I pace up and down my study, hands stuffed in my pockets to stop me from punching a hole in anything. We’ve already had the door to this room replaced three times in the past two years. I’m astounded by Mia’s naivete. I guess I had her figured all wrong. Last night she seemed strong and determined, yet today she refuses to take any vengeance against the man who spent the last decade beating the shit out of her. I can’t comprehend her thought process. Why won’t she let us protect her?
A soft knock at the door snatches my attention. “What?” I bark.
Mia’s soft voice carries through the thick oak. “Can I come in?”
Why the hell is she here? “Yes.”
She walks in and closes the door behind her. Her right eye looks even worse today, and she blushes when she catches me staring at her bruised face.
“Did Kat check that out for you?”
She brushes her fingertips over her cheek. “Yeah, but it’s fine. It usually calms down in a day or two.”
The fact that her piece-of-shit husband has done that to her so many times before that she has a usual recovery window makes my blood fucking boil.
“Did you need something?” I snap at her, my tone harsher than I mean it to be.
“I just wanted to …” she chews on her lip. “You seemed angry about me not wanting anyone to hurt Brad?” Her voice rises at the end like she’s trying to understand my frustration.
Why the fuck does she care what I think?
She fidgets with a button on her shirt. “I’m sorry. I get why you’d want to do that, I mean, I do, but it’s not …” She swats at a tear running down her cheek. “God, I hate crying.”
I resist the urge to ask why she hates crying. She’s Kat’s cousin, so I will tolerate her presence in this house, but that’s as far as our interactions need to go. I open my mouth, about to tell her that she shouldn’t concern herself with what I think and then ask her to leave my study, but she starts talking again.
“I’d hate for anyone to get hurt or get into any trouble because of me. Brad’s a cop. He has a lot of friends in high places. I just don’t think he’s worth anybody’s time or trouble.”
That’s not what she means at all. I see it in every movement of her body. Every shadow on her face. What she actually means is that she doesn’t think that she’s worth the time or the trouble. That motherfucker really did a number on her. “What I don’t get is why you wouldn’t want that sick fuck to feel even a fraction of the pain he forced you to endure.”
“It wasn’t that bad—”
“Have you looked in the fucking mirror today, Mia?”
She flinches, making me feel like shit for victimizing her all over again, but she squares her shoulders and steps so close to me that I can smell her perfume. “I am well aware of what I look like, Lorenzo. But how is hurting Brad going to change any of what he did to me? You think if I could take back every single bruise, every single scar, every single time he raped me, every single moment I lived in fear that the next time he might kill me, that I wouldn’t do it in a heartbeat?” Her breath comes in pants, teeth bared and body shaking with temper. I was right. She is a feisty one.
I glower at her. “I would take all of those things back for you. I’d make him pay a hundredfold for every single thing he ever did to you.”
“But why?” She throws her hands in the air. “It would change nothing.”
“It would make you feel better,” I insist.
“It wouldn’t!”
“Fine. Then it would make me fucking feel better,” I shout.
She blinks at me, her hazel eyes fixed on mine. “Why?” She whispers the word so quietly I almost don’t hear it.
I have no idea why. No fucking clue why I care one single iota about making her shitbag of a husband pay for all the pain he caused her. So I ignore the question and try a different tactic. “Wouldn’t you sleep easier at night if he was no longer breathing?”
“Knowing that you, Max, or Dante had a man’s blood on your hands because of me?” She shakes her head emphatically. “No.”
“I have so much blood on my hands, Mia. Trust me when I tell you that ten more pints of it won’t make the slightest difference.”
She folds her arms across her chest, pushing her ample tits together. “I disagree.”
I snort. “What would you know?”
“I know that no matter how many lives a man takes, each one leaves their mark, Lorenzo. And if you were to have that on your conscience, on your soul—because of me—that would hurt more than anything he ever did.”
Fuck me, she really means that. It’s evident in the defiant tilt of her jaw and the way her hazel eyes sparkle green with fury and determination.
“Well, it seems like you got your wish anyway, because no one is laying a finger on him.”
Her face lights up with a smile, like she somehow won.
“He’ll come for you though. You know that, right? He’s not going to just accept you walking out on him without a fight.”
The light falls away from her expression and she nods.
I sit down and indicate she should do the same. “What would be his first move?”
“I thought maybe he’d file a missing person’s report, but …” With a shake of her head, she sinks her teeth into her full bottom lip. “I don’t think he’d risk his police buddies finding out who he truly is. He’ll track me down himself.”
“That won’t take long. He knows Kat’s your cousin, right?”
She leans back in the chair with a sigh and pinches the bridge of her nose. “Yes. But he doesn’t know where she lives.”
“Hmm.” I rub a hand over my beard. “With his connections, it won’t take him long to find this place once he learns she’s a Moretti. Is that Mustang yours or his?”
“It’s his,” she says quietly, sinking deeper into the chair.
“If I were him, I’d report it as stolen.”
“I don’t think he’s as smart as you are.” She gives me a faint smile. “But yeah, he probably will.”
“We can’t have cops turning up here looking for a stolen car.”
She gasps. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t think.”
“I’ll have someone drive it back to Boston and dump it near your house.”
Looking down at her hands in her lap, she nods. “I’m sorry.”
Seeing this strong, fiery woman so defeated and meek causes something inside me to snap. “That’s the third time you’ve apologized since you walked in here. Stop it.”
“I’m …” She presses her lips together. “It’s a nervous tic.”
Saying nothing, I stare at her.
“I appreciate you helping me out with this more than you will ever know. Thank you, Lorenzo.”
“Like Dante said, you’re family.” Brushing her off, I grab my phone and make arrangements to have the Mustang picked up and taken back to Boston. She doesn’t look like she’s buying my feigned disinterest; she’s staring at me with an expression full of curiosity and awe—as though I’m some hero who’s going to save her. I’m not. I can’t even save myself.
