Chapter 8 - THE EX WHO CAME BACK FOR HER
Paige hated Kevin.
Part of her did.
Another part remembered four years of ordinary mornings.
She could not let him die.
Gabriel knew it.
“You’re thinking about going.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Gabriel.”
“He betrayed you.”
“That doesn’t mean I watch him get murdered.”
“He used you.”
“And if I become the kind of person who can ignore someone tied to a chair because they hurt me, then Matteo has already changed me.”
Gabriel said nothing.
Paige stepped closer.
“I’m not asking permission.”
“I know.”
“That bothers you.”
“Immensely.”
The address led to an abandoned printing plant in Brooklyn.
This time they involved federal agents.
Matteo had underestimated one thing.
Paige no longer faced him alone.
She wore a hidden microphone.
Gabriel hated every second.
Paige entered through the front.
Kevin sat tied beneath a hanging industrial lamp.
Matteo stood behind him.
“Hello, honey.”
“Stop calling me that.”
Matteo smiled.
“You ruined everything.”
“No. You did.”
He demanded the drive.
Paige held it up.
“Let Kevin go.”
Matteo laughed.
“You still care about him?”
“Enough.”
Kevin looked at her.
“Paige, don’t.”
Matteo struck him.
Paige flinched.
Outside, Gabriel heard everything.
Nico physically stopped him from entering early.
Matteo stepped closer.
“You know what Gabriel sees when he looks at you?”
Paige remained silent.
“A weakness.”
“No.”
“That’s what love is to men like us.”
“You don’t love anyone, so you wouldn’t know.”
His expression changed.
Good.
Paige needed him angry.
Needed him talking.
“You think Gabriel is different?”
“Yes.”
“Because he kissed you?”
“Because when he had power over me, he used it to protect me instead of control me.”
Matteo’s smile disappeared.
Paige continued.
“That’s the difference between you.”
Outside, Gabriel heard every word.
Matteo reached for the drive.
Paige stepped backward.
“First tell me about Luca.”
He stopped.
“Why?”
“Because you’ve spent years trying to prove you were smarter than Gabriel. Don’t you want someone to know you actually were?”
Vanity worked.
Matteo smiled.
He admitted it.
Enzo had ordered Luca’s murder.
Matteo arranged the warehouse.
Isabella discovered the truth.
So they arranged her accident too.
Gabriel’s face went white in the surveillance van.
Matteo kept talking.
Every word recorded.
Then Kevin suddenly threw himself sideways.
His chair struck Matteo.
“Run!”
Paige ran.
Matteo fired.
The bullet missed.
Federal agents entered.
Gunfire erupted.
Gabriel ignored every order and went inside.
He found Paige behind a steel press.
Matteo had her by the throat.
A gun pressed beneath her chin.
“Drop it,” Matteo ordered.
Gabriel lowered his weapon.
“Let her go.”
“Look at you.”
Matteo laughed.
“The great Gabriel Moretti begging for an assistant.”
Gabriel’s eyes never left Paige.
“She’s not my assistant.”
Paige’s heart slammed.
Matteo tightened his grip.
“What is she?”
Gabriel answered without hesitation.
“The woman I love.”
Everything stopped.
Even Paige.
Matteo smiled.
“There it is.”
His finger moved toward the trigger.
Kevin, still bound to the chair, kicked Matteo behind the knee.
Paige dropped.
Gabriel moved.
One shot.
Matteo’s gun flew away as a bullet tore through his arm.
Nico and the agents tackled him.
Then Gabriel was beside Paige.
His hands searched her face, shoulders, arms.
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Paige.”
“I’m okay.”
She touched his chest.
“You said something.”
“This is not the time.”
“It is absolutely the time.”
Police dragged Matteo away screaming.
Kevin laughed weakly from the floor.
Gabriel looked irritated.
Paige smiled.
“You love me?”
Gabriel stared at her.
Apparently gunfire was easier for him than this.
“Yes.”
Her smile disappeared.
Not because she was unhappy.
Because the simplicity of it hurt.
She touched his face.
“I love you too.”
He kissed her.
Behind them, Kevin cleared his throat.
“I’m still tied to a chair.”
Paige broke the kiss.
Gabriel did not look away from her.
“Nico.”
“Yeah?”
“Eventually untie him.”
Kevin groaned.
Paige laughed against Gabriel’s chest.
For the first time in months, she felt safe.
But the story was not finished.
Because when federal agents examined the original flash drive that night, they found one final encrypted file.
A file neither Kevin nor Matteo knew existed.
May you like
And its title contained only two words.
GABRIEL MORETTI.
