Chapter 57

LUCA

My head was pounding when I woke up.

I groaned, shifting my weight on the mattress.

~What the fuck is going on? Where am I?~

“Don,” I heard a voice say in the distance, “Don, wake up.”

I groaned again, wanting to push away the too-loud voice until I figured out what was happening.

~Why’s he yelling, anyway?~

Something was off. Everything around me felt softer, harder, sharper, more textured than ever before. I gripped the sheets beneath me, tightening my hands into fists around them.

It was as if I could feel every thread in the fabric woven in the intricate design that made the sheet.

A small hand touched my shoulder.

“Don Luca, can you hear me?” a squeaky, feminine voice said.

I ignored it. I didn’t like the voice. I didn’t like the touch.

My eyes snapped open.

“Freya,” I sighed angrily.

Everything came rushing back in an instant.

Antonio. The war. Matteo. Freya. Freya was hurt. I had to get to Freya.

“Don,” a familiar voice said next to me, “thank God. I thought you’d had an aneurysm or something.”

I propelled my body off of the bed, moving faster than I’d expected, practically flying into the air. Then I composed myself. I hadn’t been in my body for a while; perhaps I’d forgotten how to use it. My eyes found the speaker—Matteo—and searched the room. Multiple people here, none of them the one I wanted.

My blind anger guided me as I grabbed Matteo by the collar.

“Where the fuck is Freya?” I snarled. I barely recognized my own voice—it sounded lower, scary even.

There was someone I didn’t recognize restraining me.

“She’s safe,” Matteo replied immediately, “she’s okay.”

That wasn’t good enough for me.

“Where?” I asked again, lifting him off the ground. “~Where~ is my ~destino~?”

Matteo swallowed harshly.

“I don’t know,” he said in genuine grief, “I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

To my surprise, an actual, animalistic growl came out of me, reverberating through my chest and out of my mouth.

“Now is not the time to give in to your anger,” a voice said behind me. “Control yourself. The family needs you.”

It was the command of a Rossi.

My muscles tightened as I waited for the order to take me over and force me to do its bidding like it had done under Antonio’s mind control serum.

To my surprise, it never did.

I paused. The Rossi’s command hadn’t worked.

And I could tell that no command coming from him or any Rossi would be successful anymore. How I could know this I wasn’t sure, but I felt complete mastery over my mind and body—like a permanent mental block had been put up.

I was immune to the mind control serum.

Fury raced through me like fire.

I swerved to meet the eyes of the Rossi. I was surprised not to see the face of Antonio.

Instead I was looking at Zefiro Rossi, king of the Rossis.

I had no idea what ~he~ was doing standing in my bedroom, but it didn’t matter—at least not then. What mattered was that he had ordered me to rein myself in as if I hadn’t just spent months in his brother’s control.

I moved quickly.

Soon I was in front of him, towering over him, though he didn’t so much as flinch.

“Give me an order again,” I hissed, “and I will not hesitate to tear you limb from limb. King or no king.”

Zefiro seemed surprised but unperturbed. Under different circumstances I would have smiled.

Without the power the Rossis were defenseless, the battlefield was even.

For some reason, Zefiro no longer had that power over me.

Zefiro nodded once, never dropping his gaze from mine.

I looked back at Matteo.

“Freya,” I said again, trying to control my overflowing anger. “Where did she go?”

I remembered everything from the last two months.

Every tear running down her beautiful face, every cruel word that she thought came from me.

Antonio had made her think I wanted her for sex and power; he had used her; he had laughed as she broke. And I had been stuck, trapped inside my own body, my heart breaking with every bit hers did.

While I stood here wasting time, she was thinking I had rejected her to be with another.

But I was going to find her, and once I did I was going to make sure she understood the truth if it meant groveling on my knees for the rest of eternity. She had to know how much she meant to me, how I would die without her.

Antonio would pay for what he did. He would die a torturous death by my hands, that I was sure of. He had made me hit Freya, branded her skin, hurt her because he had known it would weaken me.

But now I was only fueled by the anger he’d put in me.

I felt better and more balanced and centered than ever. It was almost strange how powerful I felt. I was ready to kill.

Matteo hesitated as he formulated an answer.

I gritted my teeth.

“Matteo, you had better tell me what happened after she walked out of this room yesterday, or so help me God—”

“She was with me,” broke in a new voice, “it’s my fault.”

Both our heads snapped toward the doorway, where Elio stood.

I fixed my eyes on him.

“What’s your fault?”