by Bella Rose
He took her hand for the last few feet and helped her steady herself as she climbed. He caught at the railing above them and gave it a test with his weight. It wasn’t exactly rock solid, but at least it wouldn’t crumble beneath their weight. He went over first and then helped her to climb over. She felt warm and vital in his arms. He didn’t let go, even when her feet were firmly on the platform.
“I can’t believe I’m up here,” she whispered. “The view is incredible!”
“See how the glow of the city lights drowns out the stars?” he murmured. “I remember being out away from Moscow visiting an uncle who lived in the countryside. The number of stars I saw in the sky over his farm was uncountable. There were so many it was as if the entire sky was just covered in them.”
“Someday I would like to live someplace where I could see the stars like that,” Juliet whispered. “The city glow is nice. I like to see how those really tall skyscrapers nearly brush the sky, but it’s not the same as a sky full of stars.”
Antonin gently turned her in his arms to face him. He cupped her face in his hands and kissed her lips. He made love to her with his mouth. She wound her arms around his neck and stood on tiptoe to get closer. He felt her lips surrender to his. She softened against him. Her nipples hardened, and he could actually feel them pressing against his chest. Pushing his tongue into her mouth, he told her without words that she belonged only to him. He possessed her with his kiss in the same way he had when he had slipped his cock deep inside her pussy before.
She suddenly broke away, breathing hard and pressing her forehead against him. “You’re making me light-headed.”
“Good.”
“What are we going to do, Antonin?” There was a note of something approaching desperation in her voice. “My family will use you to try and get something from your family. I don’t want to see anyone get hurt.”
He wondered what she would say if she knew that he had murdered her father with his bare hands. That was the one variable he found himself unable to predict. He could deal with almost anything else, but the moment she stared at him with complete hatred in her eyes would rip him in two. Yet he would not have changed his actions. Her father had been a member of a crime family. He had known the risks, and he had paid the price. It was the way the world worked.
Chapter Eleven
JULIET FACED HER grandfather and wished she felt a little less twitchy. It wouldn’t be helpful for her if he thought she had something to hide. Of course she was hiding something, lots of things if the truth ever came out. Starting with the fact that her “prisoner” had spent the night in her room last night. Antonin was so good at scaling the outside of the house that he had simply gone out her office window and reappeared inside her bedroom after their little rooftop excursion.
“You asked to see me?” Juliet asked Carlos Caglione.
Her grandfather was sitting at his desk. He looked up and gave her a cursory smile. It was not encouraging in the least. “I’ve arranged a meeting with the Bratva.”
“Excuse me?” Juliet tried to tamp down her panic.
Surely this wasn’t going to be a bad thing. Antonin was telling the truth. He had to be. Some member of the Bratva would confirm it, and the whole farce would be over. Except the part where the capos were going to want to kill Antonin just for the sport.
Grandfather glowered at her. “You were supposed to be gathering intelligence, Juliet. Instead I find out that the prisoner is simply biding his time sitting around in your office. Explain to me how this is productive?”
“I was asking him questions.”
“And you don’t think he will lie to you?”
She scrambled for a response. “It was just a preliminary way to figure out where to start.”
“Well, you can start by taking Giovanni and Reggie with you to meet a man named Josef. He’s a Brigadier with the Bratva, and he’s willing to talk.”
Juliet didn’t bother to hide her scorn. “So he’s a traitor. You would believe the words of someone who is obviously trying to stir up trouble for some personal gain?”
“As you said.” Carlos gave an unaffected shrug. “It’s just a place to start.” He waved dismissively in her direction. “Gather your men and go. Do not disappoint me, Juliet. I have had enough of your ridiculousness when it comes to this prisoner.”
“As you wish,” she muttered.
“Oh, and Juliet?” Carlos’s expression was unreadable. “I will expect to hear news of your engagement to Giovanni sooner rather than later.”
“What?” She couldn’t hide her shock. “Last night you were poking fun at him for it.”
“But it’s a good idea,” her grandfather reasoned. “The Corleons are loyal. You need a man to run things for you, and I trust his loyalty. Once you are married I can elevate him to underboss, and the Cagliones can start to rebuild our leadership.”
Juliet swallowed. “I’ll think about it.”
“Juliet!” he said sharply. “This is not a request.”
“Yes, sir.” She swept out of his office and ground her teeth together to keep from slamming the door in agitation. Not a request? Fine. She’d never been very good at following orders anyway.
ANTONIN WAS GETTING untenably bored. He sat on the chair in Juliet’s office and pretended to be a prisoner until he finally heard her familiar tread on the carpet outside the door. Then she slipped into the office and went directly to her desk. He didn’t have to be a mind reader to know that something had upset her. A lot.
“Who is Josef?” she snapped.
He stood up, uncaring of the ruse for the time being. “Josef is a man who has never taken his vor v Zakone oath very seriously.”
“What does that mean?” Her voice was clipped as though she was in a hurry.
“It’s a thief within the law. The code is one that protects the brotherhood from individual greed and self-serving behavior. Josef wants to lead. He wants my place and eventually my father’s position.” Antonin was getting a very bad feeling about this. “Why are you asking about Josef?”
“Because I’m apparently meeting with him in an hour to talk about you.” She pulled a 9mm semiautomatic pistol from her drawer and shoved it in her purse. “He’s supposedly going to feed us info on the Bratva.”
Antonin’s brain spun around in circles. “If he’s feeding the Cagliones information, it’s bound to be self-serving. He’ll use your syndicate like his personal hit squad and then decimate whatever is left after he gains control of the Bratva.”
“Fantastic,” she said sarcastically. “So we’re screwed.”
“You’re not going,” he said flatly.
“You don’t have a choice in the matter.” She looked at him and pursed her lips. “Although I’m going to turn you loose, because this is all just bullshit. If I say that you got away, I don’t have to worry about my men trying to murder you later.”
“What else happened?” Antonin demanded. He couldn’t have said why, but he had a very strong feeling that she was cutting him loose for another reason altogether.
“There’s no point in all of this.” She waved her hand between the two of them as though she was indicating their relationship. “It’s doomed, Antonin. Can’t you see that? Our families will never allow us to be together, and neither of us are willing to turn our back on our lives.”
“What happened?” He crossed his arms and glared at her. “There is something you’re not telling me.”
“My grandfather has ordered me to marry Giovanni.” He could see the slender column of her throat move. “I have no choice. And maybe it’s better this way anyway. My grandfather doesn’t know that I’m pregnant. This way he will just think the baby is Giovanni’s anyway. We’ll play it off, and my child will at least have a legitimate place here in my family.”
“That’s my child you’re talking about,” he growled. “You cannot expect me to just stand aside and let some Italian bastard raise my son as his own!”
“First of all?” She st
alked toward him angrily, grabbing his hands and yanking the useless bonds off his wrists. “It’s a girl, remember? Second of all, I’m the one carrying this baby. I get to make the choices. And I don’t like being pushed around. So go out the window, and go back to your life.”
***
NOBODY REMARKED ON Juliet’s extremely bad mood, and she was glad. It was very likely that the first person to comment on her pissy mood would get their head blown off. Especially if it was Reggie or one of his idiot companions that decided to make some snarky joke at her expense. Juliet was so not in the mood. She was ready to rip off someone’s head and eviscerate their body.
Giovanni was driving. Juliet was in the passenger seat, and Reggie and his man were in the backseat. Behind them was another vehicle with the rest of Regg’s entourage. Apparently the man couldn’t take a piss with less than three friends present.
“So where are we going?” Reggie leaned between the two front seats. He stank of garlic. The smell turned Juliet’s stomach and put her on edge.
“There’s a park up here,” Giovanni answered. “We’re just supposed to meet him here.”
“Anyone else think it’s stupid to come and ask a traitor to give honest intel?” Juliet muttered.
Giovanni looked over at her in surprise. “You know it’s really a bad idea to question the boss.”
“Really? So you’re just willing to take ridiculous orders that mean nothing for the rest of your life?” Juliet turned in her seat and glared at him. He shifted uncomfortably, but she didn’t care.
“Juliet, informants are a part of this life,” Giovanni pointed out. “If this Josef guy wants to turn informant for some cash, who are we to judge as long as we get some good info out of him?”
“And if his entire plan is to feed us just enough to turn us into his lackeys for awhile, then to take power once we’ve weakened his organization, and then to turn right around and crush us? What, then?” she snarled.
From the backseat, Reggie laughed so hard he snorted. “Sounds like you’ve put a lot of thought into this, princess. Did your boyfriend suggest all of that?”
“What are you talking about?” She turned around to face Reggie and shot him an evil glare. “Sometimes the idiotic shit you say beggars my ability to describe it.”
“Really?” There was something smug in Reggie’s expression that made her stomach knot with fear. He knew something and Juliet had a feeling she wasn’t going to like it.
“Here we are.” Giovanni slowed the car as he pulled up to the curb. “Danny, you get out and look around.”
“Why me?” Reggie’s buddy whined. “I’m just here to watch Reggie’s back.”
Giovanni shot Danny a look that nearly singed the guy in his seat. “So get your ass out there and watch Reggie’s back.”
“Whatever,” Danny muttered.
He climbed out of the car and stood nervously on the sidewalk. Juliet had the thought that this park stuff was bullshit. There was no way they could blend in at a park. In fact they all stuck out like a sore thumb. That meant anyone looking would have a reason to be suspicious and remember them.
ANTONIN STOOD IN a copse of trees about a hundred yards away from Juliet’s car. He couldn’t believe that the Cagliones were idiotic enough to meet Josef at a park. Surely they were a little more savvy than that if they’d managed to survive all these years. Which begged the question, who was actually trying to get them killed here? Was it Josef? Or was it someone in their own organization?
Then Antonin spotted Josef. He was behind a grouping of trees that hid him from the Cagliones’ view. There were five other men with Josef. They had their heads close together and were very likely making plans to either murder the whole group, or take a hostage. Antonin growled beneath his breath. He couldn’t let that happen, which meant he was going to have to keep his head down and intervene without anyone realizing he was there.
Squatting down, he waited until Josef left his crew and approached the Cagliones. Josef raised his hand in apparent greeting. The men he had left behind the trees began to spread out. With a huge sigh of annoyance, Antonin set about getting rid of them.
It wasn’t particularly difficult. They weren’t really trying to hide. Antonin spotted Igor pulling a weapon with a silencer from inside his jacket. He became Antonin’s first target. Sneaking up behind the short, broad-shouldered Russian, Antonin wrapped one arm around Igor’s neck and squeezed until he passed out. Dropping the man to the ground, Antonin went in search of his next target.
He quickly dispatched two more men in the same way. He couldn’t imagine what it must have taken for Josef to get these men to back him. They were all from his unit, but as their Brigadier, Josef was supposed to lead them only in missions sanctioned by the Pehkan for the good of the entire organization.
The last man Antonin found was squatting behind a cluster of benches. Unfortunately Denis was rather astute and saw Antonin coming. “You! I thought you were prisoner!” Denis said in a hoarse whisper. “Josef came to bargain for you.”
“That’s a lie,” Antonin said flatly. “Why did Josef come?”
Denis stood up and curled his lip at Antonin. “There needs to be a purge. Surely even you can see that. Your father is old and weak.”
“And Josef wants to take over,” Antonin provided. “So try.”
Denis charged toward Antonin. Antonin pivoted sideways, caught the man around his neck, and broke his spine with one calculated twist of his arm. It was too bad, but he could not let this man report back to Josef that Antonin was alive and well. There were too many problems that needed dealing with first.
Chapter Twelve
JULIET GLARED AT this Josef person and wondered why nobody else seemed to see right past his solicitous smile. The guy was so ingenuous that she could have scraped the bullshit off his words with her fingernail.
“So you see,” Josef continued, spreading his hands before him, “my loyalty to my Pehkan was compromised the moment he decreed that in order for any of our men to achieve the status of Brigadier, they had to murder a top-ranking member of another crime family.”
“I see.” Giovanni was nodding. Was he actually believing this crap?
Josef appeared to be alone, but Juliet’s skin crawled and the hair on the back of her neck lifted as she felt that they were being observed by people she could not see. “And this decree,” Juliet said flatly. “This was new?”
“Well, not exactly.” Josef’s mask slipped just a bit and Juliet caught his look of derision The man did not like her at all.
“You don’t think I should be here because I’m a woman,” Juliet guessed. Then she started laughing. “You’re here because you think we’re going to buy that you feel like your Pehkan is barbaric, and yet you’re judging me because I’m a woman and you’re a sexist pig.”
“Silence!” Josef hissed. He pointed at her and then looked to Giovanni and Reggie. “Can the two of you honestly stand for your boss placing a woman in a leadership position?”
“No.” Reggie didn’t even hesitate. For all that he was an asshole, he was an honest one. Then he thumbed in Juliet’s direction. “But your guys murdered our underboss, and she’s his only remaining kid.”
“Because your men murdered her older brother,” Giovanni finished coldly. “So perhaps it doesn’t matter whether she is a man or woman. Your barbaric custom has left us a little short of Caglione men.” Giovanni took a menacing step toward Josef. “In fact, I find it really odd that you claim to hate that custom, since you had to murder someone in order to gain your status.”
“Yeah,” Reggie agreed. He seemed to have only just come to that conclusion when Giovanni pointed it out. “Who’d you kill?”
Josef looked uncomfortable. “This is pointless.”
“Why don’t you pick on another family?” Reggie wasn’t done. In fact, he was really just getting started. “Go bug the O’Hennesseys or something. What do you have against Italians anyway?”
Juliet snorted. “He�
��s here because he wants us to bump off a few of his comrades for him.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “So my question is, how badly do you want Antonin Mikhailovich? Because I’m really starting to believe that’s why you’re here. Your boss doesn’t give a shit about his son, but you do. Because if Antonin somehow survives and moves up the ladder, you’re going to be reporting to him someday. And let’s be honest here, you don’t like taking orders from anyone.”
“Antonin is worth nothing to us, alive or dead.” Josef gave a careless shrug. “We do not ransom our men. They escape and fulfill their objectives, or they are left to fend for themselves.”
Juliet pulled her 9mm from her purse and pulled the slide to chamber a bullet. “So if I decided to take you hostage right now, nobody would ransom you?”
Josef curled his lip at her. “You assume I’m here alone.”
“Oh no,” she corrected him. “I didn’t assume that at all.” In fact she was sort of waiting for his men to appear. “Although I would like to see who it is we’re dealing with.”
Josef whistled. They waited. Nothing happened. He started to look a little pale. Juliet began to snicker. “Do you think they left you here?” she suggested.
Then someone began striding toward them from a copse of trees a dozen yards away. Juliet’s heart leaped into her throat. She dropped her weapon to her side and gaped. Yes. She had intentionally left the window open. But she had expected Antonin to go home. She hadn’t anticipated him following her!
“What the hell?” Reggie snarled. “That dude is tied up in Juliet’s office. I saw him!”
“Apparently he escaped,” Giovanni said drily. The look he gave Juliet suggested he didn’t actually believe that.
Josef looked less than pleased. In fact he looked as though he wanted to shoot Antonin himself. “Antonin! Your father sent me to arrange for your release.”
“Don’t lie,” Antonin returned. “You’re a terrible liar anyway, and it insults us both.”
