SharingGianna

Lacey
Thorn

Book 4 in the Marquetti Amore series.

Gianna hasn’t been home since she left ten years ago. One
frantic call sends her racing back and dealing with emotions she’s kept buried
too long. When she meets Gabe and Tony, she is instantly attracted. Maybe sex
is just the stress relief and distraction she needs.

Gabe and Tony have both just left the Marines behind. Their
first stop to see former teammate and close friend Dante Marquetti might just
be their last when they meet his sister Gianna. But one taste of her only makes
them hungry for more. Now all they can think of is sharing Gianna.

A
Romantica®
contemporary erotic ménage romance
from Ellora’s Cave

Gianna stood in front of the patio doors and let her gaze
pass over the lights of the city sprawled below her. She hated heights, always
had. Her agent had booked the condo for her when she first began modeling and
this was where she’d stayed, on the fifteenth floor. Tonight she just took in
the view while her mind continued debating what she’d really already decided.
She was done modeling.

She’d spent the last few years working more on her designs and
she loved it, loved the creativity to make what she felt was sexy. She sent
most of her creations to a local store in her hometown run by her friend
Phoebe, who had recently rekindled a relationship with Gianna’s brother Dante.
With the connections she’d amassed through modeling, Gianna could have sent her
designs to a bigger house but honestly this was her ticket out of the life she
had, not a way to keep her there even longer. Besides, Phoebe had a head for
business and with her help, Gianna’s creations were flying off the racks, both
virtually at their online store and figuratively in the boutique Phoebe ran.

Phoebe had received offers from bigger stores to carry their
merchandise but the two of them had decided against sharing so far. With the
power of the internet, they really didn’t need to. Gianna knew that part of the
pull toward her lingerie was the originality of the pieces. Take that away and
she was just another brand. That wasn’t what she wanted and Phoebe agreed with
her. In fact Phoebe had been encouraging her to come home and see for herself
the buzz her designs generated. But Gianna couldn’t go home.

She closed her eyes and let the memories wash over her. More
as if she didn’t have a home to go to. Other than her business partner, the
only other person from home she spoke with was her brother Cristiano. She and
Cris had always been close, but even he didn’t know everything. He knew what
everyone else in the family knew, that something had occurred to make their
mother disown her oldest daughter. In fact, as far as Gianna knew, Belinda
Marquetti pretended that Gianna didn’t exist at all.

Gianna’s shoulders hunched as if to protect her but it was
too late for that. The damage was already done. She’d made a stupid mistake,
fallen for the wrong pretty face, believed the wrong silvered tongue and now
there was no going back. She’d been young and naive and would pay for that the
rest of her life. The saddest thing was that her mother had disowned her
without once giving Gianna a chance to tell her side, to tell the truth.

The phone rang and Gianna ignored it, letting the machine
pick it up. But when it rang again almost immediately, she turned and moved
across the room to see the number on the readout. Cris. The machine picked up
but once more he didn’t leave a message. Then the phone began ringing again.
Cris.

Aggravated, she picked the receiver up. “You know I have a
machine for a reason—” she began.

“Steph’s been shot,” he said and her heart just stopped. Her
brother Stephano was Cris’ twin and a member of the state police.

“How bad?” she asked. This was the call she’d always feared,
what the members of any police family feared and with a father and four of her
five brothers police officers, one she’d been lucky enough to never receive.

“Bad,” Cris said. “You need to come home. He’s going to need
everyone around.”

“Where? When? How?” The questions just tumbled off her lips.

“He was working the late shift. One of the guys needed time
off for his son’s graduation and Stephano took it,” Cris said. “He pulled a car
over, routine stop, and the guy already had a gun in his hand when he rolled
the window down. Camera caught it all. He was shot.” Cris’ voice hitched and
she could hear the tears in her brother’s voice too. “He was shot point-blank.
Bullet entered on his left side, bounced off his ribcage and traveled up,
hitting the heart. He coded twice but they brought him back. He’s in surgery
now. They’re not sure if he’ll make it or not.”

“Oh God.” She put her hand over her mouth, hardly daring to
breath. Stephano, sweet Stephano with his engaging grin and quirky humor.
“I-I…” She couldn’t get a coherent thought out, much less a sentence.

“I don’t care about the feud you and Mamma have going on,”
Cris said, his voice hard. “It’s time you came home. We need you. Stephano
needs you.”

“I’ll take the first flight I can get,” she promised. “I’ll
keep my phone on me at all times. Call me with any news. Any.”

“I will. And Gianna,” he paused and she spoke just as he
intended.

“Yes?”

“I love you, sis.”

“I love you too.”

She dropped the phone into the cradle and wanted nothing
more than to sink to her knees on the carpet and cry her eyes out. A part of
her wanted to pray to God for Stephano but God had failed the young girl in her
long ago and there were no prayers left in her grown woman’s heart. She took a
deep breath instead, and putting one foot in front of the other, she moved
toward her bedroom to pack a bag. When she was ready she’d make a call and had
little doubt that a plane would be available to fly her back.

Cris said it was time for her to come home and maybe he was
right. She’d spent the last ten years running from her demons, maybe it was
time to face them as well. She’d left as a seventeen-year-old child, broken in
more ways than anyone could have known. But she was a woman now and she had a
feeling she would need to remind herself of that many times over the coming
days.

She let her mind wander as she packed. After all, packing
was something she was good at. It wasn’t hard to remember growing up with her wild
brothers and baby sister. Cris and Stephano were a month shy of being two years
older than she and the three of them had always been close. Stephano had played
baseball, even gone to college on a scholarship. Cris and Gianna had been
runners. Maybe that was why they were so close. It seemed only the two of them
would take to pounding the pavement when they had to think. Gianna wondered if
her brother still did that. She did.

Nico was a year younger than she was and Isabella was the
baby at twenty-four. Those two had always been close. Then there were her two
older brothers, Dante followed by Angelo less than a year later. Those two were
almost like twins as well back then. Now everyone was grown. Angelo was
recently married. Isabella would be by the end of the year and Dante was living
in blissful sin with Phoebe.

She may not have been around but she knew what was going on
in their world. She just stood on the outside looking in now. She grabbed her
briefcase, making sure everything she needed was in there. Finally she sat down
and picked up her bedroom receiver.

The phone was answered on the first ring. Rocky, her agent,
her friend and at times the mother she no longer had.

“What’s up, doll? Ready for next week’s shoot?” Rocky’s
voice was quick and firm and still held a hint of the Bronx where she’d grown
up.

“Change in plans, Rocky,” Gianna said. “I won’t be doing
next week’s shoot.”

“Come on, Gia,” Rocky said, using her no-nonsense tone. “You
have to put this idea of leaving me aside and focus. This shoot will have you
in every magazine in the world.”

“And this is new?” Gianna asked.

“Well, it’s a new ad,” Rocky replied, tongue-in-cheek.

“I can’t, Rocky,” Gianna continued before she was
interrupted again. “Stephano’s been shot.” She’d talked plenty about her
siblings, so she knew Rocky would know who she was talking about.

“Oh, baby.” Rocky was all motherly now. “What do you need?”

“I need a flight back home,” Gianna said. “And a promise
that you won’t book anything else for me while I’m gone.”

“Without question, baby girl,” Rocky agreed. “I’ll be ready
and come for you within a half hour. We’ll leave as soon as I can have them get
the flight plan filed and be there as soon as possible.”

“You don’t have to come with me, Rocky,” Gianna said, but
there was a smile on her face. “I’m just going home.”

“Into the lion’s den more like,” Rocky muttered and Gianna
could already hear her friend moving about. “I’ll not be sending my girl back
there alone. Two shakes of a leg and I’ll be there.” And with that promise Rocky
disconnected.

Rocky would see her return home as going into the lion’s
den. Rocky had taken one look at Gianna and soaked her in that first day they
met. Rocky had been a woman with an eye to make a name for herself and Gianna
had been just who she was looking for. She’d been waitressing the night Rocky
had decided to interview potential models at the restaurant. Rocky hadn’t liked
any of them. Instead she’d taken one glance at Gianna and dared her to give it
a try.

Gianna had been barely making ends meet, living in a hovel
and working three different jobs to pay the rent. She had jumped at the
opportunity. She’d gone a little wild with her first success and Rocky had let
her for a bit. But Rocky had seen the shadows and dug deep until she found the
cause. She’d given Gianna a job, but more importantly she’d helped her find
some self-respect. Rocky had given her love, acceptance and understanding at a
time when she craved it. In fact Rocky had taken the broken girl and slowly,
piece by piece, helped put her back together. Rocky was the one Gianna confided
in. Everything except the one secret that Gianna had never told anyone. Cris
suspected, but she couldn’t bring herself to tell him the truth.

She took her bags and walked them to the front door. She’d
call down to the lobby and one of the doormen would come up for them. She took
her phone off the charger and stowed it in her purse, putting the charger in
her briefcase. She’d call downstairs on her house phone. She turned into the
kitchen to grab a bottle of water. Opening a cabinet drawer, she pulled a box
of peppermint sticks from the shelf and stuck them in her purse.

It was a habit she’d picked up as a child and never lost.
When she was nervous or upset her stomach would get queasy. Her mother had
always given her peppermints to suck on, not the round candies but the soft
peppermint sticks that Belinda would put in their hot chocolate. Gianna still
used them. Hell, she had a feeling that the next few weeks or however long she
was back, she’d be going through a lot of boxes of peppermint sticks.

* * * * *

Cris hung up the phone and slowly returned to the waiting
room at the hospital. No one had been in while he was gone so there was no news
on Stephano. The family was all there by now, everyone except Gianna.

Dante moved over to him along with Angelo and Sampson,
Isabella’s fiancé . “Did you make the call?”

“Yeah, she’s leaving as soon as she gets a flight and will
be here,” Cris said and he couldn’t stop his gaze from moving over to where
their mother paced in front of the window. Belinda’s face was ravaged with
tears that still seemed to fall. She held her rosary in one hand and worried
the beads with the other, her lips were moving in constant prayer. Why did he
feel as if he were betraying her by calling Gianna?

“Don’t say anything to Mamma just yet,” Angelo said. “We’ll
deal with the fallout when she gets here.”

“This is the first time Gianna has agreed to come home in
ten years,” Cris said to the group as Nico, Isabella, Phoebe and Cara—Angelo’s
wife—joined them. “I will not let her be bullied and made to feel unwelcome.
This isn’t about whatever axe Mamma has to grind. This is about Stephano.”

Phoebe stepped forward and took Cris’ hand, giving it a
squeeze. She might be Dante’s woman, but she was Cris’ best friend and had been
for several years. She was also in Gianna’s corner as well. “I agree,” she
said.

“I think we all agree with that,” Dante said. “It’s time to
put whatever happened in the past and move forward. If this doesn’t open
Mamma’s eyes to that then we’ll have to think of something else. But family is
family. We’ve always been told that since the day we were born. We’ve let this
go on for long enough. I stuck my head in the sand, thinking that eventually it
would work itself out. I was wrong.”

“At least you have the excuse that you were off in the
military and not here to see that nothing was changing,” Angelo said, one arm
wrapped around his wife, holding her close. “I just pretended otherwise.”

“We all did,” Nico agreed.

“What were we supposed to do?” Isabella asked from where she
stood in front of her fiancé Sampson, his arms pulling her to the front of his
body. “Mamma absolutely forbids us to speak of her.”

“Well Gianna is coming home,” Cris stated. “And I have a
feeling she’s going to need to feel the love and support of all of us while
she’s here.”

“This time we get to the bottom of the issue and find out
what the hell happened,” Dante said.

“I have a feeling this isn’t going to be easy, or cut and
dry,” Angelo said.

“You use all your detective skills to discover that?”
Isabella asked her brother dryly and Angelo grunted at her.

“Can’t you keep her under control, Sampson?” Angelo asked
his best friend since high school. Sampson just chuckled as Cara smacked her
husband on the shoulder.

“About as well as you control yours,” Sampson replied.

“Very funny, guys,” Phoebe said.

“Belinda, come sit down before you give me an ulcer from all
that pacing.” Their father’s voice brought all their heads turning to where
Salvatore sat watching their mother.

“I’m praying,” Belinda muttered and went back to what she
was doing.

Isabella moved to her dad. “Pops, you need anything? Coffee
or anything?”

“Nah, Bella.” Salvatore shook his head before leaning it
back and closing his eyes. “Maybe I’ll just pray like your mamma.”

“We’re all praying, Pops,” Dante said.

The door to the waiting room opened and they were all on
their feet as a man in scrubs entered.