Page 36

Chapter 36

Juliette

I’d expected the female equivalent of Constantine—dark-haired, dark-eyed, and radiating the same intimidating presence. She exuded sweetness, good-heartedness, and all the other “nesses.”

And my brain is zonked.

Not that Constantine wasn’t good-hearted, but he didn’t have that look . He exuded power and authority. A controlled threat. And, well, that definitely worked for him (and me).

Isabella wasted no time in wrapping Colin in a hug, her arms tightening around him as she sent me a kind, slightly sad look over his shoulder.

“I didn’t know you were my aunt yesterday,” Colin said once she let him go, rubbing the back of his neck. “Or I’d have been nicer.”

“That’s okay,” she assured him, her voice as soft as her delicate features.

She sidestepped Constantine and came straight for me.

My purse slipped from my grip in time for her to crush me against her petite frame.

Stronger than you look. A little like her brother, after all.

“So, you’re the one who’s turned my brother into the teddy bear I always knew he was but refused to let anyone see,” she whispered, barely loud enough for me to hear, let alone anyone else.

“Guilty,” I returned in an equally hushed tone.

“She’s a little overzealous. Easy, sis.” Constantine tugged her away from me before hugging her himself.

“Thank you for having your father’s six out there today,” Isabella said to Colin afterward, gently nudging his shoulder. “I saw what happened on the security cameras from the garage before I wiped them clean.”

Colin swiped away his megawatt grin with the back of his hand. “Oh, um, this wasn’t from that fight, by the way.” He pointed to his eye as if embarrassed he’d let anyone land a punch.

Isabella took hold of his cheek as if she’d known Colin her whole life and examined the bruise. “Not too bad.”

I knelt and picked up my purse, narrowly missing tripping over our bags to get to Constantine.

“How about we go farther inside and not hover in the hallway,” Isabella, or I supposed I’d heard Constantine call her Izzy, suggested. “I don’t bite, I promise.”

“She does, in fact, bite.” Hudson’s comment earned an elbow from her.

Constantine took my hand to navigate around the luggage without tripping. The man didn’t miss a thing.

“This is sick,” Colin announced, arms wide open while spinning around, taking it all in.

It was pretty badass in an over-the-top billionaire-home way, but I couldn’t focus on the luxury around me. We could have been walking into empty space for all I cared. Decorations didn’t matter when I had everything I wanted in front of me—Constantine and Colin.

“Where’s Mom and Dad?” Constantine asked her.

“He’s working, you know him,” she said when Colin went over to the wall of glass that overlooked the park. “He never stops. Mom is in the wine room because she thinks getting us drunk is a good idea.”

She chuckled, then her gaze zeroed in on our clasped hands, and she lifted her chin as a reminder we were supposed to be playing roles. If their parents saw us handholding, the jig would be up.

Constantine let go of me and began casually stroking his jaw. “Still nothing on, well, anything?”

“Easy there, cowboy. You’re the computer genius amongst us. I’m good, but not ‘big brother’ good.” She winked, and I could already tell I’d love her. “Emilia did text that she’ll have something for us soon,” she added as a woman in a cream-colored linen pantsuit appeared at the entrance holding a bottle of wine. “This is my mom, Angela. Mom, this is Juliette and Colin Carmichael.”

Angela zeroed in on Colin almost immediately, her gaze snapping between her son and Colin. Her lips parted, and the bottle dropped from her hand, hitting the hardwood floor. Miraculously, it didn’t shatter.

Colin stepped between us, staring at her as she launched into rapid-fire Italian, her now-empty hands moving a mile a minute.

Constantine responded just as fast, his tone sharp, his hands just as expressive.

Before I could even process what was happening, Angela abruptly turned, striding toward the wall of built-in shelves. She pulled down a framed photo, her movements quick and deliberate.

Little ridges of shock peppered my skin as Izzy wordlessly picked up the bottle of wine while Constantine bit out, “Ma,” before she held up the photo before him, lightly shaking it.

“What is it?” Colin asked.

Angela spun around, holding up the frame, and Constantine bowed his face against his palm.

“You have a son you didn’t tell me about. How could you keep a son hidden from me?” Her voice was raw with hurt and disbelief. She turned the framed photo toward Colin, her glossy eyes locked on his. “You could be twins,” she whispered. “This is your boy.”

I finally looked at the photo. A much younger Constantine stared back at me. A high school portrait.

Colin took the framed image from her, holding it so tight his knuckles whitened. “Don’t be mad at him.” He slowly looked up at her. “He just found out about me.”

Constantine’s head jerked up, his whole body tensing like he knew what was coming next.

Meanwhile, my own shoulders snapped back, bracing for what I could only assume would be a verbal barrage in Italian.

“She didn’t know who I was.” Constantine—my hero, the man who stood between me and bullets—now stood between me and his mother, his body a shield.

Angela’s breath hitched, her thick Italian accent sharpening her words. “How could she not know?”

Constantine answered her in quick, clipped Italian, his voice low but weighted.

Colin and I awkwardly peeked around him, trying to gauge her reaction.

Hudson disappeared from sight as if deciding that this wasn’t his business and that he didn’t need to be there.

“I can’t believe this,” Angela said when he finished talking. She motioned for him to step aside, presumably so she could look at her grandson.

“Hi.” Colin lifted his shoulders, becoming six instead of sixteen.

Angela suffocated him in her arms, holding him even tighter than Izzy had. “My firstborn grandson.” She switched to Italian, and while I had no clue what she was saying, either her words or the moment sent Constantine over the edge and had him looking anywhere but at them.

You’re fighting off tears, aren’t you? He’d been through the emotional wringer since we came back into his life.

“I’m sorry I lost my temper.” She turned to me next, offering a hug I couldn’t refuse.

I inhaled her flowery perfume as she held on to me, and I peered over her shoulder at Constantine, discovering him now eyeing us, a hand to his mouth while breathing hard.

Izzy set aside the wine and hooked her arm with her brother’s, leaning her head against his bicep.

“What’s all the commotion?” A deep, male voice that felt like a crack of thunder in the room had Angela letting go of me.

I couldn’t believe it, but she was now defending me. She blocked us like a goalie prepared to stop anyone or anything from coming for us.

“We’re a packaged deal ,” I remembered Constantine promising me, and I guess he was serious. Once we were part of the family, we were protected as such.

“Dad.” Constantine stepped into my line of sight, his profile to me. Izzy gave him some space as he gestured toward Colin. “Meet your grandson, Colin.”

Angela hesitantly moved aside to allow Colin to come forward.

Constantine spoke in Italian, engaging in a heated discussion with his father. Lots of hand gestures and raised voices, and this was not going well.

“How could you do this? How could you be so irresponsible? So careless. This is your fault. You should have been in his life, and he should have been in ours,” his father snapped out in English as he stabbed Constantine’s chest with his index finger.

My heart broke for Constantine all over again. The man had been through enough. He did not deserve this from his father.

“It’s not his fault,” Colin came to his defense the way he had before. “Or Mom’s. I was an accident.”

Accident? Oh no. No, no, no. I whirled around to face him, dropping my purse. “No, you weren’t.” I held on to both his arms. “Never say that again.” I didn’t give a damn we had an audience. “You were a miracle. Do you hear me?” I hauled him into my arms as he held the framed photo off to our sides.

“And now the boy is in danger. Is that your fault, too?” His father couldn’t seem to read the room or back down.

“Stop.” I refused to hear him berate his son anymore. “Just stop.” I released Colin to face off with the man.

I didn’t care if he was some badass from Italy that even the mafia feared. No one talked down to the people I loved. Absolutely no one.

“You know what,” I began, striding over to him, “I don’t like you very much right now.” I stabbed the air in his direction. “I don’t like the pressure you put on your son all his life, either. Or the decisions you made on his behalf that hurt him.” I shook my head, gritting down on my back teeth. “And if you think for one minute you’ll get to be in your grandson’s life with this kind of attitude, then you have another thing coming.” I picked up my purse and used it to gesture toward a hall I assumed Hudson had gone down. “Now if you’ll excuse me . . .”

With my chin lifted, I walked around Colin’s grandfather, and I took off before I lost my spine and my nerve. I had no idea where I was going, but I wandered down the hall, a shaky mess, until I found Hudson.

“Where am I staying?” I asked him, trying not to break down.

Hudson looked over my shoulder, and I turned to see we were no longer alone.

“Can you give us a minute?” Constantine requested.

Once it was only the two of us, he swallowed the space between us, took my free hand, and guided me into one of the nearby bedrooms.

He shut and locked the door, took my purse and tossed it, then had my back up to the wall a moment later.

“I’m sorry. He just pissed me off so much,” I cried, blinking back tears as his forearms settled on the wall on each side of me.

He brought his face close to mine as he rasped, “I’m going to kiss you now.”