“I can’t say the same about you, but I’m hoping we can change that tonight,” I tell him before releasing his sweaty palm.
He gives me a nod before turning away from us. “Let’s eat and talk.”
Dinner is served promptly, and it consists of some fancy dish with pasta and a lobster cream sauce. I can’t even taste it as Giorgio rants and raves about his wealth and stature. My other hand clenches and unclenches underneath the table as I force myself to stay calm and not lash out and grab him by his fat fucking neck.
Victoria, perhaps sensing my unease, places her hand on my arm and says, “Damon helped me with a little bit of a crisis at the soup kitchen on Thanksgiving Day.”
“I don’t know how you can be around those street rats and not catch fleas or something,” her father spits out.
Victoria ignores his dig and continues on. “There was a water leak, and the electricity went out. We had a mess to cleanup and food to gather for the meal. It was really —.”
“That’s where you were photographed. For Page Six,” Giorgio interrupts.
“Yes,” Victoria replies.
“Of all places, Victoria,” he says with a shake of his head. “Do you know I had people asking me what you were doing there? I told them you were forced to do it for community service.”
“But that makes me sound like I did something wrong instead of just volunteering, Papa. How is that any better?” she asks, fuming.
“Because no daughter of mine should be in a place like that unless she has to be,” he explains. “It’s embarrassing.”
The room is quiet after that, except for the fire crackling in the fireplace, as we finish our meals in awkward silence. I can feel the anger radiating off of Victoria, but I keep my mouth shut. I have to wait for the right time to bring this all to a head, and now isn’t it.
One of the servers enters the room, and Giorgio tells her, “Bring the dessert.”
Dessert is dark chocolate cake with white chocolate icing. It would probably taste delicious under any other circumstance, but I don’t fucking touch it.
Giorgio, on the other hand, scarfs down the dessert like the world is coming to an end.
And I can’t help but grin, because his world is coming to an end tonight.
Standing, I take my wine glass in my hand and tilt it towards her father. “Victoria told me your wishes, and I respect them. We would love for your blessing on our marriage.”
Her father cocks his head to the side and grabs his wine glass, holding it up. “And exactly what kind of family will my daughter be marrying into?”
“Well, my parents passed away when I was a child, and I’ve been alone for a long time now,” I answer. Gripping my glass tightly, I tell him, “I wasn’t always a Romero, however.”
He raises his brows as confusion floods his face.
“So, I was wondering if you would give your blessing for Victoria to be married into my given family name, the one I was born with.”
"Which is?" her father prompts.
"Rossi," I say while a smile crawls slowly across my lips.
CHAPTER 28
VICTORIA
The exchange between Damon and my father over dinner is confusing, at best. Damon looks calm, but there's a tic in his jaw and a glint in his eyes. It’s like he’s suddenly taken on this authoritative, cocky attitude that I’ve never seen before. It’s almost as if he’s talking down to my father instead of to him as equals.
I can see the disgust forming on Papa’s face as they speak without including me in the conversation.
“So, I was wondering if you would give your blessing for Victoria to be married into my given family name, the one I was born with,” Damon says.
He has a different family name? This is certainly news to me. Frowning, I stare up at Damon, expecting him to look at me or explain what he’s going on about, but he does nothing of the sort.
"Which is?" my father asks.
"Rossi," Damon tells him, his mouth stretching to a roguish grin.
Rossi.
My entire world comes to a screeching halt at the sound of that name.
At first I think I must have misheard him, but the silent exchange that's happening between him and my father right now speaks a thousand words.
Like a puzzle with missing pieces so that I couldn’t see the whole picture, everything gradually starts clicking into place.
And I slowly come to the realization that the man I've been dating…the man that proposed to me…is the same boy I loved so long ago.
"Arlo?" I ask, my voice just above a whisper.
Damon turns to me at the sound of his boyhood name coming out of my mouth.
Everything is clear to me now, and I feel…sick to my stomach. Quickly, I stand up from the table. Damon — or should I say Arlo — reaches for me, but I hastily pull away from him, knocking over my chair in the process.
"You lied to me," I say, shaking my head with disbelief. "Was it…was it all a lie?" I question, desperately wanting to know the answer. When he doesn’t give me one, I demand it. “Was it?!” I yell.
"Yes," he admits with a stone-cold expression.
And that one simple word tears my heart into a million jagged little pieces.
“I used you to get closer to your piece of shit father,” he spits out angrily. “I baited you in with money and sweet words, and you fell for it all.”
And this Damon is one I haven’t seen before.
He used me. And me being the naïve girl that I am, I fell for it. All of it. Damon never loved me. How could he? He's clearly a monster, some sort of creature that arose from the ashes of the house that burned down next door to be reinvented into someone I don't even recognize anymore.
“What are you doing here? What do you want?” my father asks, standing up from his seat and slamming his hands down on the table. His wine glass topples over, and the red liquid slowly seeps into the white, linen tablecloth. I can’t help but watch the crimson stain bloom as if it’s a sign of what’s to come tonight.
Damon is alarmingly calm as he says, “I want the name of the man you sold my sister to.”
I stop breathing altogether. Sara was sold? My father would never…
But then I realize that maybe I don’t know my father as well as I thought…or maybe not at all.
Feeling bile rising in the back of my throat, I quickly swallow it down. “Your family died in that fire,” I whisper, but I don’t know who I’m trying to convince more…Damon or myself.
He turns to me and his eyes narrow. “My father died in that fire. I almost died when your father had our house burned to the ground, but I escaped.” Then, turning to my father, he says, “You sold my mother and my sister as sex slaves.”
I shake my head in disbelief. What he’s saying doesn’t make sense. All this time…all this time I thought the Rossi family had died accidentally in a fire. “Papa,” I cry, looking at my father with new eyes. “You lied to me?”
“The only liar here is your fiancé,” he grinds out between clenched teeth.
“I want the name!” Damon demands.
I keep thinking maybe Damon got this all wrong. Maybe my father didn’t do the things he’s claiming. I don’t know why, but I cling onto that hope. It’s the only thing keeping me sane right now.
But deep down I know Damon is telling the truth. The fire always seemed suspicious. And my father’s reaction was not one of grief. It was of relief…even satisfaction.
Tears fill my eyes when I think of that poor family being murdered…Mr. Rossi burning to death in that fire…Mrs. Rossi and Sara being sold into sex slavery…and Arlo…poor Arlo living on the streets, all alone...
Suddenly, Damon pulls a gun from behind his back and points it at my father. “Give me his name!” he yells, spit flying out of his mouth.
My father stares death in the face and laughs. “You dare come into my house and threaten me, boy? You’re almost as much of a fool as your father was!”
“Don’t
push me, Ciccone,” Damon grits out.
“You know, if you kill me, you’ll never find your sister,” Papa threatens.
And if he kills my father…Damon will never make it out of here alive. Without thinking of the consequences, I step in front of my father and hold my hands out towards Damon. “Please. Don’t do this!”
“Move, Victoria,” Damon growls roughly.
"No," I say stubbornly, effectively creating a human shield for my father. "I won't let you do this. If you want to kill my father, you're going to have to kill me too."
The gun in his hand suddenly becomes unsteady, and he lowers it for a moment before raising it once again. "I said move, Victoria. Now!" he practically screams.
I know if Damon does this, there will be no coming back. If he kills my father, he won’t make it ten feet before he’s gunned down. Nobody wins in this situation.
Maybe my father did do the things Damon is saying, but Damon will be signing his own death warrant if he shoots a mob boss in his own home.
“You killing my father won’t bring them back. Don’t you get that?” I ask him, trying to make him understand why I’m doing this right now. I care about him. I still love him even though he betrayed me. I don’t want this to turn into a bloodbath. I just want him to walk out of here…alive.
“You’re right,” he hisses. “It won’t bring them back. But this isn’t about bringing them back, Victoria. It’s about righting a wrong. It’s about vengeance.” And then his eyes move to my father as he says, “This is called retribution. You took something from me, and now I’m taking everything from you.” The way he says it is as if he’s rehearsed it in his head over and over again for years, and I have to wonder if my father didn’t utter the same words to him when he was a boy.
Damon’s eyes focus on me once again, and I take the opportunity to try to get through to him. “You told me it was all a lie. Did you really mean that? Did you ever love me at all?” I ask, my voice breaking at the end. I’m trying to appeal to his softer side, the side of him I’ve seen as of lately. Maybe I can stop all of this. Stop it before it gets out of hand and becomes too late to turn back.
Damon remains still, quiet. The silence permeates the room and becomes thicker and thicker until I'm practically choking on it.
I'm gambling my life at this point.
I'm betting that he does love me. And I'm betting that he won't shoot me because of that fact.
“If you ever felt anything for me at all, you won’t do this,” I plead with him.
The door from the kitchen opens, and one of the servers stops in his tracks, the bottle of champagne he was carrying drops to the floor, glass shattering and expensive liquid splashing everywhere.
The man runs back into the kitchen, yelling in Italian for help.
"You've run out of time, Arlo," my father sneers from behind me.
"Victoria," Damon pleads, his face intense, his eyes studying mine, and I watch as a myriad of emotions cross over his features.
"My men will be in here any second, and you will be dead…just like the rest of the Rossis."
My father's words have an effect on him. The gun, which had been unstable just moments before, is now eerily still. "I'm sorry," he whispers to me before the gun goes off.
The bullet rips through my thigh, the force of it knocking me off balance. With fire running wild in my nervous system, my injured leg gives out and I fall backwards, hitting the back of my head against the stone mantle in front of the fireplace. I collapse onto the floor, hard, in a broken heap.
My ears ring and my vision blurs as I look up to see Damon pointing the gun at my father. No longer able to keep my eyes open, they flutter closed.
And then I hear two more shots ring out just as I lose consciousness.
CHAPTER 29
DAMON
WHEN I SEE her beautiful head hit the floor, I turn my attention to her father, who has a look of pure shock on his face. He didn't think I'd have the guts. Too bad for him that he clearly underestimated me and the lengths I would go for my revenge.
I quickly squeeze off two more shots into the man who has haunted my dreams for the past thirteen years and destroyed my fucking family. Two in the chest. Right into the black hole where his heart should be.
I'm ready to go for the final kill shot, but he falls to the floor in a heap alongside his daughter. I wanted to look him in the eyes as I took his life, but I don't have enough time now.
The server saw what was happening. I’m sure he already alerted the guards. And now with the gunshots they just heard…
They're coming for me.
I take a step back, but pause. Victoria is motionless on the floor, unconscious with a crimson bloom spreading over the hem of her light blue dress. The diamond in her engagement ring glitters in the light, and I can't seem to tear my eyes away from it.
Victoria wasn't part of the end game. She wasn't supposed to get hurt…physically, but she wouldn't move out of the fucking way.
I did what I had to do, I tell myself.
I purposely shot Victoria in the thigh. I was intentionally not trying to mortally wound her.
But the bullet could have struck a major artery.
She could bleed to death before they can get her the help she needs.
So many scenarios are swimming through my mind.
But there's only one ending to this twisted fairy tale — the dark knight has to leave the princess behind and flee like a coward, leaving her to possibly die alongside her bastard of a father.
And so that's exactly what I do.
Running from the room, I go through the kitchen. The chef is stunned and wide-eyed as I go rushing past him. I find the back door and push through it, rounding the side of the house to the front where my SUV is parked. I slow my steps and crouch as I practically crawl to the driver's side door.
I can hear the guards at the front of the house on their walkie-talkies talking about the gunshots they heard. No one discovered the bodies yet.
If I can just get in my vehicle and get the fuck out of here, I'll be scot-free.
As carefully and quietly as I can, I open the driver's side door. The SUV stays dark due to the fact that I flicked off the interior light switch before I got out of the vehicle earlier. I climb in behind the wheel and quietly close the door.
I recline in the seat, staying in the shadows and watching the chaos ensuing at the entrance of the house.
They must have found Ciccone.
Once the guards all disappear inside, I crank the engine, push the shifter into drive and floor it, fishtailing my way down the driveway.
The gate at the entrance won’t be a problem, because I had a special bumper installed on the front of my vehicle weeks earlier. It can withstand a lot of pressure, so I’m just hoping it will hold.
I snap my seatbelt in place and press the gas pedal to the fucking floor as I approach the large gate.
The guard in the shack comes out and stands in front of the gate with his gun raised. But when he realizes that I'm not going to stop, he jumps out of the way just in time.
The front end of the vehicle collides with the metal and makes a terrible sound as I crash through it. I'm thrown around in the car, rocking back and forth as the SUV swerves, dislodging the gate as it flies over the hood.
The SUV is in bad shape, but I just need to put as much distance as I can between me and the mansion right now. Then, I can dump the vehicle and worry about other shit later.
I almost lose it pulling out onto the main road, but I whip the wheel and get it back under control. My front end is almost completely smashed in, but the damn thing is still running. The bumper saved the engine from total ruin.
I swerve going down the road. The front left tire is giving me some problems, but I keep on going, trying to keep it as straight as possible and to not wreck into oncoming traffic.
Checking my rearview mirror every few minutes, I don't see any suspicious vehicles following me as I drive along.
I made it out alive.
I should feel proud or happy or…something.
But I don't feel anything…except an overwhelming sense of dread over whether Victoria is okay or not.
Fuck, she could be dead right now.
I slam my hand repeatedly on the steering wheel and grit out a stream of curses.
I should have figured out another way to get to Giorgio that didn't include hurting Victoria. The thought of her dying in that house, wearing my engagement ring, her last thoughts of my betrayal, makes my cold, dark heart ache with a pain I've never felt before.
A feral sound releases from my throat as I roar in agony.
I wrap my hands around the steering wheel in a white-knuckle grip, my forearms vibrating with anger, before suddenly pulling the car over. I come to a sliding stop, kicking up gravel in the parking lot of a local dive bar. I slam the gearshift into park; and a cloud of dust surrounds the SUV as I sit in heavy silence, my ragged breathing the only sound.
I want to turn around and go see if she's okay, but I know that's fucking suicide. I have such an overwhelming need to know if she's okay that I'm willing to risk everything.
"No," I say out loud, shaking my head.
I have to be smart about this. She was simply collateral and nothing more. I never cared about anyone before, so why should I start now.
But is that really true?
I used to care. I cared a lot about my family…my father…my mother…my sister…my Victoria.
I grip the steering wheel and rock back and forth in the seat, seething. I can't go back. I can't go back now. I had a plan in place, put the wheels in motion, and everything worked out perfectly. Well, almost perfectly.
What's done is done.
Nodding my head, having made my mind up, I put the car in drive and pull out onto the road once more.
I need to focus on the future, on finding out where my sister Sara is and forget all about Victoria.
Devious: A Dark Mafia Romance (Deviant Series Book 1) Page 12
