‘That’s how you made it!’ I hissed. My nails were digging grooves in my palm. I was shaking, every part of me livid with hatred so deep I thought I might be sick.

His voice rose. ‘I’m sorry about your mom. I was sure the fire would finish the Falcones but I miscalculated. I made a mistake, Sophie. There’s still time to make it right. Trust me, I’m trying to protect you. I want to make sure you’re safe. The future can’t be avoided. If you’re not with us, you’re against us, and Donata won’t stand for anything less than your full compliance. Not after your hesitance in the diner. Don’t make it harder than it has to be.’

I hung up and slammed my phone against the ground. Rage and fear ripped through me. He wasn’t going to stop. He was drugged up, profit-hungry and corrupt, and I was in his sights. Nic was right. Either I would join him or the Marinos would skin me alive.

How far away was New York? How long did I have? I remembered the cold stare of Donata Marino. What would she do to me if I refused to help her?

I locked the back door behind me and thundered upstairs. I would no longer be a sitting duck. I would not suffer the fate of my mother.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

THE ESCAPE

I was in the upstairs bathroom squishing my moisturizer into an already full rucksack when I heard a car door slam outside. I burst into my mother’s room, ignoring the stale feeling of depression that clung to the lavender-scented drapes inside. I edged towards the window, peering over the doorstep, where the top of my uncle’s head was visible. He had already left New York when he called me. I never had a head start.

I was too late.

Crap. I slid back into my room and stuffed Luca’s switchblade in my pocket. The doorbell rang, followed almost immediately by several loud thumps. My phone was buzzing in my pocket.

By the time I was halfway downstairs, there was a key turning in the lock of the front door. I almost bit off my tongue as it swung open in front of me, swallowing a curse. Jack stomped inside and I froze with one hand on the banister, the other across my heart.

We stared at each other. Every bone in my body ached to hurl myself at him, wrap my hands around his throat and watch the light drain from his eyes. I hated him, and the heat of my rage felt like it might burst through my skin and rip me apart. Would he take me by force or could I run? I had to think, to focus. I couldn’t mess this up.

Slowly I came towards him, forcing one foot in front of the other, pulling the tendrils of raw fury back into my body and stifling them. I had to compose myself, to squash the hostility long enough to get away from him. And I would do it, even if it destroyed a part of me to do so. I would not let my emotions sell me to Donata Marino. I would not let them keep me from avenging my mother.

Jack’s frame seemed to press outwards against the narrow hallway. There was no space – no place that his shadow didn’t touch. ‘Sophie.’ One word: not quite angry, but stern.

‘Jack.’ Antony, I reminded myself. But no matter what the truth was, he would always be Jack to me. A liar. A coward. The word Antony tasted too bitter in my mouth. My fingers squeezed into my palms until their tips bent back on themselves.

He shut the door behind him. ‘You didn’t answer me.’

I felt my voice vibrating with fear, so I forced it higher, louder. ‘I was upstairs. Can’t you wait, like, two minutes?’

There. That teenage indignation. Jack huffed a sigh and I watched his shoulders dip. He thought this would be easy; he thought I would come around. Idiot. He stepped closer, and it took everything in my power not to attack him. ‘Are you ready to come with me?’

We both knew it wasn’t a request; he was just allowing me the illusion of free will, for old times’ sake.

‘Do I have a choice?’ Surly, but not unbendable. It was a delicate line.

‘No. Either you come or she’ll kill you.’ A sigh, a flicker of the man I used to know. ‘And we’ve lost enough already.’

We’ve. I contemplated lunging at him and clawing his eyes out. I might get one before he wrenched me off him.

‘You’ll have to come now,’ he said.

Focus. I stamped my foot. ‘This is so unfair.’

‘Hurry up and pack a bag. I’ll wait down here.’

I jutted out my chin. ‘Can’t we just stay here?’ The idea of having him anywhere near the last place my mother had laughed and lived made me want to scream, but he would expect some opposition to the move, and if I didn’t dig my heels in, he’d get suspicious and trail me while I packed.

‘We’re going somewhere nicer,’ he said impatiently. ‘Somewhere closer to the trade.’

‘Where?’ I whined.

‘Will you just pack? I’ll tell you later. Libero and Marco are waiting in the car.’

I couldn’t escape. Double crap. At least he hadn’t brought that murderous skeleton near my mother’s house. I didn’t know how much more my wavering restraint could take, and the idea of coming at Donata Marino with a kitchen knife was just too tempting.

‘Fine.’ I trudged back upstairs, blinking back the tears of rage that spilled freely down my face once I was turned away from him.

I hovered in my bedroom, staring out the window as hopelessness wrapped itself around me. My eyes fell on the wooden trellis crawling up the back wall – the last of my mother’s garden projects. Slowly, carefully, the threads of a plan unfolded in my head. I’d have to go out back. It was my only chance – my last chance.