Page 53 of The Mafia’s Fiancee

I imagined he’d be involved in my life once more. He already was, helping me get my beaten uncle into the car. As he drove away, I worried that I was pulled in the wrong direction again.

“What about my mom?” I rubbed my hand over my face, slouching in the passenger seat while Jimmy lay in the back. “I have to find her.”

Sean nodded, driving quickly but with utmost concentration. “We will. Leo’s back out there tracking where the other drivers took her.”

“It sounds like Damon ordered her to be taken.”

“No doubt in retaliation to you interfering with Emmalina’s engagement to Antonio.”

“She wasn’t engaged. Not yet.”

He shrugged. “Same thing. She was promised to him.”

“Fine. But she promised herself to me. She’s engaged to me.”

“So I’ve heard.” He glanced in the rearview mirror at Jimmy.

I wasn’t going down this path of defending my commitment with Emma. Not again. I had to focus on my mother until I knew she was safe. “Damon ordered my mom to be taken, but someone else took over. If that fucker has been working with the Marchese family, then...”

“Then you’d be correct in assuming she might be at the Marchese residence. That’s where Leo and a crew of others are trying to investigate next.”

I let out a long, hard breath. Recalling how challenging and dangerous it was for me to sneak out of Antonio’s custody, I hated to think of having to go back. I would, for my mother. That Marchese fucker wouldn’t scare me off.

But dammit, I was sick of that guy. I couldn’t wait until he was no longer an issue, but I realized that I couldn’t barge in and kill him. He was too heavily protected and guarded, not at all accessible for an easy hit. I wasn’t even used to holding or firing a gun. I killed with my bare hands, in close combat. That would be harder to make happen with someone as protected and unreachable as him.

“Let’s get him home,” Sean said, tipping his head in the direction of Jimmy in the back. “By then, I should be getting a call from Leo. With his intel, we can form a plan and go from there.”

I nodded, glad for his perspective. While being delayed in going to find my mom wasn’t what I wanted, I didn’t think it would be productive to search for her in the wrong place or to look for her blindly.

Sean had a mind for strategizing, like me, and as we rode back, I considered how he’s always been there in the background, as a resource I hadn’t realized I needed.

We reached the Rossini estate, and the guard who let us in acknowledged Sean with an affirmative to his question.

“Has anything happened?” he asked the guard.

He shook his head. “Not a thing. One man took an SUV out, but I believe that would’ve been Frank, heading to that meetup with the MC about the drug route changes.”

Sean dipped his chin. “Thanks.”

I breathed easier with that news. If that main gate guard could attest that nothing happened here while I was gone, that had to mean that Emma would be inside, safe and sound behind these locked doors.

She wasn’t though.

“Emma?” I called out, seeking her in the mostly empty house we’d started to clean up. She could help Jimmy again, using her abandoned nursing skills and knowledge to make sure he was comfortable and not in need of going to the ER.

“Emma?”

Sean helped me set Jimmy on his bed. Then he followed me through the house as I called out for her.

She wasn’t in our wing. She wasn’t in another secluded part of the house, deep in the zone as she cleaned to stay preoccupied. I wasn’t thinking that she’d be here waiting with her arms wide open for me upon my return, but I did expect to find her somewhere. The longer I looked and didn’t encounter her, the more deeply I worried.

“She’s got to be here somewhere,” Sean said.

She did. “But it doesn’t seem like she’s here.”

“Could she have...” He grimaced, glancing at me. “Could she have left?”

“Me? Could she have left me?” I shook my head. “No.” We were in this together. I couldn’t have been wrong about it. A nagging thought persisted in the back of my mind though, reminding me that she was quicker to raise doubts about how we could make this work with everyone out to stop us from being together—or alive.