by Reilly, Cora
Fear.
My eyes took in the bloody mess. Limbs, skin and blood everywhere. “How do you know these are all the members?”
“We counted the bodies,” Orfeo said with a grimace.
“I don’t see any bodies,” I muttered. Someone had pretty much torn every single body to shreds. I spotted a bloody axe on the ground covered in blood and pieces of flesh.
“We counted the heads,” Demetrio added with a wry smile, exchanging a look with Orfeo.
The heads were in bad shape too, but they were still recognizable as heads.
“Burn down everything. Don’t leave any traces behind,” I ordered.
“Don’t you want to find out who did this?” Orfeo asked.
“No,” I snarled. “Burn everything down.”
I knew who had done this, and I had to make sure I stopped him before he did worse.
“Fuck,” Demetrio exclaimed, eyes filling with realization. He and Orfeo exchanged another look. Best friends since birth. “It was Luca, right?”
I considered my options. Luca needed to appear strong. If I tried to hide his involvement, people would get suspicious. I shrugged. “He thought it would send the other MCs a nice message. Take photos before you burn everything down, and send it to every fucking MC in our territory who wants to piss in our pond.”
Orfeo let out a disbelieving laugh, a mixture of disgust and respect on his face. “He did this alone? Fuck, he’s a beast.”
I turned around and left them to their task.
Where the hell was my brother?
LUCA
I watched the girl thrust her naked ass up before she swung herself around the pole, her dark eyes locking on mine, red painted lips pulling wide into a flirty smile. She fell to the floor and crawled toward me, her drooping top revealing big fake tits.
“I see you’re checking out our new stripper,” Matteo said as he sank into the armchair beside me. I ignored him as the girl rolled onto her back and pulled back her top, revealing fat pierced nipples, which she began twisting as she fucked me with her eyes. I could take her into one of the rooms in the back of the Pergola and fuck her brains out.
“I’ve been searching for you since yesterday,” Matteo said, his voice on edge.
He leaned forward, barring my view of the girl. I narrowed my eyes at him. His brown eyes searched my face as if he was looking for a fucking treasure hidden somewhere. “You look calm.”
“I am calm,” I said.
“Demetrio told me he got word someone massacred every member of the MC in New Jersey. Remember the fuckers who thought they could take over the gun trade in Jersey?”
I watched the girl over Matteo’s head. She returned to the pole and whirled around it topless, tits jiggling up and down.
“I went there. Complete bloodbath. Limbs and skin everywhere. Ten dead.” Matteo raised his eyebrows. “They were chopped into pieces. Most of the work was done with an axe, but a few got a bit of love with a skinning knife.” He leaned forward and tapped the knife strapped to my chest.
The dancer lifted herself up on the pole and spread her legs in a wide V. Matteo whirled around to her. “Why don’t you fuck off?”
Her eyes grew wide and she released the pole before she ran toward the changing rooms. My eyes followed her ass. I hadn’t fucked anyone’s ass since Grace four years ago.
“Do I have to get naked so you will listen to me?”
I leaned back in my chair. “I’m listening.”
“I assume you did that.”
“Their screams and their blood felt like fucking paradise,” I murmured.
Matteo shook his head. “Fuck, Luca. You won’t go ballistic on me, right? The last time I saw you…fuck. And now you’re all calm—that’s strange even for you.”
“I am calm.”
Matteo sat back in his chair, bringing distance between us, and I knew I’d hate what he had to say next. “I saw Aria in the mansion yesterday morning.”
My heart clenched fucking tight, but I kept a calm face. “She will stay there. She won’t return to New York. Have Sandro watch her.”
Matteo rubbed his temple. “Luca, listen, I know you don’t want to hear it, but I don’t think Aria cheated on you.”
I stood, my eyes drawn to the changing room door where the stripper had disappeared. Matteo shoved my chest, eyes blazing with fury.
“For fuck’s sake, will you stop this shit? You’re freaking even me out and I’ve seen you at your worst.” He paused. “Though I have to admit what you did in that clubhouse may be the most twisted shit I have ever seen.”
“You saw the photos of Dante and Aria,” I pressed out through a fucking tight throat. I clenched my fists, hating that my body betrayed me.
“They show nothing. I talked to Orazio. He got his hands on the photographer and will bring him to us tomorrow.”
“I can’t take in Orazio now. We need him as a spy.”
Matteo rolled his eyes. “I know, and he will return to Chicago.” He’d been rising in rank since Valentina married Dante. As her brother he was our perfect asset.
“Did you hear what I said? We can talk to the photographer tomorrow. Orazio already questioned him and it’s like Aria said, she met with Val, then Dante joined them and forced Aria to leave the restaurant with him, but tomorrow you can make him tell you the same thing again if you don’t believe me.”
I nodded, but apart from that didn’t react. My outsides were stone but I couldn’t control my fucking insides. I felt fucking relieved, but it didn’t matter anymore. Yesterday had showed me one thing: I had grown weak because of Aria. She was a weakness—a weakness I couldn’t allow myself as Capo.
“So will you help me interrogate that asshole?”
I smirked. “Sure.”
Matteo frowned. “I’m not sure you really get what I’m telling you.”
“Oh I do,” I said quietly. “Aria went to Chicago behind my back. That is fact. She didn’t cheat, who gives a fuck?” The words seemed to scorch my throat. A fucking lie. Even thinking of Aria being with someone other than me felt like a stab in the heart.
A weakness.
I’d never been weak in my life.
Aria was a weakness I couldn’t allow myself.
Matteo shook his head. “Whatever. Tomorrow we’ll talk to that photographer. Maybe you’ll be more tolerable afterwards.”
Orazio nodded at me as I shook his hand. He was only a couple of inches shorter than me. It was unmistakable that he was related to Valentina. Same eyes, same hair color. At least he wasn’t fawning over Dante.
Dante. My blood boiled only thinking of him, of his hands on Aria’s shoulders, of his mouth close to her ear, and his fucking arm between her legs...
Matteo shoved me. “Will you snap out of it for fuck’s sake? I can’t have you go on another killing spree.”
“Why not? I’m sure it will silence many of our enemies.”
Matteo shook his head before he turned to Orazio, who was listening with mild interest.
“Where is the asshole?” Matteo asked.
“Trunk. Pissed his pants. That’s why I didn’t want him on my backseat,” Orazio said. He led us to the back of his BMW and opened the trunk. A short, fat guy in his thirties was curled up inside. He stank of piss, shit and sweat. He blinked up at us through teary eyes, his mouth covered with tape.
I grabbed him by the throat and lifted him out, then thrust him to the ground. Behind us the building of the old Yonkers power plant rose into the sky.
Gateway to Hell.
I smiled down at the sniveling man on the ground as he watched me like I was the devil. “So you took those pictures?” I asked in a low growl as I knelt down beside the man, unsheathing my knife from my chest holster. I removed the tape so he could talk, but more than that: so I could hear his screams.
He eyed the blade with open horror. “Please! I only did what I was paid to do. I didn’t mean any harm.”
My smile widened. This was who I was de
stined to be. Brutal. Cruel. Merciless. Not the fucking emotional mess Aria turned me into.
Most of the time I let Matteo handle the torture because he was a master at it. He loved to play with his victims. I preferred the kill. Not today. Orazio and Matteo stood back as I dealt with the photographer. He’d long revealed his last secret when I plunged my knife into his fucking heart and granted him death. For a long time, there was silence after that as I tried to get a handle on my fury.
Dante had let the photographer take those photos and had sent them to me because he knew Aria was my fucking weakness. He’d hoped I’d lose my shit, had hoped I’d go on a rampage, maybe even attack Chicago. I wasn’t sure.
Orazio cleared his throat. “I also found out yesterday that Gottardo and Ermano contacted Dante a few weeks ago to help him throw you over. Dante was wary of them, thought it was a trap, but in our meeting yesterday Scuderi encouraged him to trust in them.”
“Gottardo and fucking Ermano. Those fucking bastards,” I hissed, focusing on them instead of the fact that Dante fucking Cavallaro had tried to make me believe Aria had an affair with him. Fuck him!
Love, a fucking weakness!
Matteo watched me cautiously as if he thought I’d snap Orazio’s or his neck just to kill something. “At least it’s only them and a couple of low soldiers. Nothing we can’t handle.”
“Oh we will handle them,” I said. “I wish I hadn’t given Gottardo a quick death.”
“You crushed his throat, Luca. There are nicer ways to die,” Matteo said. Orazio’s eyebrows rose in mild curiosity.
“Nicer than what Ermano will get.”
“For sure,” Matteo said.
“If you don’t mind, I’ll return to Chicago before someone notices I’m gone,” Orazio said. I gave him a quick nod. He exchanged a few more words with Matteo before he drove off.
Matteo stepped up to my side. “So Aria didn’t cheat.”
“We should attack tonight. I want to weed out the root of our problem as soon as possible. The family is full of traitors, I always knew Gottardo was one. And now Ermano too. Those two were always thick.”
Matteo scowled. “Luca, did you hear what I said?”
I got into his face. “Stay out of my marriage, Matteo, and you’d better make sure your own wife doesn’t turn you into a fucking fool.”
Matteo didn’t say anything, and it was for the best because I was out for blood again.
That night, Romero, Matteo and I attacked Ermano’s holiday house in the Hamptons. Ermano was supposed to return to Atlanta in the morning. He would never return. Orfeo and Demetrio were on their way to capture Gottardo’s other legitimate son. I knew Demetrio would have no trouble handling his half-brother. No love was wasted between those two.
I killed Ermano’s first soldier with a twist of his neck before he could call out a warning, Matteo took down the second with his knife. Not waiting to see if Romero had disabled the third, I raced up the stairs, taking them two at a time. A door to my right opened, and I slashed my knife toward the person and arched up in the last second, impaling the blade a couple of inches above the head of a young girl. Her mouth opened for a cry and I clamped my hand down on her lips. She struggled as my arm wrapped around her waist. She fought hard as I leaned down to her ear. “Not a sound. Nothing will happen to you, Kiara.” Her eyes flickered with recognition. “Where is your father?”
My cousin pointed toward the door at the end of the corridor, her upper arms littered with bruises. I released her and she looked at me with huge eyes, wrapping her arms around herself. My eyes took in the bruises on her collarbones and her swollen cheek. Ermano was my father’s brother through and through.
Matteo ran toward me and I pushed Kiara toward him, then crept toward the door she had indicated. She hadn’t lied. She had no reason to. Before I could open the door, someone else did. His wife stood before me. Ermano must have sent her to investigate the noise. Fucking coward.
I shoved her to the side and barely managed to avoid a bullet. Ermano was hiding behind the massive bed and firing at me. A heavy thud sounded a second before I flung myself to the ground and pulled my own gun. Glancing over my shoulder, I saw his wife on the ground, bleeding from a wound in her head. Ermano had shot his own wife by accident, or perhaps on purpose—who knew what went on in the crazy fucker’s head? I wouldn’t shoot him. That would be too quick.
Matteo crouched in the corridor, and motioned for me to stay down.
I crawled closer to the bed.
“What do you want?” Ermano screamed.
“Come out, then you’ll get a quick death,” Matteo shouted. As if that was going to happen. I’d tear him apart piece by piece, muscle, bone and skin.
I crawled even closer to the bed. I could see Ermano’s knees through the gap under the bed. I aimed toward his right kneecap and fired. His piercing scream was music to my ears. I pushed off the ground and was beside my uncle in two large steps, gripping him by the throat and lifting him until we were eye level.
“You can kiss that quick death goodbye, Uncle,” I snarled.
Two hours later, Matteo and I left the mansion. Romero would deal with the cleaning brigade. When we approached Matteo’s Porsche Cayenne, a disheveled brown head poked up from the backseat.
“Fuck,” Matteo muttered. “I forgot about Kiara.”
I rubbed a hand over my head. “How old is she?”
“I have no clue. We have too many cousins. Twelve?”
Sighing, I opened the back door and leaned in. Kiara flinched away from me and pulled her legs up against her chest. “How old are you?” I asked her in as civil a tone as I could manage after chopping her father into pieces.
She watched me like I was going to kill her.
I scanned Kiara’s face closely, trying to remember. “Twelve?”
She swallowed.
I closed the door and Matteo locked it before I slipped into the passenger seat. “Where?” Matteo asked.
She was our cousin, and I needed to make sure she was safe, but my options were limited. She was too young to be married off, and honor dictated that I chose family, but whom could I trust? Aunt Egidia and her husband Felix in Baltimore were the most decent of the bunch. “Egidia. Until then we’ll take her to Marianna and her husband.”
“What will happen to me?” she whispered eventually.
She was still clutching her legs against her chest. “You will be safe.”
Matteo rolled his eyes at me. “Nobody will hurt you, Kiara, least of all Luca or me.”
I was glad when we dropped our cousin at Marianna’s home. Her husband was a loyal soldier and would make sure Kiara was safe until she could move in with Aunt Egidia.
Afterwards, Matteo drove to the meeting point we’d agreed on with Demetrio and Orfeo—the Yonker power plant. Angelo, Gottardo’s last legitimate son, was bound to a chair.
He glared when I approached, then he spat at Demetrio’s feet. “You bring shame to our name. Son of a whore. My father should have never welcomed you into our home.”
“Welcomed?” Demetrio hissed.
“He’s mine,” I warned before Demetrio could shove a knife into his half-brother. I pulled out my own knife. “Let’s see what kind of secrets you’ve got for us, Angelo.”
After tonight, the Famiglia would be free of traitors and ready to brave the war with the Outfit, and I would lead them with brutal focus without the shackles of love holding me back. No matter how long it took, no matter how many lives it would cost, I would bring Dante Cavallaro down—even if it killed me.
chapter 19
ARIA
Romero stayed with us in the mansion almost constantly in the days after Luca left me heartbroken. I knew he and my sisters were worried about me because I barely ate. Not for lack of trying but the smell of most food made me feel sick. Luca stayed in New York. He hadn’t as much as messaged me in three days, and I could hardly stand it. Since our wedding, I’d been with him practically every day, and I miss
ed him horribly, not just at night.
I woke up before sunrise, feeling cold despite the two blankets I used at night. I slid out of bed, grabbed my bathrobe and threw it over my nightgown before I moved out of my room and downstairs, then out onto the terrace. Shivering, I searched the premises until my eyes found Romero doing sprints and burpees like every morning. Gianna and Lily were still asleep, and would stay asleep for several more hours.
After a few minutes, he noticed me and jogged toward me, his shirt plastered to his sweaty chest. “Aria, what’s wrong?”
I let out a choked laugh, peering up at him, and he nodded. “He will come around,” he said. “He knows you didn’t cheat. Matteo found the photographer and he confirmed your story.”
I knew what that meant, knew a man had gone through hell on earth so I could prove my innocence, but there was no guilt. I felt empty.
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
Luca hadn’t contacted me, so either he still believed I’d cheated or he really didn’t love me anymore.
I touched my stomach and looked out toward the ocean.
“He needs time to calm down. You going to Chicago behind his back, that left scars and came at the worst possible time. Luca is dealing with a lot of shit from his family at the moment.”
I sighed, hoping Romero was right, hoping Luca would give us another chance. I couldn’t imagine a life without him at my side. “I need to ask a favor of you,” I said eventually, and Romero tensed.
“Aria, now isn’t the time to do anything that could anger Luca any more.”
“I know. Don’t you think I don’t know that?” I whispered harshly. “But he isn’t talking to me. He said he’s done with me, and I don’t have time to wait for him to forgive me.”
Romero frowned. “Why? What is it you need me to do?”
“I need you to take me to New York to a doctor.” I touched my stomach again and Romero followed the movement.
