by Bethany-Kris
“Oh, I forgot to mention,” Corrine said.
“About what?” Evelina asked.
“Your father has a guest.”
“Who?”
“Tommas Rossi.”
Evelina helped Corrine load the dishwasher with the dishes from supper. Her father and Tommas had disappeared after a quiet dinner. Actually, it was kind of nice. Riley hadn’t bombarded Evelina with demands like he usually did. He asked her about college and how Adriano had seemed that week.
A loud sigh drew Evelina’s attention to the kitchen entryway. Courtney stood there with her arms crossed as her pink pumps tapped a beat to the tiled floor.
“Eve, you’re not required to assist the help in cleaning up. You can leave if you’d like, since the dinner is over and everything.”
Evelina straightened to a standing position as Corrine quietly put the last few cups into the top of the dishwasher. “It’s never actually been Corrine’s job to handle the cleaning after meals.”
“Is that so?” Courtney asked, her nose crinkling.
“Don’t,” Corrine said far too softly for the fool across the room to hear.
Evelina ignored her. “It is. Our mother used to have us help her because it taught us some sense of value in ourselves and respect for those who work for us. It also taught us how to take care of ourselves because not everyone can afford cooks and maids.”
Courtney was the perfect case in point. She hadn’t been very much except Riley Conti’s mistress in a paid-for apartment before Mia’s death.
“Well, your mother isn’t here anymore and I am. Corrine knows her place.”
Her place?
What in the honest fuck?
“The only reason you are here is because my mother isn’t,” Evelina said, struggling to keep her tone level.
“Eve,” Corrine murmured, placing a hand on Evelina’s arm gently. “It’s fine, dear.”
No, it wasn’t.
Someone needed to clue Courtney into the truth, and Evelina really didn’t give a good goddamn what her father would think about it.
“Oh, let her have her words,” Courtney said, laughing sharply and waving a hand dismissively. “God knows if I have to sit through another dinner pretending to give a damn about Riley’s spoiled little bitch of a daughter for one more minute, I will scream.”
Evelina scoffed so loudly it echoed. “Spoiled? Spoiled? Courtney, you are the definition of a well-paid whore. The only thing you were worthy enough to do in my father’s life was step into the role of his wife after my mother was dead. You wear her jewelry, you sleep in her sheets, and you drive her goddamn car. And that black mink coat you adore so much? Even that was hers. So you know what? You’re second place and that’s the first bitch to lose. You’re a man’s second pick. The hand-me-down wife, Courtney. You might wear my mother’s rings, but you’re absolutely nothing like her. And you could never be. Everybody knows it, even my father. You’re the only one playing house here, sweetheart. The rest of us are just making due with the replacement.”
Courtney gaped with what could only be described as a fish-face.
Evelina didn’t give the woman a chance to respond and instead, gave Corrine a tight smile. “Thank you for dinner, it was lovely. As usual.”
“Eve …”
Even Corrine didn’t know what to say.
“It’s perfectly fine,” Evelina whispered, aching in her heart. She’d let out a lot of anger and resentment. A great deal of it probably should have been directed at her father, but Courtney was the easy target. “I should go.”
Corrine nodded.
Evelina wasted no time getting out of the kitchen. Courtney glared as Evelina passed by. Unbothered by the woman’s attitude, Evelina glared back. Sometimes the truth hurt. Courtney had to learn that little fact of life.
Evelina had.
At the closet where she’d dropped off her things earlier, Evelina stopped to gather her stuff. The sound of familiar male voices coming down the stairwell from up above echoed inside the closet. It was one of the oddities about the large, old home. In some places, the walls were paper thin.
“A marriage,” Tommas said, dragging the last word out.
Evelina felt the blood freeze in her veins.
“It’s my last resort,” Riley replied.
“Well, I think there are a dozen more ways to correct the issues rather than that, boss.”
“Perhaps, but this will suit me well, too. After all that Adriano did with Alessa, the stains he left are hard to clean, Tommas. And now we have a mess with Walter Artino ending up dead in his house. Did you see the autopsy photos?”
“I did. He’d been dead quite a while before his wife came home from her vacation and found him.”
Evelina shuddered.
“Another problem, Tommas.”
“You’ve already got allies where you need them. I’m sure the DeLuca mess will clean itself up on its own. That’s how it usually works.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
Tommas sighed and the footsteps above Evelina’s head stopped. “Have you given consideration—”
“I don’t need to. This works, Tommas.”
“All I see is another problem. You might push everyone right over the edge here, Riley.”
“A marriage will solve that,” Riley replied sharply. “And if Joel is willing and you’re not, then he can take the arrangement.”
“You’re willing to marry your daughter off to Joel Trentini just to keep him in line?”
“It’s more than that!”
Evelina couldn’t breathe.
No way in hell.
She couldn’t marry Joel!
Joel?
“And I know he’ll take it, and in a few years, that will make him look all the better for the seat, Tommas.”
“Fine,” Tommas muttered heavily.
“Hmm, what was that? A little louder, please.”
“Fine,” Tommas repeated, “I’ll take the marriage.”
“Good choice.”
Evelina felt her fingernails cut into her palm.
She couldn’t marry Tommas Rossi, either. While her mother had been adopted by David Rossi and his wife when Mia was just an infant, making the cousin relation between Tommas and Evelina only through marriage, she had grown up knowing him as her family. But even she could overlook that. What she couldn’t overlook was her friend.
Abriella …
Why would Tommas agree?
“Give me a week or so to think it all over before I officially say yes or no,” Riley said.
“I thought this was the yes or no,” Tommas replied, chuckling.
Even the sound of the man’s amusement was strained and sad. Tommas had never settled with a woman because he had one he loved. Evelina knew it, and that stabbed at her heart as she thought about what that could mean for him and her.
Why agree?
Evelina didn’t waste any more time thinking about it. As the footsteps began to move down the staircase again, she simply yanked her coat on, closed the door, and left the house.
Anywhere …
She had to go anywhere but there.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“Riley is back.”
Theo didn’t look up from the stack of money he shoved into the cash counter. The machine spat the bills out on the other side and lit up the screen with a digital number in the thousands. Whenever Friday rolled around in any given week, the members of Theo’s crew who handled cash flow, because their hands could be trusted not to steal, dropped off their cash, took their shit, and ran with it. Theo’s cut was always ninety percent of whatever somebody brought in to him whether it be from dealing, stealing, or scheming.
Or hell, even all three.
Theo wasn’t picky as long as money was being made and his crew was being productive with their methods of making cash on the kind of streets where everybody had something to sell. But out of Theo’s ninety percent, seventy of that went to the boss.
Sighin
g, Theo slapped the cut owed to Riley into an envelope and slid it into a drawer in the old, weather-beaten desk. Regardless of his feelings toward the boss, or the problems he was facing with the Trentini crew, the head of the family was the head of the family.
“Nice pile,” his guest appraised from the doorway.
“My boys follow through,” Theo said, grinning.
“How much do you have there, anyway?”
“This is just from the early ones. I’ve got the better payments coming in tonight.”
“That’s not what I asked, Theo.”
“One-fifty.”
“One-hundred-fifty?”
“Thousand,” Theo confirmed.
Damian whistled low. “Jesus Christ. How are you making that in a month?”
Theo glanced up from the pile of cash that was his. “My take is only forty-five grand, D.”
“Still … you said this was the early guys. What else are you waiting on?”
“Rackets from the pier and the construction companies come in checks and a couple of my bookies pay on Saturdays.”
Labor rackets sometimes happened to be a hard thing to get on. A Capo needed to find the right company willing to pay out employees on the payroll when they actually didn’t even show up to the job.
Damian frowned. “The Rossi crew is barely touching one-hundred in a week.”
“Maybe the Capo thing just isn’t for you, D.”
“That’s what I fucking told Tommas, all right.”
Theo chuckled. “Or maybe you’re not watching the hands that are feeding you close enough, man. Tommas always had a high earning crew. He’s got a hand in just about everything. Weapons dealing with some gangs here, drug selling there … shit, he even managed to get a racket in on that road crew when they were tearing up the new highways. Seven flaggers were hired and never missed a day, but then again, they never showed up. He’s got a smooth talk and people fall in line with that.”
Damian’s face turned unreadable as he surveyed Theo’s cash again. “It’s not that I dislike the title and job, man.”
“Then what is it?”
“I’m still getting used to the spotlight.”
Theo hummed. “Ghost, huh?”
“Well, I used to be.”
“You know, you have to give it time, Damian. Being a Capo is tedious and slow. It takes years to build a decent name and reputation on the streets and five minutes to lose it all. As far as the DeLucas go, this pile used to be split between Dino, Walter, and me. Just like how Bastoni used to divide his with Adriano, or Tommas with his father.”
Damian cocked a brow. “I hadn’t thought of it that way, although they didn’t kill their partners.”
Theo kept his expression blank. Walter’s death wasn’t necessarily being blamed on Theo, but people weren’t not blaming him, either. He also wouldn’t be attending the funeral, whenever it was had.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about, Damian.”
“Sure you don’t.”
“We’re not discussing whatever it is you want to discuss, D.”
“You did hear what I said when I first came in, right?” Damian asked.
“Yep. Riley’s back. Here.” Theo pulled open the drawer, grabbed the item he put in there earlier, and tossed the envelope to Damian. The other Capo caught it easily and the money disappeared in Damian’s jacket pocket. “Take that to the bastard and deliver it to him. I have no plans for my next tribute to be my last when it’s accompanied by a bullet to my skull.”
“Sure, I’ll make sure it gets to Riley.”
“Let him know another one will make its way to him, also.”
“Whatever.”
“What are you doing down here in the Heights, anyway?” Theo asked.
“Giving you a heads-up, old friend.”
Theo scoffed. “About Riley’s return? I’ve known about it for a week. Word travels fast when the boss is back in town and all that interesting shit.”
Riley had returned home and hadn’t sent a single word along to Theo. Sure, rumors flew about what the boss had to say, but very little of it was likely true. The shooting incident that happened nearly two weeks before had practically faded into obscurity. Nothing had happened since and Joel Trentini had yet to act on anything he promised. Once again, Joel’s mouth was a hell of a lot bigger than his actions.
Theo wasn’t concerned.
“No, not about the boss,” Damian said. “Although he has a lot to do with it. Some people are getting antsy, that’s all.”
“About what?”
“The fact you’re being so quiet.”
Theo smirked, unable to hide it. “Being quiet is a problem?”
“It is when a couple of weeks before, you were confronting the underboss at a family dinner.”
“Joel asked for that.”
Damian tossed his hands in his pockets, seemingly unconcerned. “Maybe he did.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“The problem is that maybe I’d like to make sure you don’t end up like your brother, Theo,” Damian said quietly. “With Lily being pregnant and all, it just reinforces this belief that she should be happy and her family should be happy. I’m sick and fucking tired of watching my wife suffer because of the selfish men surrounding her.”
Theo’s jaw ticked; his only show of agitation. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“You know what it means. Don’t play dumb. Lily doesn’t need another one of her brothers ending up dead because of his own stupidity.”
“Are you suggesting that Dino—”
“I’m not suggesting anything, I’m stating it.”
Theo didn’t like what Damian was playing at. Like fire, it was probably going to burn. Theo had his suspicions about what Dino had been up to before his murder, but no proof. Every finger that Theo pointed at Dino for certain things could be pointed at other people for the same reasons. In fact, the Outfit did blame others for certain things. The shooting that killed Mia. The shooting of a Conti business. The shooting at the Trentini home that killed Theo’s uncle and a Rossi twin.
Dino had been a quiet man, but for the months leading up to his death, Theo noticed his brother had turned more solitary in nature. When Dino called Lily back from traveling, Theo really took note of the changes in his brother. Then he found out about Dino’s son.
Clearing his throat, Theo slammed the drawer shut on his desk and stepped out to face Damian. “What do you know about my brother, huh?”
“More than I want to,” Damian admitted.
Tommas Rossi’s words from nearly two weeks before rattled around in the back of Theo’s mind. Have you ever thought that maybe your brother is the reason for all of this?
Had the scars of the DeLuca brothers’ raising under their uncle’s demanding, cold eye finally opened back up for Dino? Had he finally bled out all that pain and all his secrets with a few bullets and some bloodshed?
“Revenge is a dish best served cold,” Damian said. “But never forget, your hand is the one holding the plate as you deliver it and that’ll leave you feeling like ice, too.”
Theo chuckled, feeling deader than ever inside. “Thanks for the heads-up.”
“You didn't even hear a word I said, do you?”
“I hear what I want to hear,” Theo replied.
“Which is what, man?”
“That you know a lot more than you should, D.”
Damian stiffened, but he didn’t look away from Theo. “Yeah, I do.”
“So how much of this mess was you, too?”
“The part of the mess that keeps me breathing, Theo.”
Lily.
Theo let it go.
A knock on the office door broke the men’s staring contest.
“Yeah, it’s open,” Theo said to whoever was waiting behind the door.
One of his younger guys pushed the door open when Damian moved out of the way. Eighteen-year-old Cole Artino looked Damian up and down. He likely didn’t recogn
ize the hitman turned Capo, but anyone who came into Theo’s strip club and who got invited to the back offices wasn’t just a regular patron. But the kid knew better than to ask questions.
That’s why Theo liked him for certain things.
“What?” Theo asked.
“I need the key for the holding room,” Cole said.
“Why?”
“Pick-ups.”
Theo grunted his approval and pulled the keys in question out of his pocket before tossing them to the kid. “Make sure every pound is marked and counted, and that every man who takes a brick has paid me for the week and for his spot.”
Cole nodded. “I will.”
“I’ll be right behind you to look over the books, kid.”
“I know, Skip.”
With that, the kid disappeared.
Damian laughed when the door shut. “Is he even legal to be inside this joint?”
“Barely. Three months past his eighteenth. He can’t drink or serve liquor, so I don’t let him. No need to have the cops in here going batshit crazy over a kid with a liquor bottle in his hands. They’ve got enough to watch me for without adding him to the mix.”
“Yet, you’re letting him handle business for you.”
“Some,” Theo agreed. “He needs to learn the ropes somehow and I don’t have time to be hands on for every single little detail, so he’s learning what respect means through trial and error.”
“Sounds a lot like how we learned this business, Theo.”
Theo tensed. “Without all the beatings, sure.”
Damian knew what it was like to be under the control of men like Ben DeLuca, after all. Theo didn’t need to add to his statement.
“What is the kid doing for you exactly?” Damian asked.
Theo grinned. “In here? He’s my middle man, D, the one I wouldn’t mind giving a button even if that meant he’d take my seat. Every good Capo needs one.”
“This looks good, Cole,” Theo said as he checked the black notebook the kid had spread out over the pool table. “You’re getting better with the numbers. There’s nothing short this week. That’s three weeks in a row.”
