Page 28 of Wicked Bloodlines

“You searched my room.” Not a question.

“While you were out with Belle.” I watched her face, really studied her and saw no artifice. She was scared, but I didn’t think she would lie to me. “Your father’s finances. His meetings with Rossi. The trafficking. The murders. You built a case that could put him away for ten lifetimes.”

She closed her eyes. Her chest rose and fell in a shallow, rapid rhythm. “You copied the files.”

“Every last one.”

“Then you know.”

“I know you’ve been lying to me since the day you walked through my door. What I don’t know is why. Why bring that drive into my house? Why risk everything you’ve built?”

She opened her eyes. Tears tracked silently down her cheeks. She didn’t wipe them away. “Because I ran out of options. Because my father sold me to your family to secure an alliance while he was secretly working with the Rossis, and everything I’ve done for three years was to put him away and get my sister away from him.”

“Your half-sister?” He frowned. “I hadn’t realized you were close. I had to dig deep to even find evidence she existed.”

“Maria. She’s just sixteen. Cesare keeps her in the house as leverage. He’s been using her to control me since our mother died.” The words came faster now, tumbling out like they’d been dammed up too long. “Yesterday he sent flowers. There was a burner phone in the vase. He wants me to give him shipping intelligence from Pier 17 or Maria pays. The clock started at noon and I’ve only got twenty-four hours to figure something out.” By the end, her words ran on top of each other until she ran out of breath. When she gulped in a lung full, she actually looked relieved.

“Pier 17.”

“It’s a trap. I made false documents. The real shipments come through the eastern terminal, not Pier 17. I was going to give him the false information to buy time, and get Maria out with help from one of the servants who’s been with us since I was a child.” Her voice broke. “I had a plan. I had everything planned.”

“Then what the fuck are you doing in my garage at four in the morning?”

“Because I stopped wanting to leave.” She sounded so small, her shoulders dropping and the fight went out of her all at once, leaving her small and shaking. “Somewhere between the wall and your desk and the way you held me after, I stopped wanting to go. And I don’t know what to do! I don’t know how to be here and keep Maria safe at the same time!” The admission cost her something. I could see it in the way her body folded inward, the way her hands clenched at her sides. She’d built walls around herself for years, and she was letting me watch them crumble.

I stood there in the cold garage with a stolen key card in one hand and a woman falling apart in front of me, and I made the hard choice. I texted my brother to meet us in his study. “Come with me.” I took her hand firmly and tugged. “We’re talking to Dario.”

She didn’t resist. She let me guide her back through the service stairs, through the sleeping villa, up the grand staircase to the west wing where Dario’s study waited behind a heavy oak door. I pushed the study door open. The room beyond was dark except for the single lamp on my brother’s massive desk against the far wall.

“Dario.” My voice cut through the silence. “We have a problem.”

Dario Luca leveled a look on Sofia and I found myself stepping closer to her, putting myself slightly in front of her. My brothers arrived moments later. Gabriel in gray sweatpants and a wrinkled t-shirt, hair standing on end. Alessandro in silk pajamas, laptop already open on the desk, fingers moving over the keyboard occasionally. I swear, the man slept in a suit and never wrinkled.

Dario stood behind the desk in a navy robe and pajama pants, his salt-and-pepper hair rumpled, but his gaze sharp. He looked at Sofia, then at me.

“We need the drive you have, Sofia” I said, gently.

“It’s in…” she closed her eyes tightly as she took a breath, tears squeezing through her lashes to run down her cheeks. “It’s in the box on my dresser underneath the hair comb Belle gave me for my wedding.”

I looked up at Gabriel. He nodded and left the room to retrieve the drive. When he returned a few minutes later, he laid the small thumb drive on Dario’s desk.

“Tell them everything,” I said. “Everything you told me.”

Alessandro studied the documents on her thumb drive while she explained everything. He asked a few questions which Sofia answered as best she could.

“These are real,” Alessandro said once Sofia finished, and he’d had a few minutes to skim everything. “The metadata checks out. Bank records and offshore accounts, shell companies. Photographic evidence of Cesare meeting with Vincent Rossi at locations that suggest covert operations. Voice recordings of discussions involving murder, trafficking, and collusion with Rossi interests.” He looked up at Sofia. “You did this yourself?”

“Yes.”

“Jesus Christ.” Gabriel whistled low. “The man’s daughter, right under his nose.”

“That’s not the play,” Vittorio said. He hadn’t touched his coffee. “The play is the Pier 17 document. She created false intelligence. Cesare expects her to deliver shipping details by this afternoon. If we let that document run, whoever’s feeding him information in this house takes the bait, and we find our leak.”

“Chaos.” Gabriel grinned, the boxer’s nose crinkling. “I fucking love chaos. Let the old man think he’s getting what he wants while we rip his operation apart from the inside.”

Dario hadn’t spoken. He’d been watching Sofia the whole time, his blue gaze tracking every expression. Now he turned to me. “You trust her?”

The question hung in the air. Four pairs of eyes fixed on me. Sofia sat beside, her hands folded in her lap. Now, she ducked her head, but not before I saw her wince.