Page 19 of Tortured Hearts (Marchesi Empire #2)

BECCA

I glare at the door at the top of the staircase, still hearing the moment it slammed behind Gianni, trapping the echo of his final words…

“Play along, Becca. Trust me when I say your life depends on it.”

His personality swings are giving me whiplash. One minute, I see the man who held me in his arms after my attack and rushed into a burning building to save me, and the next it’s like he never existed.

Stop this.

Obsessing over Gianni’s identity crisis won’t do anything but feed his father’s ego.

Rising to my feet, I storm across the room, my head swimming. Once I reach the landing, I pound my fist against the hard steel. “Open this damn door! ”

Just when I’m about to collapse from exhaustion, I hear a click, and my fist freezes. I don’t know who’s on the other side. Best-case scenario it’s Gianni. Shuffling backward, I brace myself for the worst case—Marcello Marchesi.

My breath catches as the door opens, revealing a muscular man with short brown hair pointing a gun at my face. There’s a fleeting moment where I consider fighting him for the weapon, but since the goal is to not die, I remain still.

“What the fuck do you want?” he snaps in a rough New Jersey accent.

I open my mouth to answer, but nothing comes out.

“You deaf, bitch?” The guard steps forward, waving his gun. “Answer me.”

I try again, only to have my vision blur, my “fight or flight” instinct turning more into “surrender and crash.” Think, Becca. You’re smarter than this. “I have to use the bathroom,” I blurt out.

He laughs and motions the gun behind me. That’s when I notice the white painter’s bucket, a slap in the face that makes my blood boil.

I grit my teeth. “I’m not using a bucket.”

“Then don’t. Hold it until your eyes float for all I care.” He steps back to close the door, but I shove my foot next to the frame, biting back a scream as the sharp-edged steel bounces off my heel. I’ve barely caught my breath when a hand wraps around my throat. “Vaffanculo, puttana!”

I don’t speak Italian, but the translation is obvious when I’m shoved backward so hard my spine slams into the railing.

I’m fucked.

I claw at my neck, so desperate for air that it takes a moment to realize there’s a gun pressed to my forehead. I don’t know if it’s the lack of oxygen to my brain, but as darkness closes in and fear takes control, I swear I hear my own words.

“ Men who feed on fear are derailed by defiance.”

As the phrase ricochets inside my head, my concrete prison crumbles, and I’m thrust back into my office that first day, surrounded by colorless walls and the scent of burnt pine. The day a smooth, arrogant man walked into my world and flipped it upside down.

A struggle is exactly what this guard wants. Guards may rank lower on the mob hierarchy, but I’d stake my license that this idiot subscribes to Marcello’s same misogynistic ideas. That’s why my chance of survival hinges on weaponizing something men like him lack.

Basic logic.

I stop fighting and drop my arms by my side. The sudden change throws him off, and the pressure around my neck lessens. “Have you ever heard of E. coli?” I rasp.

“The fuck?” His grip on my throat slips even more.

“That’s what I thought.” I smile as if I’m not one trigger pull away from having the back of my head explode. “It’s nasty bacteria that wreaks havoc on a body denied its basic functions.”

“I don’t care if?—”

“I’m talking more than a UTI.” Taking a risk, I push away from the railing and brace for retaliation.

However, instead of resetting his hold, he lowers his hand from my neck to my shoulder, spurring me on.

“You’re looking at infections, fevers, sepsis…

Left untreated, it becomes a life-or-death situation. ”

“What the hell do you think you’re in right now, bitch?”

“Fair point. However, I’m a pawn in this family feud,” I say, holding his stare. “And we both know I’m more valuable alive than dead, or we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

“Listen, you?—”

“So let me be clear…” My heart is beating so fast it feels like a thoroughbred is trampling my chest, but I push forward.

“Who do you think Marcello would hold responsible if a doctor had to be called in?” I cock my chin.

“I don’ t think he’d appreciate more people knowing he’s holding an innocent woman captive. ”

“No one who finds themselves here is innocent, lady.”

“Were any of them a police chief’s daughter?” I counter. “One who knows all about your boss’s dirty little Rogue side venture?”

As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I want to shove them back in.

Reminding a criminal you’re a cop’s daughter is bad enough, but throwing mob secrets in the mix is suicide.

Plus, we both know my threats are empty.

A man on the FBI’s radar would never outsource medical care.

However, the longer the guard’s silence stretches, the stronger my hope grows.

His pupils widen, devouring every sliver of brown until there’s nothing left but darkness and doubt. Then the pressure on my shoulder and forehead disappears, and he shoves his gun back in its holster. “I’ll be back.” Offering no further explanation, he walks out, slamming the door behind him.

I bow my head, the knotted tension in my shoulders easing. I’m not arrogant enough to take those words at face value. He could return with a command to grant my request or an order to snap my neck.

I stumble down the stairs with a rattly cough. Whatever happens, at least it’ll be on my terms. Once my feet touch the floor, a wave of exhaustion hits, and I lean against the wall.

Ball’s in your court, Marchesi.

I’m on my thirty-fourth lap around the room when I hear the door click open. I cut my eyes toward the staircase, expecting to see the same sullen-faced guard. Instead, it’s the last person I anticipate finding.

“Henry…” I stammer, panic overriding su rvival. The copper-haired “boy next door” is gone, along with his kind smile. In his place stands a predator. “What are you doing here?”

“Let’s not play games, Doctor. They no longer interest me.” He descends the steps slowly, flashing a lethal sneer I recognize all too well.

I think back to the first moment I met him at the dock warehouse, so willing to help me find Gianni, then at the same time so mercurial, so one-dimensional, so full of questions that were none of his business.

How did I not see it?

“Where’s the guard?”

“Woodchipper. Pig farm.” He offers a distracted shrug. “Hard to say. Marcello is creative with his cleanups.”

“He’s dead?”

“You sound surprised. I’d think a woman of your intelligence would realize the consequences of her actions.”

I scowl, my panic turning volatile. “That’s rich coming from you.”

He hops off the last step. “I’m not the one locked in a basement. I’m also not the one who informed a low-level guard his boss had infiltrated a forbidden territory. Here’s a tip… When threatening a man with his boss’s ‘dirty little Rogue secret,’ make sure he’s in on said secret.”

“Like you?” I bite out, lifting my red, swollen wrist. “Is this your handiwork?”

I shiver at his burst of maniacal laughter. “You were ridiculously easy to manipulate, Becca.” A few strides bring us face to face, the scent of his cheap aftershave turning my stomach. “Gianni never shut up about you, giving me every weapon I needed.”

For my every stumble backward, he takes a step forward, closing in on me faster than humanly possible. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Stall him. Keep him talking.

“Oh, please. We both know you were nothing but a replacement.” Pausing, he tilts his chin. “You know, it’s actually kind of funny. You pride yourself on getting inside people’s heads when it was Gianni who got into yours.”

“You’re wrong.”

“If I was, you wouldn’t be here.” At my involuntary wince, he flashes a smile that never reaches his eyes. “Gianni and Marcello are the same person, sweetheart. The only difference is one embraces who he is while the other fights it.”

I clench my fists by my side. “Gianni is nothing like his father.”

“You seem awfully confident in a man who lied about his entire identity.”

“You’re not the one who spent eight weeks analyzing him. What someone calls themselves becomes irrelevant once you delve past the surface.”

“You see what you want to see. Gianni Marchesi’s life was mapped out the day he came into this world, and nothing and no one”—he gestures down my body—“can change it.”

My stomach churns, but I stand my ground. “Children can break the mold their parents made for them.”

“Because that worked out so well for you , didn’t it?” He shakes his head with a rough chuckle. “You’re just as dumb as he is.”

My breath catches, his dig hitting deep. “You don’t know him like I do.”

Henry cocks an eyebrow. “Which version … the one I pretended to protect or the one I hunted behind his back?”

I’ve treated enough narcissists to recognize a reach for validation when I see it. He doesn’t want to just destroy Gianni; he wants to be Gianni. To prove he’s better, smarter, darker.

So I deny him what he wants most: acknowledgment.

“You claim him to be a monster, but you’re forgetting a key component…

” When I hear his molars clack together, I know I have his attention.

“Gianni never pretended to be a white knight. He always told me if I believed nothing else, to believe he was no hero. You, however, spent four months masquerading as the good guy, only to be a wolf in sheep’s clothing. ”

His eyes darken. “If you have something to say, then say it.”

“It sounds to me like you’re projecting your insecurities onto him.” I lift my chin. “So maybe it’s you seeing what you want to see, not me.”

“Be very careful, Doctor,” he hisses between clenched teeth.

I’m getting to him. He’s on the outside looking in, a nobody playing a master’s game. It’s in the superior smile that always hid a bottom-layer player with back-alley morals.

“What’s wrong, Henry? Did that thorn dig a little too deep?”