Page 43 of Broken Mafia Bride (His to Break #2)

GIULIA

T here’s a stretched moment of silence following my words before he begins to set my clothes to right and fixes up his pants.

“Come on, we need to talk.” He takes my hand and pulls me further along the side of the house. We walk past the garden and finally stop at the large tree with the swing attached to it.

I shiver a little as cool air whips past me. I’m not surprised when he shrugs out of his jacket and wraps it around my shoulders. I tug it closer around me, trying not to sniff at it like a creep.

Standing here with Raffaele, all I can think about is stepping up into his arms and letting him kiss me so I can just forget about everything. I want to go back to a time when I had no idea that my own grandfather is a monster. But I also know that living in the dark won’t do Noemi any favors.

I hate that my trust has once again been betrayed by another man who I thought was on my side. Just the other day, I was full of tentative hope about the future.

“After my father and I talked, and he made it clear that he supports whatever I choose to do, I stupidly assumed it would be all rainbows and flowers from then on.”

“What do you mean by that? What have you heard?” Raffaele’s words break through my thoughts.

I shake my head. “It’s not about what I’ve heard,” I tell him, pulling out my phone and navigating to my photo gallery before handing it to him. “I came across some evidence.”

He accepts the phone and stills. “What the fuck is this?”

“Those aren’t the only ones,” I say. “I only have a few, but there were hundreds of them in a folder in his office, Raff. Lucio’s been stalking me from the start.”

His gaze is still fixed on the screen. “That bastard!” he hisses.

“Apparently, Martina was on his payroll too,” I continue. “She was in the background of one of Caterina’s pictures, and she confirmed that she’d seen Martina come in and out of the estate in the past.”

I pause, swallowing. Just saying the words alone made my throat tighten. Why would Lucio do this? And worst of all is that he’s been pretending to be the good guy, the hero, and we’ve all been eating it up. I feel sick at the reminder that I’ve been so grateful to him for all his help.

The bastard!

Raffaele lets out a sigh, and when his eyes meet mine, they’re dark with determination. “I didn’t want to tell you this until I had more information, but…”

“What is it?” I ask when he trails off.

“Lucio’s reports were botched. According to him, there was an empty seat on the plane that left Sardegna a few days before Noemi went missing. But Matteo looked into it.” I suck in a breath, dreading what I know is coming. “The seat was occupied—and my best guess is that Martina was in it.”

Oh god.

“I didn’t want to jump to conclusions, but I figured there was someone in his ranks responsible for botching the report,” he tells me. “But after seeing these photos, I don’t think this has anything to do with someone in his ranks.”

My head is spinning. I can’t help but ask myself why.

Why would he take Noemi? What does he plan to do with her?

I can’t help but think that this is his way of punishing my father for taking my mother from him.

He lost his daughter in the past, and now he’s trying to gain back a daughter in any way possible.

A full-body shudder moves through me at the implication of that.

If that’s really why he’s doing this, then Lucio isn’t just dangerous—he’s a psychopath. And the urgency to get Noemi out of his depraved hands only grows. Suddenly, Casa Bianca doesn’t feel like much of a paradise anymore. It might look like one, but in truth, it’s a cage.

Sienna’s words replay in my head.

“Don’t tell me that you really believe this place is the slice of heaven you’ve sought after all your life. It may look like paradise, but beneath the colorful paint is the dark and the ugly.”

When she said those words to me, I had assumed she meant the mafia side of things. But now it’s clear that she felt something I didn’t, because I was too blinded by the lure of family, by the faint traces of my mother in the ancient halls.

This entire place is some sort of cult, with Lucio at the helm of things, manipulating situations like a fucked-up puppeteer. I find myself suddenly worried about Caterina. Was her entire relationship with Pepe fabricated by my grandfather in his desperation to keep her trapped here?

Does she know what kind of man he is? I know she loves and respects him like family, but?—

I shake my head to clear the thought. My first priority is my daughter.

“We have to find Noemi,” I tell Raffaele. “And we have a lead now. There has to be some information in this house. I need to talk to Caterina and?—”

He grabs my arm, halting the rest of my words. His eyebrows are pulled down in a frown. “Giulia, no. You have to let me do this.”

“I’m not going to stand by and do nothing now that I know he’s behind this!” I snap.

“You don’t understand how dangerous he is, the lengths he’ll go to.”

A thought suddenly occurs to me. “You think he had Isabella killed because she knew something?”

Raffaele rakes both his hands through his hair. “Isabella wasn’t the target. I was.”

“W-what?” I croak, eyes flying wide. “I don’t understand. Why would he want to get you killed? Why didn’t you tell me about this? What else are you hiding?” I hate the sudden hurt that rises inside of me.

I thought Raffaele and I were a team now, that we were in this together. After all, our daughter’s life is at stake. Doesn’t he trust me? How long has he had this information?

“I’m not hiding anything,” he says immediately. “I just found out about this. The man who made the shot was little more than a kid. Barely twenty. It took Pepe a while to find him, and then we questioned him.”

“And?” I ask impatiently.

He hesitates. “Still no idea who sent him, but that bullet was for me, not Isa. And my biggest guess is that whoever sent him was trying to stop my investigation.”

“You think it’s Lucio?” I ask carefully, hoping he’ll say no and tell me I’m being crazy, that my grandfather isn’t a kidnapping, murderous psychopath.

He glances away. “Giulia, I don’t know. But there’s a lot of evidence pointing toward Re Ombra not being who he says he is. Everybody on this fucking island is afraid of something—of someone.”

“W-what do you mean? Afraid of who?”

When he looks at me again, there’s something very serious and wary in his eyes. “I’ve been doing some investigating of my own.”

“You told me it’s been a lot of dead ends.” The words are almost accusatory.

“I didn’t want to get your hopes up for nothing,” he explains. “But there is some fucked-up shit going on in Sardegna. Everyone is afraid of somebody, and more than ever, I’m beginning to think that somebody is your grandfather. And if my suspicion is right, then neither of us is safe here.”

“I’m not running away.”

“I’m not asking you to.”

“Then what are you saying?”

“I’m saying we need to be careful. You think a man like him doesn’t have eyes and ears in his own house? We’re putting ourselves in danger by having this very conversation right now.”

“That was why Marco was here,” I tell him, unsurprised when his eyes harden.

I shake my head at his display of jealousy. “I had to ask Marco if he’s felt like he’s being watched or followed. I also told him to stop asking questions about Noemi’s kidnapping. I don’t want something to happen to him because of me.”

“How sweet,” he deadpans.

My mouth curves into a smile. “This is serious, Raff. This is life and death right now. I need to find out more. There has to be something in his office pointing to where he’s kept her, or what his plans for her are.”

His eyebrows draw down in concern. “No. I’m not letting you go back to that office. I’ll do it.”

“And if you get caught in there?” I raise an eyebrow.

“What excuse could you possibly have for being there? Face it—I’m the best option.

I’ll be in and out as fast as possible, and you can use that time to find out how deep Lucio’s psycho plot runs in Casa Bianca. Someone else has to know something.”

His eyebrows rise. “You’re thinking Pepe is involved, aren’t you?”

I shrug. “Lucio treats him like a son. There has to be a reason why. I just hope I’m wrong.”

“I just hope we’re wrong about all of this. Not just Pepe.” His dark blue eyes soften, making me feel too exposed.

The truth is that I also want all of this to turn out to be one big misunderstanding. Maybe Lucio has those photos because he was keeping an eye on us.

It’s time to get to the bottom of this once and for all. I start to step away from Raffaele, but he cups my face and pulls me into a smashing kiss that ends too fast.

“Be careful,” he tells me sternly. “Get out at the first sign of trouble. I mean it, Giulia.”

“Have some faith in me,” I retort.

“I wouldn’t be letting you walk back into the office of a man who’s probably been playing us like chess pieces for weeks if I didn’t.”

“I’ll be safe,” I tell him before hurrying away without another backward glance.

Hours later, when the sun is just starting to sink on the horizon, and the house has gone still and quiet, I slip out of my bedroom. I run into a few maids as I make my way down the hallway to my grandfather’s study. I paste on a smile for some of them, making sure to look as normal as possible.

Finally, I’m in his study.

I waste no time jumping into action. I pull out his drawers and search through them, quickly but carefully. I pull out several books from his bookshelf, trying to locate another secret drawer, but there’s nothing.

Frustration bubbles inside me the longer I search the office and come up empty.

Where does a man hide proof he stole his own great-granddaughter? There has to be something. But then again, he’s not going to leave evidence lying around.

Tears bite the back of my eyes when it becomes clear that I’m wasting my time. Except for the photos, there’s nothing else tying Lucio to my missing daughter.

I go through the study again, even going as far as to poke at the flower pots positioned near the window. Nothing.

“Damn it!” I bite out under my breath, sliding to the floor in frustration. “Where are you hiding your secrets, old man?”

Just then, my phone buzzes. I pull it out of my pocket and swipe to answer. “I’m kinda in the middle of something,” I tell Raffaele.

“There’s something you need to know,” he says, voice low and heavy.

I open my mouth to ask what?—

But something catches my eye at the base of Lucio’s desk.

I freeze. Crawl forward. Fingers shaking as I pick it up.

The moment I see it, everything inside me splinters.

Oh god.

“Giulia? Are you there?” Raffaele’s voice cuts through the static in my head.

A single tear slips down my cheek, but my voice comes out calm.

“Yeah,” I whisper. “I’m here.”