Brutal & Raw: Mafia Romance & Psychological Thriller (Beneventi Family Book 1)

by Sonya Jesus

  “I understand nothing that comes out of your mouth unless it comes with a better attitude,” she growls into the phone. “Considering I’m your only connect, and I’m going to have a scar on my forehead because of your psycho toy, I’d be very nice to me if I were you.”

  “You’re right. You took one for the team.” I wince as I try to drum up something kind to say. “You okay?” That should suffice.

  “I’m stuck in a place full of women, talking about my feelings, and making friends. No, I’m not fucking okay! I’ve almost slipped up twice. They have ways of making you talk here. I don’t know how she hasn’t spit everything out.”

  She hasn’t?

  “I’m not used to carrying out these operations for more than a couple of hours. Don’t ever make me do this again. I don’t do pajama parties and girl talk. It’s annoying and inconvenient, and it makes me wish you and Stone were girls or that I went to college and—”

  Shut up. I grumble to myself impatiently as I rub my forehead. “I don’t care. Why haven’t you checked in with me?”

  “You worried me for a second. I thought you were actually going to be brotherly and care.”

  “Baby steps, Kelsie. God took seven days to build the world. Making me into a perfect brother is almost as impossible.”

  She mumbles something about how long it took to make hell before clearly saying, “There are no cell phones allowed in here, unless they are new. They’re all confiscated at the door, so we don’t cave and talk to our aggressors.”

  “Where is yours?”

  “Hidden in a book on the bookshelf. But I’m never alone, and she barely sleeps, so I don’t have much time to talk. I need to be at the group session in a little bit.”

  She. That’s all I needed to hear. “You found her.”

  “Yes,” she says hesitantly.

  I want to ask so many things. Like how she looks, if she’s still beautiful, and if she ever mentions me, but then I grow the fuck up and remember I’m supposed to be disposing of her. “She’s functioning?”

  “Yes, but it’s not that simple. She’s messed up.”

  “What does that mean?” I stop everything and listen closely. Thoughts of her being hurt or paralyzed or comatose cross my mind, confusing me and spinning the strings of my heart around into a knot.

  Fuck. I need to see her first. Then, I can kill her. “Where do I intercept?”

  “She doesn’t leave this place, so it’s not like you can just pick her up. And there are guards at the door, so you can’t come in.”

  I can always get in. “Then how am I supposed to get her?”

  She remains silent for a while. “Maybe you don’t, Breaker. Maybe you let her try to piece herself back together… She loves you, or she may love you. The longer she’s in here, the more confused she gets.”

  I wasn’t expecting those words. I slink back on my bed and stare at the screen. 327 is lying in my arms, cuddled into me. Her forehead touches my chest, her soft breaths hitting my skin. My throat tightens and my stomach turns to knots as her new name comes to mind. Mercy.

  “Can you hear me?”

  “Yeah,” I say coldly and hit the power button on the TV. “She’s also a liar.”

  “She’s not lying about how she feels for you.”

  “You’re there twenty-four hours and suddenly you’re an expert on her? She was with me for six weeks. She lies about who she is. Is her real name Mercy?”

  “No, I don’t think so,” she answers. “I think she’s hiding a lot about her past, and she’s running away from more than just you.”

  “She probably wasn’t even a fucking virgin.”

  “You can tell those things, Breaker.” She clicks her tongue and breathes deeply, then lowers her voice. “She talks about the guy she was with last being her first. I don’t think she would lie about that.”

  “She’d lie about anything,” I speculate. “Maybe she’s just a good actress.”

  “She wakes up in the middle of the night freaking out and screaming because of Franco, and then she falls back to sleep, out of nowhere, and moans your name as she holds a pillow. So, no, I don’t think she’s acting. I think she’s in a real shit place in her life because of everything, and she went to the doctor a few days ago… Do you know she has a knife in her nightstand? Like a long-ass fucking knife? She’s terrified he’s coming to get her. There’s more, and I don’t know how—”

  “She calls for me?” Nothing else matters, except that she still wants me. She still lulls herself to sleep, pretending to be in my arms, like the girl I was just watching.

  After killing Costa and telling her, I didn’t sleep for days. I didn’t go back there until I had to bring the Cabralis to show my future wife and business partner the facility.

  I should’ve left with Magdalena.

  But I needed to see 327. Just like I do right now. Knowing she’s within my reach, makes the option of not seeing her obsolete. There’s no way I could do that to myself. Just one more time. It won’t be like it was at The Farm. I’ll see her, get the information I need from her, and fuck her out of my system. Then I’ll kill her. I’ve given myself too many choices with her, and everyone knows choices make everything harder.

  “Even sequestered in north-bubble-hell, I’m still hearing your name. She has no idea that she does it.”

  “That doesn’t mean she loves me.” My pitch drops unintentionally.

  “But she doesn’t hate you either. She wants to so bad, but she can’t forget, so she’s stuck hating herself for liking you.”

  “This is what happens when I’m not an asshole all the time.” Expectations are drawn, and I’m real good at disappointing.

  “Why were you nice to her though? Have you thought about that?”

  Every fucking day.

  “She hasn’t said a word about the day she escaped, except to take some of the blame off you. She says you’re ‘not that bad.’ Obviously, she doesn’t know you at all, and no one knows anything about her. The closest person to her is Addie, and even she doesn’t know much.”

  “That doesn’t mean she didn’t go to the cops. Or that there aren’t cops infiltrated in there. Does she have any close friends?”

  “Ivy and Addie, and Ivy just got here so I don’t think she’s a cop. And Addie? She doesn’t want anything to do with the cops. Also, Mercy hasn’t left this place since she got here, other than the doctor once. If she had gone to The Commission, she wouldn’t be here, and if she had gone to the police, she’d be in witness protection. Neither would leave a witness out like this. She’d be safer with them.”

  “She lies, Kelsie. That’s what she does.”

  “She survives, Breaker. She lied to you because she was scared. She has no idea who I am, so why would she lie to me?”

  “You feel sorry for her?” Not sure whether to be pissed or proud.

  “This place is full of people going through the same thing. She doesn’t want me to feel sorry for her; she wants me to understand her, and you know what? I do. I agree: you’re an asshole and a sick fuck, but I also think…sometimes…you can have a moment.”

  “A moment?” I spew out. “Only if it’s a moment of weakness, because nothing else is acceptable.”

  “That’s what this is about?” she shouts. “You want her gone, not because she has information, but because she represents your weakness. She’s a liability.”

  “Like Hayden?” I remind her I’m the one with the power. “I’d check your tone because I’m the one not far from your liability.”

  She scoffs and laughs a little. “You really want to talk about distances from liabilities? Because I may not have my gun on me, but—”

  “Keep pissing me off. Maybe I’ll send Franco over and decorate your guesthouse with body pieces. Hayden’s heart on a bed would be kind of symbolical, wouldn’t it? Since that’s where you two fell for each other.”

  “Let me hammer out your liabilities for you… Killing 327 in the bathroom wouldn’t have a lick o
f symbolism, but it sure would make me feel good.”

  We reach an impasse. And she wins.

  “Do it,” I dare her. “Save me the fucking trouble.” My skin feels raw, and my jaw may snap in half if I keep clamping it shut. If she touches one hair on her before I see her, I will rip Hayden apart.

  “Maybe I will. You don’t deserve someone like her anyway.” I hear the door opening. “Shit.”

  “Maybe I don’t.” She needs to stick around, which requires me to be a bit less of a dick. “What so you’re all B.F.Fs now?” I ease the tension between us.

  She stops and shuts the door again. “Yeah, Breaker’s Fake Family.”

  “Not fake, technically.”

  “Not real either.” She pauses, and the voice comes out muffled. “We need to stop hurting each other. We always go to threats when truths are said, and things escalate from there.”

  She’s going to be my second, but she needs to be taught not to talk back to me. Costa’s lessons were brutal, but they fucking worked. He broke me in. I never defied him, well, until the day I shot him.

  She interrupts the wheels spinning in my head, “They need a guard.”

  “At the refuge?”

  “Yes, it’s your in.”

  “Technically you’re my in. That’s why you are in the damn place instead of being here.”

  “I’m not going to kill her for you. If you want to do it, you have to do it yourself. I’m not fucking lifting a finger.”

  “I’ll send Stone and Rom.” I don’t want to hear anything else from her until she learns to respect me.

  “St—”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Kelsie.” I strain to hear the person talking to her, and my breathing stalls. “I didn’t know you were here. I’m just going to hop in the shower.”

  “Okay. I’ll be done in a minute.”

  “Take your time and good luck.”

  327.

  “Sorry about that. Like I was saying, I have experience, but we can meet to discuss your questions at three tomorrow.”

  “Message me the details.”

  I drop the phone on the sheets beside me and bury my head into the pillow. Magdalena spent all night video chatting me. At first, the phone sex was good, I could watch her and 327 on the screen, which gave me threesome vibes that got me off, but she didn’t hang up.

  At four in the morning, she went on and on about the guest list, black and gold monogram invitations, and not wanting a bridal party. Probably because she doesn’t have any friends.

  By five, she exhausted all my give-a-damns and hung up on me in a huff. When we got to wedding favors, I suggested monogrammed gold bullets. “We could ask that guy from the news,” I had said.

  Apparently, she didn’t find that as funny as I did.

  Shit. She’s crazy enough to do it. With the price of gold these days, they’d be rounding about four hundred bucks a bullet. She had five hundred people on the guest list. No way in hell am I paying two-hundred grand for wedding favors.

  Well, if I find the safes, I wouldn’t even care. Hell, she could even have gold napkin rings and goldware instead of silverware. Costa used to have money in various locations because he was afraid the Feds would freeze his accounts because of Fabrizio. He used to say he had enough money to pay his men for four years.

  I just need to find the fucking money. For this month and because Hayden insisted it would spark doubts, I sold the gold bar my father had in the living room coffee table at a reduced rate and paid the men. But I needed to find the safes for the next month and the following ones.

  Nine months and a wedding—an expensive wedding. Once the heifers start birthing calves, everything will be fine.

  Romolo pulls up to the old farm. The place is pitch-black, so we use flashlights to guide the way. I sent the two guys watching this place to check the road and make sure we weren’t followed. I should’ve just thrown the power switch on, but I didn’t want to draw attention to what I was doing. We weren’t, but they didn’t know that, and I needed them far away from me.

  “Where are we headed, Boss?” Romolo says, as he opens the door with the keys.

  “Second floor, down the hall. Make a right, and then a left. I need to check something in my old office. I’m going to go on ahead, you get the tools from the car and meet me there.” I repeat the directions, “Right then left.”

  This place is a labyrinth, and recruiters didn’t often go inside, so I suspect he’ll get lost.

  In my office, the place had been completely cleared out. The bathroom, even in the dim light, looks spotless. Too spotless for an abandoned place, but I’m about to dirty it up some. I step inside the tub and look for the error in the tile pattern.

  There it is. I run my fingers along the corner seam. Two black tiles and two white tiles line up together, and the white ones are slightly warmer-toned.

  I reach into my back pocket for the handheld metal detector Rom purchased this afternoon and turn it on before scanning the wall. I start on the opposite side of the showerhead to see if it can pick up the water pipes beneath the tiles.

  It beeps when it gets close, and I follow the tubes along the wall. The water lines lead to the right and not to the left or the other end, which means, if this beeps near the mistake tiles, there may be a safe behind here.

  Shit. I run the wand over the suspected area, and it doesn’t beep, so I keep scanning. Beep. Beep. Beep. The sound goes off ten tiles over.

  “Boss?”

  Thank fuck. I turn my head to Romolo. “Break through these tiles.”

  He nods, and I leave him to clank away at the materials while I take my phone in one hand and the detector in the other. I run it over the walls, trying to find the metal safe behind them. It beeps again. “Rom!” I shout. “Bring a marker.”

  He shows up by my side with this phone tucked into his front shirt pocket and free hands.

  “Mark the spots, so we can know where to break.”

  He nods and writes an ‘X’ on the wall when the detector goes off. It goes off two more times. Rom heads to the bathroom and comes back with a hammer. He slams it against the wall, over and over, and finally gets through all the holes. My head is pounding, but I have both keys in my pocket, and I’m ready to stop worrying about everything. With money and with 327 gone, I’ll be a little less stressed.

  Rom calls me over. He has no idea why we are breaking down the walls of this old building, but I’m so happy I tell him, “There’s a lot of money in those safes.”

  “Are there more here?”

  “I have no idea.” He wouldn’t put them all in the same place. Or would he?

  We both shine our lights inside. Both safes are identical and need a fucking code as well as a key.

  “You need both or they lock down, Boss.”

  I hate that dead motherfucker. “Cut them open.”

  “They’ve been bolted down and encased in cement. It’s going to take a while, and I need electricity to get them out and maybe a crane. What’s on the other side of this office?”

  “A storage closet maybe, or an office. I don’t know. No one ever used it.”

  “These have to have a width of at least twenty or thirty inches. He created this wall just for these safes.”

  “Maybe he created other walls for safes?”

  Rom runs his dusty fingers through his hair and gets up. “He didn’t tell you where they were?”

  I roll my head back and massage the back of my neck. “Costa had a flair for the dramatic. He told me about one in the office’s bathroom, but I have no clue where the others are.”

  “We’ll find them,” Romolo offers very nonchalantly. Either he believes me, or he doesn’t care to defy me, which right now makes him my favorite person.

  “Let’s leave these here for now.”

  “What if someone sees them?”

  “Only you and I know they are here. And if those two guys outside take it, I will hunt them down. No one steals from a Beneventi.”

  He g
rabs his tools and puts them into his yellow metal box. “So, what’s next?”

  “I need you to drive into Upstate New York with Stone. He has an interview tomorrow, and if everything goes well, he’ll be one of the guards on night shift at the refuge. And I need you to bring me the lying identity thief.”

  “What if she recognizes me?”

  “Wear a mask. Make sure no one else sees you. If she does after you get her out of there, she won’t tell anybody.”

  His eyebrows curve higher, and he nods his head in understanding. “You’re not coming?”

  “No, I have some things to do here.” Like find the key codes and a meeting with Kelsie. “I’ll call Franco and give him the heads-up. Bring 327 to the mansion, and make sure Stone doesn’t go soft and let her go.”

  “Sure thing, Boss.”

  He grabs his box and follows me out the door, both flashlights in our hands to lead the way. “I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”

  “What’s that?” he asks, as we climb down the flight of stairs.

  “How would you like to be head of my security at the mansion?”

  “Isn’t that Stone’s job, Boss? Don’t get me wrong, I’m very appreciative, but I don’t want to piss off one of the Beneventi brothers.”

  “Stone’s agreed to be my consigliere. I need him focused on law school and keeping me legit, but I need someone to lead the crew. To organize the team and be my security detail.”

  “Is Franco your second?”

  “No. That’s part of what I need to figure out tomorrow.” We head toward the car, parked right at the front entrance. “You can move into the mansion. If you’re interested, the bedroom on the ground floor, west wing is yours.”

  12

  Boiled Eggs

  327

  “I didn’t even know you could burn boiled eggs! Twice!” I say to myself, as I grab two dishrags and remove the pot from the burner. I shut the gas off and open all the windows as wide as possible. Just the one over the sink isn’t enough. This place stinks of eggs and burnt protein.

  Multitasking in the kitchen is most definitely not something I should try again. I puff out air through my clenched mouth, regretting my early decision to sit outside in the courtyard, under the moonlight, peeling the vegetables for the soup. Not only did I not finish that, but I also dozed off.