Gabrielle startled awake. She sat up, shaking off sleep, trying to figure out what had woken her. Then she heard Max barking.
She threw a sweater over her pajama top and shorts and raced down the hallway. A hard knock rattled the door, and she hesitated. Max would never bark at Nicole. So who was outside? Jeff? God, she didn’t want to have to deal with him again tonight.
Heart thudding, she peered through the peephole, her breath catching when she recognized the man on the other side of the door.
“Luca?”
“Gabrielle. Open the door.”
Holy crap. Her fantasy man had found her.
With one hand tight on Max’s collar, she pulled open the door.
Without so much as a hello, Luca brushed past her and stalked into her house. He was a wearing a fitted dark gray polo shirt, perfectly pressed dark pants, and shiny leather shoes. He was too rough to be beautiful, but his raw masculinity was so utterly compelling, she couldn’t look away.
“What are you doing here?”
“I came to check on you.”
Max barked and strained to get at Luca.
“It’s okay.” Gabrielle struggled to hold Max back, patting his head with her free hand. “He’s a friend.”
“Let him go.” Luca bent down with his hand extended. Gabrielle released Max and he sniffed Luca’s fingers. A moment later, her betraying guard dog stopped barking and wagged his tail.
She gave an irritated huff. “You must have a dog.”
“I had two growing up,” Luca said. “Now I live in a penthouse, and I didn’t think it would be fair. They need somewhere to run.” He stood, his brow creasing in a frown. “Are you alone?”
“Yes. Nicole’s at her boyfriend’s place.” She lifted an eyebrow. “How did you find me?”
His eyes darted around the house as if he expected to see someone jump out of the shadows. “I have a friend at Glamour who gave me your information from the database.”
“But that’s illegal.”
Luca shrugged. “I wanted to find you.”
Such simple words, and yet loaded with meaning. No matter that he had broken the law. He wanted to find her, and he made it happen. End of story. What she wouldn’t give to have such a cavalier attitude.
“Why? Is this another booty call?”
“I thought you were in danger.” He stalked past her and into the kitchen. Without asking permission, he checked in the broom closet and peered out the back door.
“What are you talking about? What danger?” She followed him back to the living room and watched as he rattled the broken screen door.
“How did this happen?”
The skin on Gabrielle’s neck prickled, and she marched over to him and poked him in the chest. “Were you outside watching when Jeff was here?”
“I only arrived a few minutes ago.” Something in his expression changed, his hazel eyes sharpening, darkening, turning feral. “Who is Jeff? Is he the one who broke your door?”
“I work with him, and yes, he broke the door. He was … agitated.”
Luca’s eyes narrowed. “I was agitated when you walked away in Glamour, but I didn’t break your fucking house.”
“He broke a door, not the house,” she countered.
“It was disrespectful.”
She supposed it was, but she hadn’t really given it much thought. Jeff was upset, and his behavior, while unacceptable, was uncharacteristic of the man she knew.
“So is showing up at my home at eleven o’clock at night,” she said, frowning at Max as he pushed his ball toward Luca’s feet. “Normal people call during daylight hours and arrange to go for coffee or have a drink.”
“You didn’t give me a choice. You ran away and didn’t give me your number.”
Her cheeks heated and she dropped her gaze. “I was a little … overwhelmed.”
“As was I,” he said softly. He scooped up Max’s ball and rolled it across the living-room floor. Max gave a delighted yip and raced across the room. It was hard to stay annoyed with a man who was so good with Max, especially because it became clear after the vet checked Max out, that her precious beagle had had little joy in his short life.
“He likes you,” she said lamely. “He’s usually wary of men. When the shelter found him, he wouldn’t eat if there was a man in the room. I rarely bring men home because it upsets him.”
Luca gave a satisfied grunt. “I’m glad to hear I don’t have any competition except for Jeff, the door breaker.”
“You didn’t seem to be too worried about competition on Friday night,” she teased.
“Gabrielle.” He breathed her name, and her knees went weak. “The way you looked on Friday night, you were lucky we even made it upstairs.”
A soft oh escaped her lips, but before she could respond he was halfway down the hallway toward her bedroom.
Why was she allowing this? She hadn’t even let Jeff in the door, and she didn’t have a problem asserting herself in any situation. But some part of her wanted him here. She was glad to see him, touched by his concern, and no small bit amused by his insistence on checking out her place for imaginary danger. For goodness sake, she had a gun and she knew how to use it.
“Wait.”
Of course, he didn’t wait. He pushed open the door and walked right in.
Gabrielle’s cheeks heated as she followed behind him. Other than Jeff, who had helped her assemble the bed, she’d never brought a man into her bedroom, and it was very unlike the public face she showed the world.
“It’s kind of girly,” she said, her cheeks heating as he looked around at the pastels and lace.
“It’s beautiful,” Luca said. “It’s you.”
A lump welled up in her throat, and she bent down to give Max a pat, hiding her face. It was her. The her no one but Nicole and Cissy and her mother knew.
Luca studied the framed pictures on her dresser. “Are these your parents?” He picked up the only picture of Gabrielle and her parents together. Her mother had been in a wheelchair by then, but strong enough to want to go for a drive in the mountains.
“Yeah. My mom died when I was nine. Breast cancer. It spread before they caught it. She loved pink and purple and sparkly pretty things. We lived in Colorado. At the time, I didn’t appreciate our town, but it was beautiful with forests and lakes all around it. My dad remarried two years later to a woman who had two sons, and we moved here with my brother.”
She pointed to the next picture in the row. “That’s my husband, David. And the picture beside him is my brother, Patrick. He died from a drug overdose.”
He lifted the picture of David and her sitting together at a pool party a friend had thrown one summer. “You’ve suffered through a lot of loss.”
“It’s life, I guess. Just sucks when all the bad things seem to happen to you.”
He studied her for a long moment, and lifted the last picture in the row, taken only a few weeks before David died. “Who is this?”
“That’s Jeff with David and me. He was David’s best friend.”
“Jeff who broke your door?” His jaw tightened and he put the picture down with a firm thump.
Gabrielle sat on the edge of her bed and toyed with the lace edging on her duvet. “Things are complicated between Jeff and me.”
“Are you fucking him?”
“You’re being very crude,” she shot back. “And not that it’s any of your business, but no. I’m not fucking him. He’s my friend. He helped me through a difficult time after David died—”
“Because he wanted to fuck you.”
She gave an irritated groan. “Luca. Seriously. Do you have to be so direct? It wasn’t like that.” At least she hadn’t thought so. And the first time he kissed her, she felt curiously betrayed. What she’d thought were selfless acts of friendship turned out to be a means to an end.
“What happened tonight?” He leaned against the dresser, folded his arms.
She shrugged. “I told him I wasn’t interested in a relationship with anyone. I can’t go through losing someone I love again. Three times was enough. And you don’t know my whole story, but I have nothing left to give someone. I’m broken. He could do so much better than me.”
“So he broke your door,” he said impatiently, as if she wasn’t understanding the importance of what Jeff had done. “A man who does not respect you is not worthy of you.” Luca cupped her jaw in his hand and tipped her head back, whispering in Italian.
Her tension left her in a rush, her body heating all over. “What does that mean?”
He leaned down and kissed her, his lips warm and soft. “Roughly translated, it means you are my angel. Heaven is in your eyes. I am dazzled by you.”
“Oh.” Her breath left her in a rush and she kissed him back.
Born to seduce. Raised to seduce. Live to seduce. Nicole’s words danced in her head, but she didn’t care if he gave the same line to every woman he met. His words made her feel beautiful, happy, and so good inside she wanted to burst. Even if he walked away now, she would remember the sound of his voice and how his words made her feel.
* * *
Fuck.
She was so damn sexy, Luca could barely think. He deepened the kiss and Gabrielle melted against him, crushing her soft breasts against his chest. Her hips ground against his cock, painfully erect beneath his fly, and he groaned. Taking her kiss as a sign his intentions were welcome, he lifted her easily and carried her to the bed.
“Wait.”
Fuck. No. He didn’t want to wait. Couldn’t wait. Something about this woman drew him in a way he couldn’t understand. He didn’t do relationships or even repeat hook-ups. Burned once. Scarred forever. He gravitated to women who understood the meaning of one-night stand. Mindless sex. And there’s the door.
Gritting his teeth against a tidal wave of need, he stopped near the bed. “What’s wrong?”
“Max. He’s barking. Something’s wrong outside.”
He lowered her to the ground, listening to Max’s frantic yelps. Even though he’d never had a beagle, he knew a warning when he heard one.
“Stay here.” Luca put out his hand, gesturing her back.
“You stay here. I have a gun.” She pulled a weapon from her nightstand and shoved in a magazine. Alarmed, Luca yanked his own weapon from his holster.
“I’m also armed, bella. Stay.”
He frowned when she kept moving. He was used to obedience. Not used to strong, rebellious women pushing him aside to get out the door.
But when the first shot ricocheted down the hallway, he didn’t think. Throwing himself on Gabrielle, he brought her down to the floor, just as the house shuddered from the rhythmic thud of an automatic weapon.
“What the fuck was that?”
“AK-47 from the sound of it.” She heaved in a breath. “Max is out there. I have to get him. He’ll be scared.”
“He’ll be hiding. He’s safer where he is. And you’re safer where you are.” Luca shifted his weight to one arm, trying to keep her body covered while he aimed his weapon down the hallway.
“Let me up. He might be hurt.” Gabrielle struggled against him, but he dropped his weight, pinning her to the floor.
“If it’s an AK-47, then he’s almost out of bullets. Standard magazine capacity is thirty rounds.” Adrenaline pounded through Luca’s veins so hard, he could barely hear. Rarely was he in a situation where he had so little control.
She twisted beneath him, and shoved her knee between his legs. Stars exploded in his head. No need for condoms ever again. That part of his anatomy was no longer in working order.
“Max!” She wriggled away while he was still wondering if this was the end of the Rizzoli family name.
“Gabrielle.” Groaning, one hand on his groin, the other on the gun, he followed her down the hallway. She was clearly experienced with this type of situation. She kept low, her back to the wall, gun ready. He had a vague memory of a discussion with her about guns at the hospital, and an overwhelming sense of disgust that the men she’d been with hadn’t protected her.
But she hadn’t told him why she was carrying a gun. Or how she’d been shot. Or what she did for a living that meant she’d been in a position to be shot in the first place. He regretted skipping the important questions the last time they met and diving right into dessert. Regardless, he was a man. This was his situation to deal with. His woman did not risk her life when he was here to defend her.
“Gabrielle. Stop.”
But, of course, she didn’t stop. She worked her way across the living room in a crouch, trying to coax Max away from the corner where he was hiding. With no choice but to cover her, he raced out, putting himself between the shattered windows and the courageous woman on the floor.
Sweat beaded on Luca’s brow. He looked out the window and saw two shadowed figures on the street. Was it Jeff and a friend? What kind of crazy fucks would shoot up a house like this? It made no sense, but if they weren’t leaving, then they were reloading, and that meant Gabrielle didn’t have much time.
“Max.” He stared the dog down, pointed at Gabrielle and used his dominant voice, the tone that kept his soldiers and associates in line and let the world know he was not a man to be trifled with. “Go to Gabrielle. Now.”
Max shot across the room and into Gabrielle’s arms. Luca felt a small amount of satisfaction that, although he could not get his woman to obey, he could at least command her dog.
“Back to the bedroom, bella.” He stayed in position, keeping watch as she scooted across the floor tugging Max by the collar with one hand and holding her weapon in the other. “Who would shoot at you? Is it Jeff?”
“Jeff?” She snorted a laugh. “No. He’s a police officer, and a friend. He was upset, but he’s not going to come to my house with an AK-47 and try to kill me. I’m pretty sure it has to do with the case I just got pulled off. The one that landed me in the hospital where I met you. We were after a very bad guy.”
Police officer. Friend. Case. Bad guy. Luca read between the lines and didn’t like the story. He also knew a lot of “bad guys.” Very bad guys. He understood how they thought and how they operated. He couldn’t think of any “bad guy” who would come to a residential area at night and try to do a hit with an AK-47 from outside a house. The risk of getting caught was too high. And it was stupid. There was little chance of hitting her while she was inside. And if it was a message, why risk killing her?
* * *
Another round of gunfire shattered the silence. Gabrielle threw herself down, covering Max with her body. Seconds later, Luca was behind them, urging her back to the bedroom while he covered them from behind.
Glass shattered, wood splintered, and a rogue bullet sailed through the hallway and thudded into her door.
“Get in the bedroom,” Luca shouted over the noise.
“I’m not playing victim while someone shoots up my house.” She released Max and gave him a push toward the bedroom. “You call 911, and I’ll go out the back door and circle the block so I can come up on them from behind.”
“No. You call 911, and I’ll go out the back door.”
She gave an irritated groan. “I have a gun, Luca. This is what I do for a living.”
“What do you do for a living?”
“I’m a police officer.”
He froze, his body going rigid on the floor, and in that moment, she wished she hadn’t told him. He’d seen Gabrielle the woman. Now he’d only see the Gabrielle everyone else knew: the public face that she used to fit in and mask the pain inside.
“You’re a cop?”
“Detective. How did you think I wound up getting shot?”
“I thought you were the victim of a robbery.” He thudded his fist against the floor. “Jesus Christ. Why didn’t you tell me?”
She bristled at his anger. “You didn’t ask. You were too busy fucking me. Now, call 911. My phone is in the living room. I can’t get to it.”
“I’m not calling 911,” he said emphatically. “I’ll call some friends of mine.”
She stared at him aghast. “What kind of friends are going to scare away guys with automatic weapons? They didn’t shoot six hundred rounds of ammo into my house because they want to steal my spare change. And your friends aren’t going to get here faster than the police.”
“Stay calm.” He put his phone to his ear. “I’m handling this.”
What the fuck was wrong with him? He was going to kill them with his macho bullshit. “Stay calm? Are you serious?” Her voice rose in pitch. “Do you see me screaming and running around? No. You’re the one who needs to stay calm.”
“Trust me, bella.”
“Trust you?” Her voice rose in pitch. “You illegally procured my ID from a database and showed up at my house in the middle of the night. And now you’re phoning a friend instead of dialing 911. This isn’t Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. If the guys outside don’t put a bullet through you, I will.”
Another round of bullets thudded through the house. She lay on the floor holding onto Max until the round was done.
“Luca.” She lifted her head, stared down the hallway. Luca lay still on the floor surrounded by shattered glass.
Silence.
She had a flashback to the night she found David and her blood ran cold. “Luca? Are you okay? Oh God. Say something.”
“You said you wanted to put a bullet through me earlier,” he said dryly, looking up. “I thought I’d just lie still and make your wish come true.”
“Fuck you.” She released a ragged breath. “That wasn’t funny.”
Sirens wailed in the night, and she sank back against the bed. “Someone finally called 911.”
“Too bad.” He holstered his gun. “I would have enjoyed dealing with the bastards myself.”
No doubt. He was the most self-assured, confident man she’d ever met, and she worked in an environment where confidence and machismo were in abundance.
The police arrived a few minutes later. After they confirmed the area was clear, two officers escorted Luca, Max, and Gabrielle out of the house.
“Gaby!” Jeff jogged toward her and she steeled herself to hide her shock. What the hell was he doing here?
“I was on duty and I heard your address on the police scanner. Lucky I was nearby. Are you okay?” He wrapped his arms around her and hugged her tight. “I came as soon as I could.”
Something that sounded suspiciously like a growl came from deep in Luca’s chest. Alarmed, Gabrielle pulled away, putting some distance between her and Jeff. “I’m fine.”
“I should have been here.” Jeff reached for her again. “I could feel something was wrong. I shouldn’t have let you push me away.”
She took a step back and into the solid heat of Luca’s body. Before she could move, he pulled her to his side and dropped his heavy arm over her shoulders.
It was a purely possessive move, primal in nature. Warning bells jangled in her head, but they were drowned out by the inexplicable thrill of being so overtly claimed despite the fact she was a police officer and clearly able to look after herself. She never had any doubt that David loved her, but he had never chased other men away.
Jeff’s face tightened. “Who is he?”
“Luca.” And then because Jeff looked so taken aback, she said the first thing that came into her head. “He was in the bedroom with me when the shooting started.”
Wrong thing to say.
Jeff’s face darkened. Tension thickened the air between them. Max pressed himself against her legs, and growled.
“So that’s why you didn’t want me to come in?” Jeff spat out. “You went for dinner with me, but you spent the night with him?”
“It’s not like that.”
“Well, what is it?” he shouted. “I hope to hell it’s a one-night stand because you said you didn’t want a relationship with anyone. You said you’d never get over David. Was that a lie? Did you just mean me? After everything I did for you? You owe me, Gaby.”
Luca’s body went rigid beside her, and when she looked up, she saw his scowl darken to something dangerous.
“Is this Jeff who broke your fucking door?”
“Yes, but—”
Luca’s fist shot out before she even realized he’d moved. Jeff’s head snapped to the side with the force of the blow, but he was quick to retaliate with a hard uppercut.
Gabrielle threw herself on Luca’s back, wrapped her arms around his chest and shouted in his ear. “Stop, Luca. He’s a police officer. I don’t want you to wind up in jail.”
He shuddered, and she could see his pulse pounding in his neck. “He broke your door, threatened you, disrespected you, claimed you…”
Two of the attending officers helped her drag Luca and Jeff apart. Gabrielle’s brain went into overdrive as she tried to think of a way to ensure Luca didn’t leave her house in the back of a police car.
“What were you thinking?” She dabbed at the blood at the corner of Luca’s mouth with a tissue.
“He disrespected you.”
“Violence isn’t the solution.” She said it because she had to, but a small betraying part of her whispered that Jeff had been out of line, and now justice had been done. And yet another small part thrilled that Luca had stepped up to defend her knowing who she was and what she did for a living.
“He wants what’s mine.”
He was still pumped from the fight, she realized. Vein pulsing in his neck, thick arms folded, his gaze still tracking Jeff who was with one of the recently arrived medics, holding an ice pack to his jaw.
Deliciously, brutally, mouthwateringly masculine.
“I’m not yours,” she said, keeping her voice low so only he could hear. “We had sex. Once. That’s all. I’m not interested in anything else. I didn’t think you were either.”
His eyes blazed with feral heat, and his hand shot out, twisted in her hair. He tugged her head back and claimed her mouth in a fierce, hard, dirty kiss with a message behind it no one on the lawn could ignore.
“You thought wrong.”
* * *
What the fuck was wrong with him?
Luca leaned against the police van, arms crossed, glaring at Jeff as a police officer took Gabrielle’s statement. He’d started a fight with a fucking cop. In front of other fucking cops. Over a fucking cop.
Every made man pledged to uphold the ten commandments that were guidelines for good, respectful and honorable conduct for a mafioso. Many of the guidelines were not followed and sanctions were light. Wiseguys regularly went to pubs and clubs, lied, disrespected their wives, and showed up late for appointments. Some even had affairs with the wives of other men of honor, although justice in those cases was meted out by the aggrieved party and generally resulted in death. But the rules preventing associations with cops were more serious. They existed to protect the crime family and to ensure that potentially harmful information was not passed to the police.
Family was everything.
Luca didn’t know what would happen if anyone found out he was with Gabrielle, but he was pretty damn sure he wouldn’t just get a slap on the wrist. There were only three punishments for a made man who broke the rules. First, he could be “broken,” which was a demotion of rank. In this case, Luca would be demoted from capo to soldier, lose his crew, the respect of his men, and his privileges in the family administration. Second, he could be “chased,” a form of banishment in which he would be barred from doing business with any made men, and a punishment that was considered merciful because the third option was death.
And what of his quest to restore the family honor? Like father, like son, the family would say, and the Rizzoli name would be scratched off the Cosa Nostra books forever. Luca didn’t have a real son to carry on the Rizzoli family legacy handed down over the generations from first son to first son. Although no one knew Matteo wasn’t really his son, Luca would die knowing that the Rizzoli bloodline ended with him and in dishonor.
So why wasn’t he walking away?
After texting Mike and Little Ricky to stand down, he’d given his statement like the good citizen he pretended to be. Gabrielle had managed to smooth things over and convince Jeff not to press charges. Watching her in action was the only good thing about the experience. She was confident, assertive, and she didn’t take shit from anyone. Luca was a civilian, she’d said, a restaurant owner unused to violence and traumatized by the shooting. He’d overreacted. Surely Jeff could understand, and if he didn’t, maybe he would understand when she pursued charges against him for breaking her door.
Traumatized. Unused to violence. Luca had to fight back a laugh. If only she’d seen what he and Frankie had done to those two Albanians a few weeks ago. Now that was trauma—for the Albanians, not him.
So now she was talking to three male cops. Luca didn’t like how they were checking her out. But she was safer with them than with that fucker, Jeff.
As if he knew what Luca was thinking, Max growled beside him. Smart dog. Luca bent down and stroked his head. He had learned early to rely on his intuition, and his intuition told him something about Jeff was off, and it wasn’t just about how badly he wanted Gabrielle.
And man, he wanted her bad.
Almost as bad as Luca wanted her. But it could never be. She was a cop. He was Mafia. Time to forget about his beautiful angel and return to Hell. But for the life of him he couldn’t get his damn feet to move.
Someone had shot at his woman. At him. A made man. A fucking caporegime. A member of the Toscani crime family.
Revenge was now a matter of honor. Despite Gabrielle’s unfortunate choice of profession, he had a duty to protect her. No honorable wiseguy would walk away from a woman in danger, even if she had her own gun. He would keep her safe until the streets ran red with the blood of the bastards who had dared shoot up the house. And then he would walk away.
If he could walk away.
He liked that she didn’t take shit from anyone, and that she didn’t expect her man to lay the world at her feet. She was fiercely independent, ridiculously competent, highly intelligent, and the hottest piece of ass he’d ever seen.
And a fucking cop. Of all the women in all the professions in the world, he had to fall for the one woman he couldn’t have. He should leave. Right now. Turn around and never look back.
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Jeff leaving the paramedics and making his way over to Gabrielle.
Decision fucking made. It wasn’t like he and Gabrielle were going to be together forever. He would find the bastards who shot at her and keep her away from all the wiseguys in the city. By then, she would be out of his system, and he would be able to get back to his normal life of multiple women, single times.
Holding Max’s leash, Luca pushed away from the vehicle and made it to Gabrielle with only seconds to spare.
“Come, bella. I’ll take you and Max to my place.” Luca held out his hand to her, although his gaze was fixed on the man with hatred in his eyes.
“Gaby, my couch is free.” Jeff returned Luca’s stare, his hand also outstretched to the woman between them.
Luca’s heart pounded as the seconds ticked away. Gabrielle knew he had little respect for the law. Would she cross the line and come with him? Had he managed to tempt her to the dark side?
After a long moment of hesitation, she placed her hand on Luca’s arm. “Thanks, Jeff. I appreciate it. But I think I’ll stay with Luca tonight.”
Luca gave a soft satisfied grunt and put an arm around her shoulders so there would be no misunderstanding who was the victor tonight.
“You need any help with the insurance or repairs?” Jeff persisted. “I set you up with my insurers when we found the house. I could give them a call.”
Luca hissed in a mental breath. Outwardly, Jeff appeared contrite and accepting of the situation, but the words he chose, his reference to their time together, told Luca he hadn’t given up the fight.
“I should be okay,” she said.
“What about Nicole?” Jeff’s voice rose almost imperceptibly and he dared take a step toward them.
“I called her,” Gabrielle said. “She’s going to stay with Clint until the house is safe again.” She tugged on Luca’s arm. “Come on. Let’s go.”
“Who the fuck is he?” Jeff called out as Luca walked her away with a protective arm curved around her body.
Unable to resist, Luca looked back over his shoulder and sent a silent message with his smile.
I’m the one she’s going home with tonight.