by Bella Rose
“You think the capos will stand for that?” Giovanni shouted. “Has that man turned your mind against us so thoroughly?”
“I didn’t have to turn my mind against you. You turned yours against me first,” she shouted back at him. “You came here, suspecting me of harboring someone who could have murdered my grandfather!”
Juliet got out of bed and snatched up her robe. She wrapped the garment around her body and pointed at the Caglione soldiers still milling about her bedroom. “Get out. This man has no control over you. None. I am the Consigliere of the Caglione family. If my grandfather is truly gone, I am the only remaining leader. Now get out so that I can get dressed. Tell everyone in the house to assemble on the main floor in fifteen minutes for a meeting.”
Thankfully her word still carried some weight in the house. She couldn’t imagine what her next steps would be. She had to find grandfather’s will. She had to find out what would happen to the house and the business holdings. It was a big job. She needed to contact their attorney and see how to go about transferring ownership of everything. And she needed to find out who had murdered her grandfather—if there had been a murder in the first place. Why was Giovanni so certain that foul play was involved? Had he done something? The thought was utterly horrifying to contemplate.
It took only a few minutes to put on a decent set of plain, businesslike clothing and pull her hair up into a smooth ponytail. She took a deep breath and opened her bedroom door. Stepping out into the hallway was a bit like stepping off a cliff into a crazy mess of men milling about as they tried to figure out what to do next.
She strode downstairs to the first floor and took her place at the front of the living room. There were nearly fifty men gathered before her. They spilled throughout the living room and down the back hallway. These were the Caglione soldiers. There weren’t as many as there had once been, but they were still a strong bunch.
“Now.” She looked pointedly at Giovanni. “What did you see in my grandfather’s room this morning?”
“I saw him lying dead on the floor.”
“And you tried to find a pulse?” she clarified. It would have been so typical to have her grandfather lying on the floor after having had a stroke or something, only to miss out on someone taking him to the hospital.
“Of course.” Giovanni looked affronted. “He’s in his bed. I left him there and called the doctor. Dr. Mills will be here anytime now to call the death and issue the death certificate.”
She raised an eyebrow at Giovanni. “You seem awfully sedate about all of this.”
“There was nothing I could do.” Giovanni glowered at her. “There was a pillow right beside him as though someone had smothered him.”
“And do you have a suspect in this supposed murder?” Juliet asked carefully.
Giovanni met her gaze without flinching. “Antonin Mikhailovich.”
***
BRATVA HEADQUARTERS WAS buzzing like a beehive when Antonin returned. He could tell immediately that something big had happened. He grabbed a man’s shoulder as soon as he walked into the house, stopping him long enough for an explanation.
“What happened here?” Antonin demanded.
The soldier looked harried. “Didn’t you hear? The old boss of the Cagliones is dead.”
“And why does that have anything to do with us?”
Now the soldier looked annoyed. “We’re taking their holdings and pushing them out of the territory for good. The order came down from Mikhail this morning.”
“Of course,” Antonin muttered.
His father would have been waiting for something like this. It gave him a very proper reason to finish getting rid of a rival. Unfortunately, this did not fit in at all with Antonin’s plans. He started thinking very quickly, formulating and discarding several different plans of action before finally settling on the one thing that might buy Juliet a little bit of time to consolidate her power base. She was likely fighting Giovanni on the home front. There was no reason to make her fight the Bratva as well.
Mikhail was behind his desk when Antonin approached. The man was in his element, issuing orders and consulting a map of the territory before issuing even more orders. Antonin walked right up to his father and placed his hand flat on the desktop.
“I’m asking you to stand down from the Cagliones,” Antonin said quietly. “Do not launch any offensive actions against their business or personal holdings.”
“What?” Mikhail looked up, his face a mask of confusion. “Why would we not go on the offensive right now? Their leader is dead. This is the perfect time to shove them off their territory and claim it for our own.”
“I’ve already done that,” Antonin told his father. It was only mostly a lie. There was an actual grain of truth in what he was saying. “I’ve secured the affections of Juliet Caglione, who is now the only remaining member of the family. The leadership will fall to her, and through her it will fall to me.”
“Secured the affections?” The amusement in his father’s tone grated on Antonin’s nerves. “And how have you done this?”
“I would think that obvious.” Antonin wandered away from his father’s desk toward the window. He couldn’t look the man in the face while he said these words. “She’s carrying my child. I would think that’s all the answer you need on the subject.”
“So Josef was right,” Mikhail mused.
Antonin turned, frowning as he gazed at his father. What was this? “Anything Josef says is a lie. The man is hopelessly self-serving. Surely even you see that. Or are you too blinded by your own petty jealousies and suspicions?” Antonin pointed at his father. “I do not want your position. I want only what I have.”
“You will be Pekhan of the Cagliones!” Mikhail shouted. “And you tell me you do not wish to set yourself against me?”
“I am still your Brigadier,” Antonin bit out through clenched teeth. “The Cagliones would be my unit, but I am still loyal to you. Why is that not enough?”
“Because you are loyal to yourself first!” his father shot back.
A door slammed open behind Antonin. He spun about to see two men from Josef’s command approaching him. He held his hands low and loose at his sides. It would be a simple thing to lay these men out and leave with his freedom intact. Still, he could not leave behind the idea that his father might see reason. Mikhail might be persuaded to realize that Josef was not loyal to the Bratva. At least not to a Bratva run by Mikhail.
“Why do you believe this?” Antonin asked Mikhail. “What have I ever done to cast doubt on my loyalty to you?”
“You chose this Caglione bitch over your allegiance to me and to the Bratva,” Mikhail said coldly. “Surely you did not think that could be overlooked.”
“Tell me how I chose them,” Antonin growled. “Have I compromised the interests of the Bratva? Have I gone back on the oath I took when I was appointed vor v Zakone? No! You are allowing Josef to whisper in your ear and feed you lies. He is feeding on your paranoia and creating unrest within our ranks. He has been doing it for years! Why do you think he was such a good spymaster for you?” Antonin was talking fast and low. He had to get through to his father. He had to. “He wasn’t putting a stop to plots that he discovered. He was creating the unrest and then coming in like a hero to give you unlimited information on all of the players. Why do you think he was so well informed?”
Something behind Mikhail’s expression flickered. Perhaps he realized that his son was telling the truth. Perhaps he did not. Either way, it was too late for Antonin. Vorsky and Sokolov grabbed Antonin’s arms and twisted them up behind his back. He found it amusing that they both attacked him at once. It was apparent that they expected him to put up a fight, but he did not. He would wait. There would be a better time to make his point. For now he wanted his father to realize that it was not Antonin scheming against the Bratva.
“Remember this moment,” Antonin told Mikhail. “When Josef is stabbing a knife into your back, I want you to remember that I warned you that it wa
s coming.”
“Take him away,” Mikhail said imperiously. “Then send Josef to me. We need to have a little discussion about his sources of information.”
Antonin shook his head. Mikhail might doubt Josef, but he could not seem to break the habit of listening to the man’s poisonous advice.
Chapter Eighteen
THERE WAS A flurry of activity at the Caglione house as the capos and their men got ready to follow Giovanni into what would surely be the turf war from hell. Nothing Juliet said made any difference. The men were looking for someone to blame, and Giovanni had provided them with that. In the absence of her grandfather, she might have been able to sway them into following her leadership. But that would have only worked if she had managed to get the support of someone like Giovanni. Without him backing Juliet’s call for caution, the capos were all too eager to move toward death.
“This is a bad idea, Giovanni,” Juliet said for what felt like the millionth time. “They’re going to be waiting for you. Worse, it isn’t even likely that you’ll see Antonin. You’ll be facing hundreds of his men instead—foot soldiers. Why are you doing this?”
She grabbed his arm and spun him around, but he was already snarling at her. “Just because you cannot see the truth of Antonin Mikhailovich does not mean the rest of us don’t see him for what he is. The man is a bloodthirsty gangster. Look at him! He’s covered in scars because he has taken the blood of hundreds of men. Now he has set his sights on the Cagliones, and you’re willing to just hand him the reins and step back as though it means nothing!”
“You’re wrong!” she pleaded. “He’s no more bloodthirsty than you are. Why can’t you understand that you’re all being used like pawns in this ridiculous power game? Let’s stop and think! We can be stronger if we just stay out of it.”
“You’re nothing but a blood traitor,” Giovanni spat. “And when I return home, I will marry you and take over leadership of the Cagliones myself.”
“You can’t marry me without my consent, Giovanni,” she told him calmly. “Even you must understand that truth. I’ll never marry you.”
“You will. If it means saving that bastard child you carry, you will.” Giovanni’s dark eyes glittered. “What do you think the men would say if they knew you were carrying the child of the man who murdered their boss? Do you think they would be forgiving? Or do you think they would find a way to get rid of your child as soon as the first opportunity arose?”
She felt almost light-headed with fear. “You wouldn’t!”
“If you want to keep that from happening, you’d better get ready to marry me. I’ll keep you safe, but you’re going to bear my name and promise to love and obey me if you want the privilege of life for yourself and that bastard child you carry.”
The unfairness of it all took her breath away. Surely her brother’s oldest childhood friend was no so coldhearted as all of this? Yet the man she saw before her was not the Giovanni she had known all her life. He was harder, different. She knew deep in her soul that she could no longer trust him.
***
ANTONIN SAT ON the floor with knees bent and forearms resting on his thighs. He had been locked in a supply closet in the basement of his father’s house. Around him the place had gone eerily silent. He was no fool. He knew exactly what was happening. Somehow Josef had lured his father, the Bratva men, and the Cagliones into a turf war. At the end of the slaughter, it would be simple for a man like Josef to walk in and take over. In all of the confusion his father could be easily eliminated. With Antonin neatly out of the way, there was nobody to stop it from happening.
The question that Antonin could not help but ponder was to wonder if the boss of the Cagliones had died a natural death. Had he been helped on by someone like Giovanni who thought he was somehow doing what was best for the family? It was difficult to say. Only Giovanni knew the answer to that question, and the likelihood of him confessing his sins was nil.
Antonin got to his feet and began pacing the fifteen feet from one end of the closet to the other. He needed to stay moving and keep loose if he was going to stand any sort of chance in what was coming. Eventually men like Josef and Giovanni made mistakes. They underestimated people or overestimated their own influence. When that time came, Antonin would be waiting.
A key turned in the lock. Antonin stepped back from the doorway and prepared to meet his fate, whatever it might be. His only regret would be that if he died, he would never be able to see his child when she was born. Strange how things he’d never before thought of had suddenly become the whole focus of his life.
“Hello, Antonin.” Josef stepped into the tiny storage closet with all of the pomp and circumstance of a conquering hero. His supercilious smile made Antonin long to plant his fist in the man’s face. Josef waved his gun in the air. “I know that this weapon here is the only thing keeping you from attacking me, so I’ll just assure you that it is loaded and I would love the excuse to use it on you.”
“I’m no good to you dead,” Antonin grunted.
Josef snorted. “You’re no good to me alive either.”
“As long as my father is still alive, you can’t have me executed,” Antonin guessed.
Josef smirked. “And when your father is dead, I can do whatever I want.”
“You can try,” Antonin agreed.
“I thought you might like to know that when all of the Cagliones are dead, I intend to have a little party for their new Consigliere.”
“Touch her and it will be the last thing you do,” Antonin snarled.
Josef merely laughed and walked out of Antonin’s prison. The door slammed shut, and Antonin was alone once more.
***
JULIET PACED BACK and forth in the kitchen of what had suddenly become her home. The hour was late, and she was exhausted. The funeral director had only just left. The man and his assistants had finally come by to retrieve Carlos Caglione’s body to prepare him for burial.
Now the lawyer sat at the butcher block table in the well-lit kitchen, looking over her grandfather’s papers. Every few seconds the man would underline something or make a weird grunting noise as he checked a fact or reread a portion of the legal papers Carlos Caglione had left behind.
“Your grandfather was very specific, Juliet.” Mr. Luciano gave her a sympathetic smile. “He came to me after your father passed away and wanted to be very certain that you would not have any issues with the authorities if and when he passed on.”
Juliet couldn’t help it. She gave a little snort and then sighed. “What you’re saying without actually saying it is that my grandfather put all of his personal property into my name after my father’s death because he wanted to avoid the feds trying to take any of it.”
The corner of Mr. Luciano’s mouth twisted into a hesitant half smile. “In a manner of speaking. Yes.”
“So this house, the grounds, all of the businesses, everything.” She was still trying to wrap her mind around it all. “It all belongs to me.”
“You and your heirs.”
“I need you to help me with my will.” She bit her lip, well aware that Luciano might not be entirely trustworthy.
“All right.” He took a generic document from his briefcase and then pulled out a signature page. “And who do you want to leave your assets to in the event of your death?”
“Antonin Mikhailovich.”
Luciano drew back as though she had struck him. “Are you sure?”
“He’s the father of my child.” She touched her belly. “I want my child to inherit everything. But if something should happen to me, I want Antonin to have rights.”
“He’s not exactly an easy man to kill,” Luciano commented. “But if something should happen to both of you, who do you want to take care of your child?”
She almost couldn’t believe she was saying it out loud. “Giovanni Corleon.”
“That makes more sense.” Luciano bobbed his head as he wrote. “I’ll need your signature here. I’m assuming you want standard l
anguage. Meaning you want this to be something that none of the other bosses, families, or even your own men can somehow wriggle out of.”
“Exactly.” She pressed her hands over her belly. “And I don’t want Giovanni to be able to challenge Antonin in court.”
Luciano frowned. He cocked his head and gave her a very strange look. “Are you worried for your own health? Because I have to say that I’m getting the feeling you are.”
“I’m worried about a lot of things,” Juliet admitted. “Let’s just say I want to be prepared.”
Luciano shrugged. “I suppose I cannot argue with the wisdom in that.”
***
EVENING WAS SHADING into twilight when Antonin next heard someone unlocking the door of his impromptu prison. This time it was his father who stood in the doorway. The smile on Mikhail’s face suggested that the day’s “battle” had been a successful rout.
“The Cagliones are broken,” Mikhail announced. “Your attempt to take my position from me has failed.”
Antonin shook his head. “I never had that intention. How many of our men have you sacrificed to your paranoia? Ten? Twenty?”
“We lost fifteen men,” Mikhail admitted stiffly. “The Cagliones are decimated. We killed all but one of their capos.”
It was surreal to hear something like this. His father was speaking as though he were talking about a battle on some far-off field instead of a modern situation where real men with families and responsibilities had been gunned down or knifed while fighting for something they probably had no real understanding of.
“So the capos are dead,” Antonin mused. “Meaning you’ve left them in an even worse state than before, but you’ve also left them angry.”
“Excuse me?”
Antonin could not help himself. He began to laugh. Soon the sound of his laughter was echoing around the storage closet like some deranged death rattle. He could see that his father didn’t understand. Mikhail was staring as though he were afraid his son was utterly losing his mind.
“What happens when men get angry?” Antonin asked his father. “Do they simply lie down and die quietly?”
