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“My father didn’t just fuck your wife.” I say the words nice and slow, watching as the vein in Sal’s neck starts to bulge, his fingers clenching into tight fists at his sides. “He also fathered a child with her. A son to be exact. A son you raised as your own.”

“You’re lying.”

I shake my head, and out of the corner of my eye, I see Rex and Dante come barreling into the room. But the words are already falling from my mouth.

“I’m not. That little affair they had resulted in a baby. Turns out Dante isn’t your son at all.”

“What did you say?” Dante growls, his nostrils flared as he strides across the room, shouldering past his father. He fists the front of my shirt, backing me against the wall. “Say it again,” he seethes, jerking my body so he can shove me again, only this time my hip hits the side of a table, and I wince.

“You’re my brother. Sal isn’t your father. Luca was.”

“You’re lying.”

I shake my head. Looking over Dante’s shoulder, my eyes scan the room to find Rex. His lips are in a thin line, his nostrils flaring, and I wonder if it’s because of how rough Dante is being with me or because of the bomb I just dropped.

With each labored breath, Dante’s eyes are begging me to tell the truth, so I do. My gaze is unwavering when I say, “Ask your mother.”

He releases me as though my words physically burn him, but I don’t get far because Rex steps into his place, towering over me, preventing me from moving.

The warmth I’m used to seeing in Rex’s eyes is long gone, replaced with ice as he looks through me. “You’ve got a death wish, Shae, because now you’re not just fucking with my father, you’re fucking with my brother, and that’s where I draw the line.”

“You don’t believe me? Ask your mom. Or better yet, here—” I dig in my pocket, pulling out the tattered letter Isa sent to me. “See for yourself.”

Isabella’s fingers cover her mouth as Rex rips the letter from my hand. Dante hovers over his brother’s shoulder, reading the words my dad wrote to his mother all those years ago, and I see the realization in Dante’s eyes.

Anger.

Disbelief.

Shock.

He looks at me, his gaze holding mine as chaos erupts around us.

Sal scans the letter over Rex’s shoulder, rubbing a hand along his jaw, and then he turns his rage-filled eyes on Isabella.

“What the fuck is this?” he roars. “Is she telling the truth?”

Isabella sits, stunned.

“Answer me!” Sal yells, charging across the room.

Isabella manages the slightest nod, her sad eyes finding Dante’s. “Yes. She’s telling the truth. Luca DiMarco is Dante’s biological fath—”

Sal cuts off her words of with a sharp slap to her face, and she falls to the ground in tears.

Dante rushes to her side, dropping to his knees, but Rex doesn’t budge. His feet stay planted on the floor, his eyes locked on mine.

This isn’t the man I know. There’s no way the man I grew to love would stand here after someone smacked his mom around.

Narrowing his eyes, Rex shakes his head in disgust as he takes a step toward me. “I trusted you, and you kept this from me?”

I want to defend myself, tell him I just recently found out, but what’s the point? Whatever we were is over.

“What’s it matter? We were never going to work, not with the history between us. Your father destroyed my life, and now I’ve destroyed his.”

Rex flinches, the slightest crack in his wall, but he quickly pulls himself together. “You didn’t just destroy my father’s life, you destroyed my brother’s as well.”

“He’s my brother too,” I hiss, and in my peripheral vision, I see Dante look at me.


Tags: K. L. Grayson Mystery