“Of course I am. I love him.”
Carlo’s face grew taut, his jaw ticking—just like his brother’s would do. He scrunched up his nose, shaking his head as if trying to get rid of a thought. “Do you love him the same way you loved me?”
“I never loved you!”
He cranked his neck from side to side. “If you didn’t love me, then why did you act all broken hearted after I left?”
What?
“You watched me?”
“Of course I watched you. You were a major part of this plan. I had to keep my eyes on you.”
I stared into his eyes, and the absence of an elongated pupil caused my heart to crack.Where was he? Where was Castello?
Carlo leaned closer, placing his hand next to my head on the wall. “I bet your little brain is about to go into overdrive trying to figure all this out.”
“Just tell the bitch so that we can move on,” Vico chimed in from the other side of the room. Every time he spoke, my body shuddered.
Carlo turned and glowered at Vico over his shoulder. “I think you should give Tatum and me some time alone.”
Dear God, no. As much as I hated Vico, I didn’t want to be alone with Carlo.
Vico shrugged. “Whatever. And don’t let the fact that she’s breeding a bastard child fuck with your head. It just has to die with her.”
“No!” My survival instinct kicked in, and I glared at Vico, wishing I could skin him alive. “You are not going to hurt my baby.”
“Sorry, sweetheart, we plan on hurting you so the baby will be collateral damage.”
“What do you want from me?” I bit out between clenched teeth.
Carlo stood up straight and moved back. “Let me explain exactly what’s going on here. You sure you don’t want to take a seat?”
“Fuck you.”
“Ooh, I see my twin brother turned you into quite the feisty one.” His eyebrows lifted, an amused look on his face. “Okay, then. So here’s the story.” He started to pace again, but I decided that my attention needed to be on Vico. He didn’t leave as Carlo requested, and he was the devil I needed to fear.
Carlo clapped his hands. “So where do I start? Okay, so I’m not dead…obviously.” He snorted, and I just glared his way for a second before turning my attention back to Vico.
“See, when I found out about the hit your father had put out on me, I decided to use it to my advantage. I let my family think I was dead, except for Vico here, and my mother.” He cringed. “Unfortunately, none of us figured Dad’s heart would stop. Oh well, we would have killed him eventually if he didn’t die. So I guess it worked out great.” He smiled, and when he noticed neither Vico nor I were smiling with him, he pulled his face straight. “Anyway, as you know, Castello was supposed to kill you and your father. But we all know how that turned out. I always knew he was the weakest link in this family.”
“So you faked your own death. And what did you hope to accomplish with that?”
Carlo walked up and down the room. “The plan was to kill you and your father after he paid the ransom, and then once all the dust settled, Vico here would have driven a knife through Castello’s heart, and I would pretend to be him.” He gestured to the side of his face. “I even had a fantastic make-up artist in the bag, or should I say in my bed, to help me look like my brother. I would have eventually pretended to have the scar surgically removed. But yeah, it never got to that because you managed to hook your claws in my twin brother.”
I shook my head. “You’re not making any sense. Why would you want to pretend to be Castello? You were the rightful heir anyway.”
He placed his finger on his lips. “True, but see…our worthless father and his gambling addiction put me in a position where I had to step up. If I didn’t pretend to be dead, Castello would never have wanted revenge. I knew your father wouldn’t give me the money I had asked for in order to assure I stayed away from you, so this was our only option to get our hands on your family’s money. I pretend to be dead, my twin brother demands revenge, we get paid, kill my twin brother, and then I rule. It’s simple.”
I swallowed hard. “Why did you need Castello to kidnap me? Why couldn’t you have just done it yourself since being a stone-cold, lying son of a bitch is your forte?”
That goddamn annoying smile that seemed like it was permanently plastered on his face grew wider. “God, I have to say, I love what he did to you.”
Vico snorted but remained still.
Carlo sat down on the bed, his elbows on his knees. “You see, Tatum, if I had to just kidnap you, hold you for ransom, and in the end kill everyone in your family, what would that say about me?”
“The truth.”