I turned to find Gia coming inside, watched her smile vanish when she saw my face.

What? she mouthed.

“They think it was another heart attack,” Salvatore continued.

I didn’t care. I didn’t care. I didn’t fucking care.

“You should come to the house,” he said finally.

“When did it happen?”

“More than a day ago. He’d sent his staff home. Stupid old fool. He’d sent them all away.”

“He was in the house dead for more than a day?”

“Yes.”

Silence. Gia knelt at my feet, her curious, worried face turned up to mine as if she’d draw information from my mind.

“Will you come to the house, Dominic?” Salvatore asked. “I’m on my way. My flight boards in a few minutes.”

“What is it?” Gia whispered.

“I have to go,” I said.

“Dominic,” Salvatore started again, then sighed.

“I have to go,” I barely managed before hanging up, shock having made a mute out of me.

“What?” Gia persisted.

I looked down at her eager face. “Franco Benedetti is dead. My uncle found him this morning.”

No emotion crossed her face. She watched mine instead, waiting.

“I should be dancing, right?” I said wildly, standing swiftly, rubbing the back of my neck, walking a circle, not seeing her rise, not seeing anything. “I should celebrate.”

“Dominic.”

She touched my shoulder. I flinched, shrugging her off.

“Dominic.”

She was more persistent this time, her touch more firm. “He was the only father you knew. It’s natural—”

I looked at her, unable to speak. Not wanting her to see me, not now, not like this. Too much fucking emotion I should not be feeling. Too many memories flooding back, too much anger, too much rage, too much fucking goddamned regret.

“Go away, Gia.”

“No.”

“Leave me alone.”

She shook her head.

Franco Benedetti was dead. And his last words to me had been to deny me. To humiliate me. His last fucking words disowned me.

“Dominic.”

“Fucking let me go, Gia,” I snapped.

What she saw in my eyes frightened her. I knew it. I saw it. Hell, I felt it. She stepped backward, like she’d done in that room in the cabin. She kept her eyes on me, watching, as if she waited for her enemy to strike. To be prepared for when he did.

I ran a hand through my hair. I almost said something, but then I didn’t. I walked out the door instead, fished the keys out of my pocket, made sure she was locked in the house behind me, and I drove off the property. I needed to think. To get these fucking emotions under control. He had made me weak in life; he would not do so in death. I wouldn’t give him that power over me, not ever again.

I hated him.

I needed to remember that I hated Franco Benedetti.

18

Gia