. The love of my goddamned life, and I hadn’t had the courage to tell her when I had a chance. And now I had to?—

I had to share her.

No.

I wasn’t sharing.

I had to reframe this bullshit, or I’d never get her back, even once we found her.

Sofia wasn’t a chew toy for us to fight over. She was a strong, beautiful, brilliant woman who’d been through hell, who was currently in hell, and if just one of us weren’t enough?—

My heart cracked. I’d never been enough. I’d neverbeenough.

“Hey,” Dante shouted as Luca snatched Lizzie out of the swing and swung her above his head. Lizzie loved it, of course she did. These evening excursions with her uncles were the highlight of her day.

Under any other circumstances, the sight of the four of us, the fucking mob, bloody knuckles and tattoos and shadows under our eyes, stopping our hunt for Sofia every day to play with her daughter would have been fucking adorable.

I missed her.

Luca brought Lizzie back over to us, but conspicuously didn’t let go of her. Dante surreptitiously checked his phone before returning his attention to the girl in Luca’s arms.

“Ice cream?” Lizzie asked, knowing none of us could refuse her anything. At least with the four of us, she wassafe. Not a single one of us trusted her to the others, and it killed me to drop her off at Tony’s at the end of these playdates, knowing I was no longer welcome.

“Go,” Nick instructed Dante and Luca. “We’ll sit outside.”

Unexpected, but sure. We followed the two men who were so damn similar, with their broad shoulders and dark curls. Nick grabbed a table, and I let my eyes rove over him—khaki shorts, polo shirt, boat shoes, blond hair, and green eyes—a pediatrician who’d taken a wrong turn at the yacht club and found himself mixed up with the mob.

He pulled out a chair.

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