Page 115 of Unchained

Hard work didn’t help the feeling go away, though. It kept nagging at me. The dread on her face when she got the phone call. Which is why my whipped ass called Hunter and got the jet ready for an impromptu flight to California.

Never in a million years did I think I’d miss having Gianna around me. Even if she does leave her side of the bedroom like a damn pigsty. Clothes all over the floor, makeup on the bedside tables.

I pull up her contact and text her…

Me: Did you arrive safely? Or have you had your fingers cut off already?

I sit on the edge of the bed in the plane, waiting for her to read it. And she does, pretty damn fast.

Wifey: I’m here, and still have all ten fingers. Why?

Me: Well, I assumed there must have been a dramatic reason for you not to have texted your husband to let him know you arrived safely.

I can already picture her rolling her eyes.

Wifey: Dear God, you’re dramatic, cowboy.

Me: Caring about you makes me dramatic?

Wifey: Caring about me will make you weak, Colten.

I tut. She always finds a way to push back, but that is part of the appeal. I know deep down, she don’t mean it. I wanted to check on her because I could tell she was dreading going home. After what went down with Levi, I doubt her father is going to be happy. And I’m not too sure how a man like Vito behaves when he’s angry. That, and the way her face paled when she spoke to him this morning. Which is exactly why I’m thirty-eight thousand feet in the sky right now.

Me: Nothing about you makes me weak, viper.

I wait for the sassy quip to pop up, but it doesn’t. So I lay down on the bed; I’ve still got forty-five minutes left on this flight before I land. I’ve got her and Vito’s addresses loaded up on my maps and a car waiting for me at the private airstrip.

Something in my gut told me I had to be there, that it wasn’t right letting her go do this alone, even if it is her father.

After how he behaved at our wedding, I don’t trust him around my wife, and I don’t like the person he makes her. I’ve seen the Gianna that’s hiding under the surface, and when she comes out to play, that woman can take on the world. I’ve seen how much she's changed in the short time she's lived on Sterling Ranch. Give her freedom, and she’s amazing. It’s her father who is holding her down, and once she realizes this, she’s going to be unstoppable.

Gianna needs to learn pretty damn fast that she doesn’t have to carry this all on her own. And if what Romeo said is true, then I can’t let G be around her father.

I have to do worse than that; I have to persuade her to kill him.

CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

Gianna

“What’s got you smiling at your phone?” Dom asks from the passenger seat.

I’ve parked up around the corner from Dad’s mansion, replaying the script in my head of what I’m going to say to him. I have to get him to tell Levi to back the fuck off Sterling Ranch.

A rock settles in my gut.

My father wants the Sterlings gone. And I know that isn’t going to work. My father doesn’t understand the scale of Enzo’s world. If he keeps pushing, using assholes like Levi, he’s going to get us all killed.

I chew on my lip as my chest squeezes. I know it’s more than that. The thought of anything happening to that ranch wakes me up in a cold sweat at night.

Thinking about Wyatt, Harper, and the kids all on that ranch. About Colten, and the way he makes everything seem that little bit brighter in my life without even trying.

I was living in a storm, and now that I’ve started to see the other side, I’m not sure I want to go back to where it’s cold and dark. I can’t seem to figure out a way to live in the middle. Where I have both.

With how my father is reigning, I don’t believe it’s an option anymore.

“Colten asked if I had my fingers chopped off,” I tell Dom.

“And may I ask what prompted that?”