Page 27 of Playing the Sicilian's Game of Revenge

Teo would not care for the answer, but Saverina considered it more deeply than she ever had. “Happiness,” she said gently. She’d thought that was Lorenzo being blinded by love talking, but now...

She just wondered if it were true. Could happiness and not worrying about revenge and competition really be the answer?

Teo’s scowl told her, Not with this man.

Happiness. Teo grunted irritably. Happiness. A man like Dante wouldn’t know what to do with happiness if it landed in his lap, so how could he be jealous of it in Lorenzo?

Teo glanced at Saverina. Dangerously close on the fussy little sofa. The smell of her perfume seemed to wrap around him, as it had done on the dance floor. The memory of her in his arms as they danced tonight was too potent.

Happiness.

Would he know what to do with it?

Well, he’d find out when he got his revenge. Because it was the only thing that could bring true happiness. That couldn’t shatter and break. That couldn’t leave a hole so big and wide it hardly mattered the good that had come from it.

People died. Revenge didn’t.

“I had just started university at the time,” Saverina continued, clearly focused on something he couldn’t quite follow yet. “Furious someone would print such blatant lies about my brother, obviously. Lorenzo was also angry, I could tell, but he wanted to keep me out of it.”

“I’m sure you took that equitably,” Teo muttered. He knew her too well. She would not have taken that easily.

She laughed, and Teo found himself leaning toward that sound. He missed her laugh. Her genuine smiles. He missed...

Well, nothing he wouldn’t have again. She’d get over this foolish, naive need for love. They’d have what they had before, and everything would be quite simple and easy. He was sure of it.

He always got what he wanted these days.

“I know he was worried I would become a target if I waded in. Lorenzo knew Dante could be ruthless even if the public didn’t. I understood his reticence to let me in. He’s always taken my protection quite seriously.”

For a strange moment, Teo felt...arrested. Deep within. The idea that Saverina being in Dante’s orbit might make her a target... He closed his hands into fists. He would kill first. But this was ridiculous, as he wasn’t putting her in any danger at all.

“But no, I did not take his warning me off well. I was determined to get to the bottom of the perpetrator of the attack. I’d already been developing my computer skills at that point, so I used them. To determine the police’s suspects, to track where Dante was getting his information.”

“They never even found a suspect for the attack.”

“No, but with what I did gather, I developed a...theory. I’ve never been able to prove it. It’s totally a theory of my own making based on circumstance, but perhaps it’s a theory we should consider once again.”

He knew he should focus on her story—it might lead him to an even stronger thread of revenge. Leverage. Everything he wanted. But all he could focus on was the part of her background that didn’t make sense.

“Whyever don’t you work in the Parisi IT department, Saverina?”

This question clearly surprised her. She made an odd little noise, then lifted her hand to flutter it in a strange gesture he’d never seen her use before. Almost as if she was flustered. Over a rather straightforward and easy question, all in all.

“It doesn’t matter,” she insisted. “What matters is, though I couldn’t prove my theory at the time and I let it go since I couldn’t, his wife stopped attending events with him after the attack on their son. Dante only ever comes to these sorts of things alone now, but before the attack on their son, she was always at his side, or she and his boys. They were always the picture-perfect family. The perfect contrast to Lorenzo’s singlehood and complicated background before Brianna.”

“The reports are that she suffers from some kind of condition.” Though Teo had never spent much time digging into Dante’s wife. She’d seemed rather inconsequential, especially since she did not attend events with the man anymore. The former staff member who’d once filled him in on what had happened to his mother had only sung Mrs. Marino’s praises.

“This very well could be, but I’ve always wondered. Could Dante have ordered the attack on his son himself? Could he have done it himself? Could his wife have found out about it? Is that why she stopped attending events right after the attack and has continued all these years? Is that why no perpetrator was ever found?”

Teo could only stare at her, sitting elegantly on her elaborate sofa, that excuse for a dress making her skin seem to glow gold. It would have threatened to be a distraction if the bomb she dropped was not quite so big.

Could Dante have attacked his own son? And for what? Just to blame Lorenzo? It was cruel and insane, but Teo was not above believing those things of Dante. And if it was true...

He reached out, all her rules be damned, and took her hand. Squeezed. “We must prove it, Saverina. You must prove it.”

She swallowed and looked away. “I will see what I can do, of course, but if I couldn’t find proof when it happened, how could I find proof now? Maybe you should hire someone else. Someone with real experience in investigation.”

She sounded oddly...insecure, when she’d always been so sure of herself. She was a confident woman, and she’d stood up to him time and again. Hell, she’d hacked into all his systems, followed him to that bar. Why should she seem...fragile now?

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