A Madness of Crows: Mafia University #3

9. Day 30 – Dante

Find her.

The bright lights of the strip flicker outside the window of our twelfth-floor meeting room.

Behind me, someone clears their throat. “Sir?”

Ignoring them, I stare mindlessly out of the glass. Stare at the dots far below me. Walking. Laughing. Seeing the sights of Vegas.

Enjoying themselves.

But my thoughts are far away from Las Vegas.

“Dante.” Vito’s voice is low, careful enough to draw me out of my silent observation.

When I turn, nobody meets my eyes. “We have nothing else?”

The flatness of my tone leaves no mistake over my reaction to the lack of information. Vito is the only one brave enough to respond, his arms crossed as he leans back in the leather seat. Lines of grief are still etched into his face, lines that weren’t there four weeks ago. “We’ve tried every avenue we have. Every contact. But given the requirement for secrecy, it’s not that easy.”

His voice lowers further. “We’re trying, Dante. Everyone is trying.”

“It’s not enough.”

Stalking to the table, I slap my hand down against the large blueprint that covers the long table. The others in the room, the small number of people I trust to help me with this, look away.

Rocco speaks up next. “We have the outline, at least. It’s a start.”

I stare down at the blueprint of Salvatore Asante’s fucking monstrosity of a home.

A month.

A whole fucking month, and all we have to show for it is a fucking outline.

Thirty days gone, and every single day, she’s—

My hand reaches for the familiar heavy tumbler as I take a sip of the amber liquid. The brandy burns the back of my throat.

I weigh it in my hands.

The crash as it hits the wall doesn’t even dent the numbness. “You’re dismissed. We meet one month from now – and I expect some fucking progress before then.”

The men around me murmur apologies and farewells as they trail out. Only Vito and Rocco stay behind.

Rubbing my hand over my eyes, I drop into a seat. Pull the blueprints closer, so I can study them again – although I’ve looked at them so many times they’re permanently etched into my memory. “I can hear you thinking at each other, assholes.”

Rocco – my enforcer, my friend, clears his throat. That he even shows that sign of discomfort instead of just blurting out his thoughts is indicative of how much our relationship has changed in the past few weeks.

After I stepped up to claim my seat as the V’Arezzo heir, bathed in the blood of my father.

I need another glass of brandy.

“How long do you intend to continue this plan, Dante?”

I jerk my gaze to his, frowning. “For as long as it takes. You know that.”

He exchanges another glance with Vito, and the barely held lid of my anger threatens to snap. “Say it.”

His shoulders tense. “Maybe… maybe you should consider letting her go.”

Let her go.

Let her go.

The words bounce around in my skull. Slowly, I turn my head to my uncle. He’s watching me closely, that sorrow that never leaves him more present in this moment than it has been for weeks.

“I liked Caterina, Dante.” He holds my stare. “Truly. The girl had fire in her, and I respect that. But she is married now. We’re no closer to getting her out than we were when we started. The Asante estate is a damn stronghold. And… there is much to be done here.”

A careful, veiled reference that the V’Arezzo legacy is slowly falling to pieces under my grasp. With Matteo dictating my every move, the men around me look less convinced every day that I’m the right man for the job.

The secrets line up on my tongue. Ignoring the V’Arezzo issues for now, I focus on Cat. As I always do. “I’m getting her out of there.”

They both look dubious, and I stand, reaching for the bottle and motioning Rocco to take a seat. Slowly, I move over to the door. Check the other side and lock it.

They both watch warily as I move around the room. Checking.

I checked this room twice before the meeting started, but if I have learned anything since that blood-soaked night, it is to never trust blindly.

Neverassume.

When I’m done, I retake my seat. My friend and my uncle stare at me as though I’ve lost my mind, and perhaps I have. I push my hair back where it dangles into my face. I need to cut it.

My fingers scratch against my beard as I eye them both. Still debating, even now.

I do not trust anyone anymore.

But I need their help. And if their resolve, their respect for me as their capo, is wavering, then I will give them another reason.

A precious one. A secret that so few people know. My hands clench into fists as I voice the words, keeping them low.

“Matteo Corvo is holding my daughter hostage.”

Rocco’s face goes slack. Vito only stares at me, his eyes unwavering. And then he nods, slowly, as if in understanding. “I see. Did - did Frank know?”

A hint of pain, at the brother he loved and lost. I nod. “I told him… right before.”

There is more than enough pain to go around.

Rocco spins his head between us, gaping in shock. “I… what? You have a daughter?”

For more than an hour, I sit. And I talk. And my two closest men listen carefully, silent and watchful aside from the few questions they put to me.

And when I am done sharing, Vito leans forward. He scans the blueprint, lips tightening.

“You see now.” It’s not a question, those quiet words. He offers me a nod.

Rocco frowns, leaning forward to look too. “But I don’t understand. Why are we going after Asante, if Alessia is with Matteo? Not that I don’t understand, amico, but surely she should be the priority.”

My throat tightens at the reminder. “Matteo will not let me close to the house.”

I tried. Several times in those first days, desperate, only to be turned away. And then the command came, to leave altogether and go home to Vegas.

Obey, or they will both face the consequences.

And here I am. Working in the shadows, working with scraps of information to try and pull a plan together.

An escape, an attack – for us to be ready for the moment we can get her out.

Rocco stirs. “We?”

I eye him, a hint of irritation working in. “Yes, we. Which is why I’m sending you back to campus, amico.”

He doesn’t bother to hide the frustration that flashes across his face. “Dante—,”

“Please,” I say quietly. Appealing to him. Not as my direct report, but as my friend. “You know what is at stake now, Rocco. You know what Gio is trying to do, and why. I need you to work with him.”

To build an army – a force big enough to combat the hundreds of men Salvatore Asante has under his command.

“Sanctimonious bastard,” Rocco mutters. But he sighs. “The shit I do for you. You’d better make me godfather when you get her back, Dante.”

My heart clenches at the joke. Rocco’s humor trails away at the expression on my face. “I’ll leave tonight. And… I’ll work with Fusco. With all of them. Try to, at least.”

He grasps my shoulder tightly before he leaves with a nod of farewell to Vito.

“You should have told us sooner,” Vito says softly as the door closes. “What a weight you have been carrying, nipote.”

The room blurs. “It is not my weight alone.”

And yet the loneliness threatens to choke me. Night after night of planning, of seizing last-minute opportunities, careful moments for veiled, hissed conversations on disposable phones.

We are watched. All of us.

All the damn time.

And I am tired. So, so tired.

“Thirty days,” I murmur. “It’s a lifetime, Vito.”

Thirty days of my daughter growing up, on top of the time I have already missed.

Thirty days of my tentazione alone and behind enemy territory.

And for it to be Asante…

Both the knowing, and the lack of it, threatens to drive me mad.

“So,” Vito says finally into the quiet. “They are allies, then.”

He’s staring thoughtfully at the plans when I look at him. “Who?”

Vito gives me an incredulous look. “Gio Fusco? Luciano Morelli? Powerful alliances, Dante.”

He doesn’t mention Domenico.

But the familiar fury lights up my veins at the mention of Luc. “I don’t ally with traitors, Vito. I wouldn’t last long if I did.”

I hate him. Hate him for what he did.

He took Cat straight to them that night. Showed his true colors as a snake in the grass.

Deliveredher, as if she was a fucking parcel. He allowed her to sacrifice herself to Salvatore Asante, in a foolish, misguided attempt to get Alessia back.

As if they would ever have handed her over, as if Salvatore or Matteo would ever have adhered to the code of honor that no longer applies in the Cosa Nostra.

If Cat had been in her right mind, she would have known that. As he should have. Should have protected her. Instead, he failed her, and we’re all paying the fucking price.

Cat most of all.

Luciano delivered her into Salvatore Asante’s lap, bleeding out in the middle of the road beneath Matteo’s blades as a reward.

Good.

May he burn in hell.