Keeping My Bride by Angela Snyder
Chapter 52
Luca
BENITO ENTERS MY office a short time after I’ve settled down at my desk. The look on his face is serious and drawn, like he’s been contemplating how to tell me bad news for a while.
“You received a delivery,” he tells me.
I smile. “I know. I saw the painting by the door when we arrived home.”
“No, not that. Something else came in the mail.” He approaches and slides a manilla envelope across my desk. I stare at the envelope. It seems innocent enough. I turn it over and notice my name scrawled on the front in unfamiliar handwriting. “Who sent this?” I ask.
“We don’t know. It appeared in the mailbox the other night.”
I frown at that revelation. A hand-delivered letter can’t contain anything good when you live in the kind of world that we do.
Opening the envelope, I dump the contents out on my desk. Photo after photo of Verona appears before my eyes. Some are far away, through a telephoto lens, like Verona and I in the airport just a few days ago. And others are close, far too close for my liking. Her at the mall, shopping. My fingertips grip the edges of the photos that are zoomed in of her ass and breasts, and I crinkle the edges as a fury erupts inside of me.
“And you have no idea who did this?” I ask him.
“No, boss.”
“That’s not what I want to hear. I want to know who sent these and why. What’s their fucking game?” I demand, standing and pounding my fists against my desk.
“We were hoping that maybe you would have an inkling as to who might have done this. Give us a lead,” Benito suggests.
I stare at the photos and look up at him. There’s only one man who would do this. One man who has threatened Verona, touched her, tried to take her away from me. “Constantine Carbone,” I say. “He threatened Verona the night of the art gallery. Told her he’d see her again soon.” I glance down at the pictures. “He has to be the person behind all of this.”
“We should have gone after him the moment he laid a finger on Verona.”
“I know,” I agree, nodding. “But I promised her I wouldn’t go to war over it.” I sit down at my desk and lock eyes with my most trusted friend. “Now I don’t think we have a choice.”
“I’ll get the men prepared,” Benito says before leaving my office.
I sit in the room alone, pissed off and over-thinking everything. I can’t believe just an hour ago I was planning vacation trips in my head with Verona. I wanted to travel with her, leave this world behind us. But that’s the thing with the mafioso, you can never leave. Not unless you’re in a casket. I shouldn’t have entertained such childish illusions. And thanks to letting my guard down, I have to come back home to this fucking mess.
My eyes dart to the pictures once again; and the longer I stare at them, the more furious I become.
Constantine fucked with the wrong man. If he wants a war, then that’s exactly what he’s going to get. Because I won’t back down, and I won’t fucking stop until he’s dead.
