Sil with his needle and thread playing tailor. And Aria…Aria is watching intently.
I caught the look in her eyes.
She’d stare down death.
Actually, she already has.
I tell myself that being here has nothing to do with her and everything to do with my alliance with Villani, but watching her now, her beautiful face pinched with a mixture of rage and sorrow, it makes me doubt my intentions.
I call bullshit…on myself.
Thank God my brothers are still in Monaco.
At least nobody else can call me out on it.
Uncle Sil finishes, admires his handiwork, and pats Aria’s hand. “You’re good as new.”
A small smile lifts her bruised lips, and then her blue eyes flicker in my direction, widening in surprise.
And then seconds later, they narrow, suspicion etched into her features.
“You’re back,” she says, and Uncle Sil turns toward me, startled.
“Vincenzo,” he says. “What brings you back? I figured you’d be halfway to your villa by now.”
“I was in my car, but I, um, found your phone,” I say to Aria, careful not to use her name. “It must have fallen in between the seats. I figured you might need it.”
Uncle Sil looks at Aria and I take that opportunity to wink at her since we both know she didn’t have a phone on her. Whether or not she ever did, I have no idea, but that’s a problem for tomorrow.
Right now, I need to get her out of here without Sil asking any questions.
Aria presses her lips together and gives me a quick nod. “Thanks.”
“Well, that’s a good thing,” Uncle Sil says with a smile. “Now, why don’t you give it to her so she can get some rest? I need to keep her for observation for a few hours because of that bump on the head. We just need to rule out a concussion.”
My eyes tangle with hers and I can see her jaw tense. “I’ll wait. Just to be sure she’s out of the woods. Can’t be too careful, you know?”
Uncle Sil looks between us and shrugs, busying himself with cleaning up after his impromptu surgery. “How about an espresso, Vincenzo? I’ll give your friend some medicine so she can sleep and we can catch up.”
“No medicine,” Aria grunts.
Uncle Sil looks at her, a questioning look on his face. “But you need to—”
“I don’t mean any disrespect and I appreciate what you’ve done, but I’d prefer to stay awake.”
Uncle Sil throws up his hands. “Okay, then. Why don’t you at least lie down and relax? You need rest and fluids, and if you won’t sleep, at least you can stay still for a little while.”
Aria’s lips lift slightly. “Okay. I can do that.” She points to her wrist. “Especially since you’ve got me hooked up to an IV.”
Uncle Sil snickers and claps me on the shoulder as he shuffles past.
The smile on Aria’s face fades as quickly as it appeared. Once Sil is out of earshot, her mouth twists into a grimace and she fixes a harsh glare on me. “Your uncle may be gullible as hell, but I’m not. I’m sure you didn’t come back to return a non-existent phone,” she hisses. “If my father paid you to keep me close until he can get to me, if that’s why you brought me to this place, know this. I’m not going anywhere with you and I’m sure as hell not gonna wait around for him to show up. You obviously have no idea who you’re dealing with, Vincenzo. You’d have been better off in your fancy car headed to your even fancier villa.”
Shit, there’s fire shooting from her eyes and hatred dripping from her tongue, but that doesn’t stop my cock from twitching when she says my name like it’s the most vile thing to ever graze her lips.
Consequences…
She grabs a jar of cotton balls off the table next to her and hurls it at me. I duck out of the way as it smashes against the wall.
“You think just because I passed out, you could take advantage of me for your own purposes? Are you fucking kidding?” She rips the IV off and jumps off the table, grabbing a scalpel from a nearby metal tray. “Did my father tell you what I did back in Croatia? Huh? Did he tell you what I did to him and his men tonight before I got away? Are you sure you want to battle me?” She shoves the gurney into me so she can slip around it. I stumble backward into a cabinet storing bottles of pills and supplies. The glass doors shatter as it hits the tile floor. Aria turns the scalpel in her fingers, her nostrils flaring. “You still game? Wanna see what I can do with this, Vincenzo?”
“Look, you can’t go anywhere alone,” I say, holding up my hands as she slices the air with the scalpel, missing me entirely. Thank fuck.
“If you think I’m dumb enough to wait around for him to make me suffer the same end as my mother, then guess what? You’re as stupid as you are pretty.”
Did she seriously just call me pretty?
“He’ll find you. He’s already looking for you, Aria. I can help you!”
Her spine stiffens and she gasps. “You did find him! You slimy sonofabitch!” She swings the scalpel in my direction, slicing through the arm of my shirt. I grit my teeth as the searing pain explodes over my skin. Jesus Christ, this girl is gonna be my kryptonite.
I really should have kept driving.
“Your mother’s cousin. Paolo Villani,” I rasp. “I know him! I can get you to him!”
“So now you’re a name-dropper!” she screeches. “My father knows about Paolo! He could have given you that name! It proves nothing!” With a hard shove, she darts past me just before I can grab her wrist. She run-staggers down the hallway, looking left and right, clutching her side. Droplets of blood spill onto the stark white floor as she moves.
But dammit, she’s persistent as hell and keeps going. I run toward her and pull her against me so she has no choice but to look at me. And I’m taking a big risk because she’s still wielding that scalpel. “Get your fucking hands off me,” she growls, driving her knee into my groin.
And I missed it because I was lost in her troubled, deep blue irises. I let out a loud groan and double over as she makes another run for it. The deep ache in my gut makes it damn hard to straighten up but if I don’t, who knows what the hell will happen if she escapes?
“Young lady!” I hear Uncle Sil’s concerned voice as he hurries toward us carrying a tray with two espresso cups on it. “Where are you going? You can’t be out of bed yet!”
But Aria is already hobbling in the direction of the exit. “I’m fine. Thank you! Send him the bill, just like he said before.”
Uncle Sil looks at me and shakes his head. Then he hits a button under a nearby desk and suddenly, a gated door drops from the ceiling a few feet from where Aria is standing. It slams into the floor.
Like a prison gate.
I look at Sil, taking long, deep breaths that do nothing to erase the excruciating pain she just inflicted on me. Unjustifiably, I might add.
He shrugs and places the tray down on the desk. “You would have been better off just going back to your villa, Vincenzo.”
“What the fuck are you talking about, Sil?” I rasp, still holding my stomach.
Aria is pulling at the gate and spins around with a look of desperation on her face. “What the hell is going on?” She rushes toward Sil. “Let me the fuck out of here! I told you I didn’t want to rest!”
“But that would be irresponsible of me,” Sil says, stroking his chin. “As a doctor and as a business owner. You see, I rely heavily on donations to keep this place running and letting you leave would have cost me a lot of money, my dear Aria.”
Aria gasps, her eyes wide. “You duped me!” she screams at the top of her lungs, leaping at me and slashing me with that damn scalpel. “You brought me here when I told you not to! You sold me out when I was incapacitated! You bastard!”
Okay, enough of this crap. I’m already up shit creek because of her. I don’t need any more battle scars right now. I grab her arms and twist her around so they’re securely behind her back, my lips pressed against her ear. “Relax. I’m on yo
ur side,” I hiss. “Can you stop fucking slashing me for a goddamn second?”
“Get the hell away from me! You’re a liar! You brought me here! You sold me out!” She lets out an ear-piercing shriek, kicking her legs and driving her head backward so it crashes right against my nose. I grit my teeth, stars flashing before my eyes as the pain shoots straight into my brain.
Jesus Christ, no wonder why she was able to get away from those assailants tonight. She’s fucking brutal!
“I’m trying to help you!” I whisper, my fingers digging into her arm.
“Yeah, help me get killed!” she shouts, struggling unsuccessfully to get out of my iron-clad grip. She lifts her wrist and sinks her teeth into my hand, so hard it brings tears to my eyes.
“I saved your fucking life! And you just took a bite out of me?”
“Saved me? You killed me by bringing me here! And you’re a pathetic piece of shit for taking advantage of a helpless woman for your own gain,” she seethes.
“Helpless, my ass! I should have left you on the side of the goddamn road and let the animals get to you!”
Click.
My head snaps in Sil’s direction, a chill slipping down my spine as I eye the Beretta in his outstretched hand.
“Enough!” Sil’s voice rumbles, the sound reverberating in the empty space.
“What the hell are you doing, Sil?” I growl.
“Vincenzo,” he says, walking toward us. Aria stops in her tracks with a gasp, her hands balled into tight fists at her sides. “You did good by bringing her here. You gave me leverage, and it is much appreciated.”
He turns to Aria and nudges her toward him with the barrel of the gun. “And you, young lady, are going to make me a lot of money in a very short amount of time. Turning you over to your father is a win-win for me. It proves my loyalty and lines my pockets.” He lets out a low chuckle. “I’d like to retire, and you’re going to help me with that. I’ve done a lot of work for your father over the years, helped make him very rich. Now it is my chance to collect.” He grabs her wrist and drags her to him, holding the gun to her temple with his free hand.
“Sil, what the fuck are you talking about?” I seethe. Is he telling me what I think he is?
Is my uncle…my blood relative…working with a known sex trafficker? My throat constricts like there’s a hand around it, squeezing every molecule of oxygen out of my body. Everything we’ve been doing to combat these trafficking rings in Italy over the past few years, all of the bloodshed, all of the plans we executed to take them all down…he knew everything.
And he aligned himself with the enemy anyway because he’s a greedy sonofabitch with no moral code.
I admit, my moral compass doesn’t always point due north, but for fuck’s sake! All of those women, brutalized, drugged, sodomized, murdered?
“And all of that blood on Lovrić’s hands?” I seethe. “It’s all over yours, too, Sil! Can you live with that, with everything you’ve done to help him? Knowing your own daughter Lila is a potential target for those sadistic bastards? How the fuck do you sleep, you greedy asshole?”
Aria’s eyes are wide as they stare at the gun, her spine stiff. Sil takes her arm and guides her away from me.
“I know that my daughter would never turn her back on me, her own father, who has provided her with everything she ever wanted or needed,” he says in an eerily calm voice with a pointed look in Aria’s direction. “Parents are to be obeyed, Aria. Always. We know best. You should have remembered that before you caused such destruction to your father’s business.”
“My father is an evil, despicable man who killed my mother!” Aria screams. “I owe him nothing! And I want nothing from him!”
“That’s unfortunate,” Sil says. “Because he is very interested in reconnecting with you.”
“He wants me dead!” she yells. “If you hand me over to him, you’re killing me! Do you understand that?”
Sil nods. “I do. But my job is not to worry about what he is going to do to you. My job was to patch you up and hand you over. And for the fee I’m collecting, you’d better believe I will deliver.”
“How long has this been going on?” I take a few steps closer to my uncle. A knot at the base of my neck tightens like a noose.
Sil shrugs. “Does it matter now? It’s not like you can stop me. You and your ‘partners’ think you can shut down one of the most lucrative businesses in the world,” he scoffs. “Don’t you realize the money will always win out, Vincenzo? People will flock to the money, no matter what they have to sell in order to get it!” His lips curl upward in a sinister smirk. “If you were a smart businessman, you’d realize that.”
“A truly smart businessman finds other ways to make money when his moral code is challenged,” I growl through gritted teeth, glaring at my uncle. “What do you think my father would have said to you if he knew you’d sold out to those low-life scumbags?”
Sil yanks on Aria’s arm, making her yelp. Bright red spots appear in his already-ruddy cheeks, and his mouth twists into a grimace. “Your father,” he sneers. “He’d cut your throat for a fucking euro!” he thunders. “And let me tell you something about your father. The reason why he was popped is because his ‘moral code’ was nonexistent! He cut me down every chance he got until he finally cut me out of his shady deals with the dredge of the Earth! He was as lowlife as they come. So if you wanna talk about moral codes, don’t use our names in the same sentence, Vincenzo! And don’t give me that ‘holier than thou’ bullshit, either. You’re a criminal! We’re all fucking criminals!”
There is too much being hurled at me to make sense of it at this second, but the one thing that I have processed is the fact that there’s a gun on Aria…a gun that can just as easily be pointed at me.
Sil waves the gun around and continues on his tirade about my father, pulling Aria around with him.
Looks like I struck a nerve with that one.
I knew there was bad blood, but Sil clearly has some serious pent-up hostility directed toward my dead father.
I take a few deep breaths and scout the facility. I have a very small window to get Aria out of here before Mirko shows up with Christ only knows how many thugs in his degenerate army.
“Sil,” I say, keeping my voice strong. “I’m going to give you one chance to let the girl go. Tell Mirko she escaped.”
He lets out a rough laugh. “Did you drink too much vino before you barreled back in here? Why the fuck would I do that?”
“Because you want to live,” I reply.
“I’m the one with the gun!” he screams, waving it around. “Do you know how long I’ve waited for this? For a chance to make a name for myself in Mirko’s organization? To finally move up? To find the respect I never could get from my own brother?”
I swallow a groan. Christ, do I look like a fucking therapist? I don’t have time for this whole ‘come to Jesus’ party if Mirko is on his way here.
Which I’m sure he is.
“What about the respect of your family? Do you think they’d have it if they knew who and what you really are?” I say, my eyes flickering toward Aria’s. A tiny twitch catches my gaze, and I see her fingers slide slowly around her back, the rest of her body still as a corpse.
“They don’t give a shit about how I get my money, all they care about is that I get it in the first place!” he bellows. “They’re bloodsucking leeches, all of them!” Sil’s eyes take on a wild spark, and I keep my gaze steady, my voice even.
A glint of steel flashes as the scalpel appears in her fist.
She never dropped it.
And Sil never thought to grab it from her.
There’s that thing about hindsight again.
Talk about it coming back to bite you in the ass.
“And now that I have this girl,” he says through clenched teeth, yanking her a little harder. “I don’t give a fuck about anything else! She’s gonna get me exactly what I want, what I’ve worked for!” He fixes his steely and slightly
insane gaze on me. “I’ve taken care of you and your family for a long time, patched you up and sent you on your way to make more money and collect more power! And you never shared any of it! I never held a grudge, even after everything your father did to me, and you and your brothers never bothered to do more than throw me a bone every now and again. Just used me and my services when they were convenient. But I don’t need you anymore. I don’t need any of you! Mirko hired me because he knew what I could do for him. He actually values me, unlike your asshole father.” He lets out a diabolical laugh. “You’re so worried about your ‘empire’. You should be, because we’re going to crush it! All of your businesses will be worthless when we take over these territories! And you won’t be able to stop any of it. Your father’s legacy will be a worthless pile of ash when we’re done torching it,” he says, disdain dripping from his lips. “So get ready. The end is coming, Vincenzo.”
“Ahh!” A loud screech echoes in the otherwise quiet hallway, and Aria twists out of Sil’s grip and drives the scalpel into his jugular. “You’re wrong about that one, Doc! The end is here!”
The gun slips out of Sil’s hand, clattering to the floor as he stumbles backward, his hands clutching his throat. He gurgles and sputters, his dark eyes wide. Aria stands over him, a menacing grin on her face. “Sorry you’re not going to collect on your prize, Uncle Sil,” she says. “All that value is about to drain from your miserable body and then you’ll be worthless. A worthless, disgusting pig for aligning yourself with my father. I hope you burn in hell for everything you’ve done to help him and I’m going to make sure he joins you very fucking soon!”
I scramble to grab Sil’s gun as Aria continues spewing anger at my slowly dying uncle.
His eyes glaze over moments later as his head is submerged in a pool of his own blood.
He made his bed.
Now he’s drowning in it.
It’s a fate I’ve always feared, one I’ve worked damn hard to avoid.
But shit has a way of catching up with you.
Aria finally looks up at me, her eyes blazing. She’s silent for a second, and I just watch her with a quirked eyebrow until her lips purse. “Okay, fine, you convinced me.”
Fallen: A Dark Italian Mafia Romance (Men of Mayhem Book 4) Page 5
