LUCA
“Luca, can I talk to you for a sec?”
Tristan was waiting for Enzo and me when I got out of the SUV. I was just getting home from my newest club, I was tired and hungry, and I wasn’t really in the mood for whatever the hell it was that made Tristan have that look on his face. Some shit had gone down between one of my guys and a member of the cartel who was in town to make a collection from me. The bartender called me as soon as things started to get heated, and I’d gotten there just in time to keep my cousin from getting shot. I didn’t need this shit right now. I had other things to worry about here at home.
“Can it wait?”
“No. I don’t think it can.” He and Enzo exchanged a look I couldn’t quite read.
My stomach growled. I was anxious to get inside to see if I could coax Veda into having dinner with me. “Can we at least go in the house?”
Tristan put a hand on my arm as I went to walk past. “Luca, just give me a minute here.”
I stopped, glancing back at him over my shoulder. Something was seriously bothering him. “Okay.” Putting my empty stomach out of my mind for the moment, I turned to face him as Enzo took up a position beside him in a show of solidarity. “What is it?” I asked, glancing between the two of them.
It was Tristan who spoke. “I want to talk about Veda.”
Instantly, my gut clenched. He didn’t need to say anymore. I turned and started back toward the house, shouting over my shoulder, “What happened? Is she alright?”
“Luca! Wait! She’s fine. Nothing’s happened.”
I swung back around. “Then what the fuck are you making me stand out here in the heat for?” Holy shit, I was so fucking ready for summer to end.
Tristan stood silently, waiting for me to come back.
“Luca,” Enzo said. “You might want to listen to us.”
But the thing was, I didn’t. Because I could tell by the way they were both looking at me that whatever the fuck they had to tell me was about to change things between me and my vita. And, goddamn it, I’d just gotten her back.
I let none of this show on my face, however, as I walked back to them. I crossed my arms over my chest. “I’m listening.”
“Don’t you think it’s strange that your brother just suddenly gave her back to you unharmed?”
“She wasn’t unharmed,” I corrected.
“Did she say something to you?” Enzo asked.
“No.” I shook my head. “But she’s not okay. She’s not herself.”
“She was alive,” Tristan said. “That’s all that matters.”
I looked at him like he’d lost his mind. “Mario is a fucking psychopath. I have no idea what he did to her while she was there, but I can guarantee the time she spent with him wasn’t something any of us would like to go through. So no. I wouldn’t say that she was unharmed.”
“He didn’t kill her,” Tristan repeated. “Why do you think that is?”
“Because it was more fun for him to give her back to me the way he did. So I would go fucking crazy wondering what happened.”
“Did you ever consider that he turned her?”
My eyes snapped to Tristan.
He held up his hand. “Hear me out.”
“What the fuck are you saying?” I asked him. “And you’d better think very fucking carefully before you answer that question.”
But Tristan wasn’t intimidated by my tone or the tension in my shoulders. He never was.
“I’m saying how do we know she isn’t a spy for your brother?”