Page 91 of The Right Garza

“Well,shedidn’t do anything except exist,” he says. “She was my papa’s woman first, you see. He messed up one too many times, so she left him. Uncle Flavio, who had always wanted her, swept her up and made her his queen. By the time Papa came to his senses it was too late. For Papa, she was the one that got away. He resented Uncle Flavio, so he kept us from visiting the Garzas or attending their family gatherings.

“In our mid-teens, he had a slight change of heart and started allowing our cousins to come visit us, but never Monica. He refused to see Monica and Uncle Flavio together.”

Wow. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to come to terms with the fact that the Garzas are related to what appears to be a freaking mob family.

“Funniest part?” Stefano continues with a humorless chuckle. “Exactly one week after Uncle Flavio’s heart attack, Papa had one right behind him. The regret of forcing a wedge between himself and his brother instead of coming together as a family killed him.”

Damn. That’s sad. “I’m so sorry.”

His hand reaches up to my face as if to brush my hair from my eyes, but when I flinch in reaction, he drops his hand.

“I value family.A lot,” he tells me.“I’d shoot a woman dead before I let her come between me and my blood. But money…” He sighs dramatically. “Sweet Lexi, I do not fuck around when it comes to my money. My cousin seems to care about to you, andIcare about my cousin. But while I would never start a war with family over a woman, I would do it for five million dollars. So, for all our sakes, I am really, really,reallyhoping Trenton comes through on this one.”

Chapter TWENTY-SEVEN

“Ask me again.”

Lexi

After around three differentstops to “business associates”—I was left under watch in the car each time—the Escalade makes its final stop in the alley behindBlack Gold Casino.

Suited men with grim expressions file out of the vehicles and shuffle me through a black metal door guarded by two large men.

After climbing two flights of stairs, Stefano tugs me into an elevator with him and holds his hand up to halt the others from entering.

The elevator spits us out on the sixth floor, and he leads me into an office.

It’s quite an office. Wide and masculine, a dominant decor of gray and deep brown with an unobscured vista of the strip. It screams ego.

He gestures to one of two long, leather couches. “Have a seat, Lexi.”

I do so without argument, as I’m not sure if being secluded with just him is a good thing or a bad thing.

He strides to his ginormous desk, unbuttons his jacket, and sits down. He glances over and starts to say something, but then his phone rings and he answers.

And as soon as that call ends another one comes in, again, and again, and again. From his desk phone to his cellphone to his desk phone, one call after the next. Who is this man?

With my hands clasped in my lap, trying not to breathe too loudly, I listen to his one-sided conversations instead of the thundering beats of my heart. It is a terrible thing to wait in fear. Not knowing what fate awaits you. Death or freedom?

A knock comes at the door and Stefano pauses his phone call to give the knocker the okay to enter.

The doorknob starts to turn then stops. Sounds of a scuffle… A feminine screech of protest… A low grumble… Then the doorknob turns again and Lorenzo strides in with two takeout containers on a tray. His serious, don’t-fuck-with-me eyes sweep around the room and settle on me. Something glints in that terror-inducing gaze of his.

“Why are you bringing this instead of Kate?” Stefano asks with a scowl.

“She…tripped,” Lorenzo replies.

And I sense that there’s more to Kate’s “trip.”

Stefano sighs. “The shark is for me, the Salmon for Lexi.”

Lorenzo strides over to where I’m at and hands me the takeout container. On top of it is a sticker with “Salmon/Veg” scribbled across it.

“Thanks,” I mumble.

“Drink?” he asks, his voice a deep, low rumble, his gaze coasting over me like I’mhisown meal.

“Yes. Um, water.”