“How the fuck did they find us?” I said, controlling the anger in my voice. “Call Cain. Find out what the fuck happened.”

“Sir? We need you to fill out some paperwork,” a hospital worker said, giving me a wary look. I wasn’t surprised. I was like a caged tiger, ready to tear off everyone and anyone’s head if they even breathed wrong.

But she needed me. Angelique needed me. I had to stay calm and do what I could for her while I waited.

I walked through the ER doors and went to get Francesca’s paperwork in order.

Chapter Fifty

Francesca

The room was dim. Unfamiliar. I heard distant sounds, but they were hushed. Footsteps. A car driving past outside.

A machine. Beeping.

Where was I?

I turned my head and saw a machine. I was in a hospital. Fear started to pound through my veins. I wasn’t in pain. What had happened? Was I alive? How badly was I hurt?

I started to try to rise, but I felt sluggish. That’s when I saw him. A man sat in a chair by the window, his head in his hands. Vincent was here. I immediately relaxed.

“Vincent?”

His head snapped up.

“Frankie?” He was on his feet and by my side in an instant. “Oh, my God, Frankie.”

“Am I . . . am I okay?”

“Yes, sweetheart. Yes. You are okay. You fainted. Your blood pressure got too low.”

He gestured to a bag of fluids hanging beside me. Just like he had needed, I recalled. That wasn’t so bad. It happened.

But I remembered something else . . .

“I heard a shot,” I said, everything coming back to me suddenly. “We had just gotten to the house, and—”

“Yes.” He squeezed my hand. “They will pay for that.”

“Who was it?”

“One of the families. I’m not sure yet. It could have been random. A hunter.”

I gave him a dubious look.

“But it was probably deliberate,” he acknowledged.

“Did they hit anyone?”

“No. I don’t think they want to kill you. Perhaps just to scare us. But they will die for this, anyway.”

I nodded. That was how it should be. Even if it meant we would go to war. I sat up, still feeling like I was underwater.

“I’ve never fainted in my life. How embarrassing.”

He smiled at me then. A secret, happy smile. It took me by surprise, under the circumstances.

“You fainted because your blood pressure was low. You’ve been busy, it seems.”

“Busy?”

He nodded and placed his hand on my belly.

“Busy making our baby.”

Chapter Fifty-One

Vincent

“What do you want?”

Marco stared at me, clearly not sure how far he should reach. How brazen he should be with me. I could see the dumb fuck calculating in his head.

“I should kill you for what you did.”

“What you think I did,” he said with a sickeningly coy smile. He finally caught my energy and his smile faded. He cleared his throat. “But you won’t.”

“I still might. But I want to at least try to settle this without bloodshed. For Angelique. You might be a piece of shit, but you are her uncle, more or less.”

“Nobody got hurt.”

I launched myself over his desk, gripping him by the throat.

“You hurt my woman. You almost hurt my baby. That is unacceptable. I could start a war over this. And I would win.” I tightened my hold on his throat, and his eyes bulged. I could hear his windpipe creaking under my hand. “But you wouldn’t be around to see it.”

I released him back into his chair, and he gasped for air.

“You motherfucker,” he wheezed.

“Yes.”

“I could kill you for that.”

“You could try.”

“I should call my men in here right now.”

“Go ahead and try it,” I said, adjusting my cufflinks. I looked at him expectantly. “Rethinking that?”

“What do you want?”

“Actually, I want out. I want to hand over the family business to my consigliere.”

“Your cousin? That playboy?”

“He might look pretty, but he’s mean as a snake when he has to be,” I said with a bland smile. “And he’s much, much smarter than you. He’s smarter than almost everyone.”

“What the fuck does that have to do with me?”

“I will instruct him to give you a piece of the pie.”

“You’ll what?”

Marco’s eyes were bulging again. But this time with greed. I had his full attention now.

“We’ll give you something. The dens, maybe.”

“The gambling? What about the warehouses?”

I waved a hand as if I wasn’t giving away millions of dollars a year in profits.

“I’ll let Michael work out the details with you. I would need a promise that our people are treated well. And that we now have a formal alliance. An alliance to benefit Angelique. You don’t come after us, and we don’t come after you. For her.”

He stared at me, hard. He wanted me dead. He wanted my woman. It was very old-school Italian of him to think of taking a dead brother’s wife as his own. In this case, they were cousins. But they had been raised together under the same roof as brothers. So, it was nearly the same thing.

Tags: Joanna Blake The Margarelli Brothers Romance
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