The Recluse Heir by Monique Moreau

22

Ididn’t run after her. Thinking back, I probably should have. I didn’t know where she was or if she was okay, and that…bothered me. The look of devastation on her face was seared in my mind’s eye. The one time I thought I could be happy had been a fucking illusion. This proved a sneaking suspicion I’d buried down deep; I didn’t deserve to have what everyone else had.

Instead of going after her, I did the next best thing. I trashed my place. Wireless keyboard, books, files, vases, overturned furniture. I started in the office and methodically made my way to the living room, leaving holes in the wall in my wake.

Nicu flew into my apartment, door slapping against the wall, gun propped in both hands. Swinging it left and right, he scanned the area until he saw me.

“No one’s broken in. It’s only me, ruining my own apartment,” I declared. By this time, I’d collapsed on the floor, legs splayed open as I stared down at my bloody knuckles.

“What in the ever-loving fuck happened?” he asked, looking around in bafflement.

I might get angry and snarky. I might give a dressing-down or a verbal lashing, but I didn’t do destruction. That was more his thing. Even as a kid, if we’d both been given gifts, he’d have obliterated his toy car before dusk had fallen while I kept mine pristine in its box, taking it out on occasion to play and then safely returning it to its rightful place.

Until today.

I was so furious and hurt, that the violence exploded out of me, unimpeded. My control snapped, and I didn’t want her to see me lose my shit. That was the primary reason for making her leave.

I told Nicu that I caught Cat digging into my files and had thrown her out. She didn’t know they were dummy files, placed there in case we ever got searched by the Feds. Please, I wasn’t stupid enough to leave a paper trail of our activities. Every single transaction was encrypted and untraceable, holed up in a server farm in a converted Weimar bunker in Germany.

But that didn’t stop me from hating her betrayal. Had she played me for a fool from the beginning? I shook my head adamantly. Before finding her sprawled over my folder files, I would’ve sworn on my mother’s life that she’d never do something like that. A prickling on my nape scolded me for not listening, for not digging deeper, but I was so consumed with the need to get rid of her before I wrecked the place, I couldn’t think clearly. Fuck, I was conflicted, and I didn’t like it one bit. I should have nothing to do with her, want nothing to do with her. Instead, I felt like I’d made a mistake. Maybe I should’ve listened to her stumbling excuses. Sifted through her reasoning. For the first time, I was willing to give someone the benefit of the doubt.

I turned to Nicu, who was praising me, “Good riddance, brother. She’s a Popescu, for Christ’s sake. I could never trust another mafie female outside our family. Never.”

“That’s because you’re a suspicious motherfucker,” I grumbled.

“You can’t live in this life, even vicariously as our women do, without it tainting you. Not fucking possible. And a Popescu is as dirty as they come.”

“Stop saying that,” I snapped. I had no idea why his words were pissing me off, but they were. No, I did know. I was still protective of her. God only knows why, considering what I’d caught her doing, but there it was again. That feeling of having missed something.

“It’s true, Luca. That’s why I never allowed myself to get close to her. She’s poison. I didn’t fall for that little innocent act. Impossible for a Popescu to be innocent. It’s not in their DNA. Are you sure she was a virgin, because I had my doubts.”

“She was a virgin. I can vouch for that,” I growled as I got to my feet. Damn, his matter-of-fact acceptance of her deceit infuriated me. Lack of shock was one thing, but his lack of surprise was getting on my nerves.

“Sure about that?” he challenged, as he took a seat and lounged across my couch. “They already used fake blood to make it seem like Una had a miscarriage. Who says they wouldn’t do it for a hymen.”

“It wasn’t fake,” I ground out, pacing. Swear to God, if he kept up this line of questioning, I was going to clock him.

Nicu bent over his phone, tapping out a text. Pressing send with a flourish, he righted the upended coffee table and tossed his cell phone on top. “I just texted Alex and Tatum. They’re coming over.”

I buried my head in my hands and groaned before falling onto the couch beside Nicu. “Fucking thanks, bro. Just what I needed is those two assholes in here. Can’t catch a break.”

“Seriously? You caught her ransacking your files. This needs to be dealt with. And why did you kick her out? You should’ve locked her in a room and called us to figure out what to do with her,” he said.

“To do with her?” I pulled back and blinked at him. “What were you thinking of doing to her? You couldn’t hurt her.”

He waved his hand dismissively, even though there were strict rules of engagement. No touching women or children was one of those bright-line rules. I snorted. With Nicu, you never knew.

“Of course, I wasn’t going to hurt her.” His voice dropped to a dangerous tone. “I don’t hurt women.”

“Good to know,” I muttered.

“But that doesn’t mean you should’ve let her waltz out of here. We could have used her. Exchanged her for something. How long has she been gone? I could run her down.”

He made to get up, but I slapped a hand on his chest and shoved him back into the depths of the leather couch. “Stay there. She’s long gone.”

Fuck that. He wasn’t touching my woman. Christ, she was no longer my woman, but there was no way in hell Nicu was laying a hand on her. A vision of her kneeling at my feet, haunted eyes staring up at me, bleeding remorse and desperation, reared up. I scrubbed my eyes with the heels of my palms.

I bet her family put her up to this, those godless jackals, but it had been her choice to go with their plan. That was what hurt most. Although, she’d gone about it like she wanted to get caught. Thinking back, I realized they must have gotten to her when she’d visited them. It explained her quietness and withdrawal when I picked her up. Fuck, guilt percolated inside me. She was young and impressionable. I should have been there to protect her. Then again, she was her own woman. She should’ve chosen better. She should’ve chosen me. I gripped my forehead; a migraine was coming on.

Alex and Tatum sauntered through the door, left open by Nicu. Tatum locked it and turned to survey the damage. His razor-sharp gaze ended its voyage on me, sizing me up for a long moment. Whatever he saw made him avert his eyes. Tatum was my closest friend. I wasn’t his closest friend, because, until Cat, I was unwilling to reciprocate the intimacy required for a mutually intimate friendship, but he knew me. He knew my heart was bleeding out.

Alex, on the other hand, was deep in fixing mode. Lifting an armchair, he placed it upright only to have it crash over as the leg splintered off. Undaunted, he cleaned as Nicu and I watched mutely.

“What happened?” Alex asked, as he came back from the kitchen holding a broom.

“Jesus, what happened to you?” Nicu choked as he stifled a laugh. “Look how domesticated you’ve become since Nina moved in.”

“Yeah, she’s tamed him,” threw in Tatum.

“Hardy-har-har,” muttered Alex as he swept up the shards of a broken crystal vase scattered across the parquet. He zeroed in on me and prompted, “Luca?”

“I caught her snooping through my files. She admitted that her family put her up to it,” I explained tersely.

Nicu barked out a sharp laugh. “Last time I checked, she was an adult.”

“I’m aware, Nicu,” I bit out.

“Where is she?” Tatum asked as he came from my office.

“I cut her loose.”

“Come again?” Alex said.

“I. Cut. Her. Loose,” I gritted out between clenched teeth. “What the fuck did you expect me to do?”

“Regardless of whatever she’s done, she’s still yours,” Alex explained.

“What?” I bellowed, jumping to my feet.

With a raised brow, he clarified, “She’s yours. She’s mafie, and you fucked her. You fucked her knowing she was a mafie princess. There’s no going back from that. I don’t care what the fuck happened or what the fuck she did to us. You bonded with her, so now you’ll marry her. If not, I will punish you.”

I sputtered out sounds, incapable of speaking through my rising fury.

“Consequences,” he persisted. “You won’t be going anywhere. Not to Cali, not to Chicago, not to Westchester. I’ll fucking skin you alive until you do right by this family.”

My mind went blank and I saw red.

“I may have fucked her, but I clearly didn’t know she was a lying snake. Since when have you known me to be self-sacrificing? Not since I got out from under that fucking bastard, our beloved pater. Do you remember the last time he hit me, Alex?”

My head snapped to my youngest brother. “Nicu?”

I choked back a bellow of tormented rage. “No, you don’t. The answer is when I hit him back. He stopped when he realized that I wouldn’t stand for it anymore. When I was ready to leave it all, leave you all. Walk away from everything. My clan, my family, my fucking blood bond.” I smacked the clan tattoo on my chest. “If I was ready to do that, then walking away from Cat is nothing for me. Nothing, do you hear me?”

If there was a chance that I would take her back, it vanished the instant Alex opened his big fucking mouth and spewed out his ultimatum.

My brothers blinked up at me in shock. I’d gone further into the past than ever before. Getting my heart ripped out of my chest cracked the invisible wall of silence that I had maintained for so long. Frozen in place, I let out a gust of shocked breath. What I had done was unprecedented. I swallowed around my cinched throat.

Taking a seat, Tatum’s eyes darted from me to each of my brothers, trying to read the situation. He cleared his throat and said, “This has been festering for years. It’s time we deal with it.”

Alex’s eyes flickered to him, then Nicu.

Nicu’s blinking had gotten faster until he shook himself out of his daze. “Why, Luca? He was so good to us. Why did he treat you differently?”

“Honestly, I don’t know,” I croaked, my throat twisting tighter.

Rapping his fingers on his knee, Tatum said, “Something happened. It—my mother once let something slip after you slept over one night, when we were still kids.”

Alex’s eyes returned to Tatum, some sort of realization dawning on his face. His wily brain was always the fastest on the uptake. “What is it, Tatum? You know something.”

“I do,” he admitted, nodding sagely. “But it’s not my story to tell.”

“Fuck, what the hell does that even mean, Tatum?” I fumed.

“It means that the three of you are finally ready to face the truth.” Addressing me, he said, “You rarely talk about it, even with me, and never to your brothers. Whatever happened today has burst through the invisible line you never cross.” He spread his hands out. “Well, here we are. It’s time for some truth telling, and if you want to know why you were treated differently, why you are different, then it’s time to find out.” He paused. “From the source.”

Heat crawled up my nape. “And who the fuck is the source?”

“Who else? The women in your family,” he replied simply.