Dark Mafia Heir (Mafia Vows #3)

Chapter 33

33

Vivienne

T he cold bites at my skin, waking me before my eyes even open. My head pounds—an unrelenting drumbeat that makes me wince as I try to sit up. The sharp scent of saltwater fills my nose, mingling with something acrid and metallic.

I blink into the darkness, disoriented. The low hum of engines and the distant crash of waves tell me where I am before my eyes adjust. The seaport.

Everything is blurry at first. Shadows of towering shipping containers stacked like a maze around me. The night air is heavy with the stench of oil and fish, and the flickering orange glow of a distant floodlight makes the shadows dance in eerie patterns.

I shiver, rubbing my arms, and that’s when it hits me; my wrists are sore.

I glance down, my pulse spiking as I see the faint red marks on my skin. Rope burns. The memory crashes into me like a wave—my father’s voice, cold and sharp, his last words to me before I passed out.

The sting of betrayal bites into my heart like the edge of a sharp knife. He betrayed me—my father killed my bodyguards and kidnapped me.

My throat burns, but I can’t cry now. I need to find a way out of here. I need to save my child. And Antonio… God, I can’t begin to imagine how scared he must be right now. He must be going crazy trying to find me.

Resting my hand against the wall behind me, I manage to stagger up to my feet, though it’s a struggle to keep standing because I am still drowsy from whatever my father injected me with, and my vision is a little blurry.

Still, I have to try to leave. I have to get back home to Antonio.

“I see you’re awake,” a voice says in front of me.

I flinch and back up against the wall. No matter how much I squint, I can’t make out who the silhouette in front of me is. I can tell he’s an older man from his voice and short, round, body frame.

He’s not my father, and there’s only one other name that comes to mind. “Salvatore?”

He chuckles. “Smart girl.”

Ice trickles through my veins like water. It’s truly him—Salvatore. My father really brought me to my husband’s worst enemy. “What do you want?”

He shakes his head. “You’re smart. I thought you would have figured it out already.”

Right. It’s Antonio he wants. I am just a bit of bait to get to him. My father set a trap, and I stupidly walked right into it. Now, my husband and unborn child are going to be in danger because of me.

A shiver spirals down my spine. I know our relationship had never been good, but still, I believed my father would never hurt me, not like this.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I inhale deeply, trying to stay calm. Being rash won’t help me in any way. “

“Oh, but I think you do,” Salvatore drawls, closing the distance between us.

My stomach churns with disgust the closer he gets. He smells like cigarettes and rotten fish. Just how long has he been hiding in this place? “You’ll never get Antonio,” I spit out. “He’ll kill you before you even get a chance to hurt him.”

Salvatore pins a knife under my chin, and I groan in pain as the cold metal pierces my skin. “Not if I kill you and his unborn child first. Pray he cooperates, or you’ll be dead before daybreak.”

“That is enough!”

I look over Salvatore’s shoulder to find my father standing several feet away from me. His eyes are bright under the moonlight, but his face is void of any emotions.

Salvatore snarls at me and moves away as my father approaches.

Tears I didn’t know I was holding back start to run down my face. “Dad, why are you doing this?”

My father stops in front of me. He gives me a pitiful look and shakes his head. “I worked so hard to get here, Vivienne. I won’t let anyone destroy everything I worked for, not even you.”

“But…” More tears stream down my face. “I am your daughter. How could you choose material things over me; over your grandchild?”

“Antonio’s spawn is not my grandchild, and you’re a disappointment, Vivienne. I regret that you’re my daughter. Your sister hates me because of you.”

An alarm goes off in my head as the realization that I hadn’t seen Harper starts to dawn on me. “What did you do to my sister?”

“Nothing…yet. You and Antonio will disappear tonight, and everything will go back to the way it should be.” He lowers his voice to a whisper. “Your sister will forget you. The world will forget you ever existed.”

The pain I feel is almost physical. I throw my hands forward, hitting my father’s shoulder and screaming. “You bastard. You’re insane. You should have been the one to die and not Mom.”

“Your mother deserved everything she got. She wouldn’t have died if she’d not tried to save Antonio’s family from me,” he grips my shoulders and throws me down to the floor.

My eyes widen with shock. “You killed Mom? You’re responsible for everything that happened to Antonio’s family?”

“His father should have never been Capo. Too bad Dante took the boy and raised him,” Salvatore answers this time. “He should have died with the rest of his family.”

My heart sinks to my stomach. I feel a lot of things at once—disgust, hatred, anger. I want to kill Salvatore and my father. God, I hate them so much.

I turn to my father, looking into his eyes and pleading, hoping all of this is a facade and nothing more.

He doesn’t give me the answer I desperately want to hear, though.

“I killed them, Vivienne. Antonio’s family, every last one of them. It had to be done. And I killed your mother, too.”

My father’s voice is calm, too calm, as if he’s talking about closing a business deal and not ending lives. The weight of his confession presses on my chest, and I can barely breathe.

“You’re lying,” I whisper, my voice trembling as my knees threaten to give out beneath me. The sea breeze chills the tears streaking my face, but I don’t wipe them away. “Tell me you’re lying.”

He doesn’t.

Instead, he turns, his back straight, his hands clasped behind him like this is just another night at the office. Like he hasn’t just shattered my world. “I won’t kill you. You’re my daughter, after all. I’ll kill Antonio, and you’ll get rid of that bastard in your stomach, and things will go back to the way it was.”

“I’ll never get rid of my baby, and I’ll not let you kill Antonio.”

He spares a glance, and then he turns away again. He doesn’t respond to anything I say after.

The silence is suffocating, broken only by the distant sound of water lapping against the docks. My head is spinning, my stomach twisting as I try to make sense of what he’s just admitted.

Antonio’s face flashes in my mind—his dark, piercing eyes, the quiet grief he carries like armor. And now I know why.

A sharp crack slices through the air, shattering the silence. A gunshot.

I flinch, my heart leaping into my throat as the sound echoes through the port, bouncing off the steel walls of the shipping containers.

My father doesn’t flinch, but Salvatore does. His eyes bulge as if he’s as surprised by the gunshot as I am.

“What the hell is that?”

“Check what it is,” my father orders his men.

They nod and go out to check the source of the sound, but they don’t make it out when more gunshots ring, and the men drop dead.

I hold my head, trying not to scream. It’s Antonio, I can feel it’s him.

My father, Salvatore, and what is left of their men pull their guns, ready to fight.

The chaos that follows is deafening. Gunfire cracks through the air, each shot a jolt to my already frayed nerves. I crouch behind a stack of crates, my body trembling as I watch the fight.

I catch a glimpse of Antonio through the haze of smoke and shadows. His men spread out behind him. There’s a flash of relief in his eyes when they meet mine.

"Get her out of here!" my father shouts to one of his men.

Salvatore’s sharp eyes dart in my direction, and a sick twist of fear churns my stomach. I don’t want to go anywhere.

“No!” I scream, my voice drowned out by the sound of the shouts and bullets.

Antonio sees me. His dark eyes lock onto mine for a fraction of a second, his expression hardening with resolve.

“Vivienne!” he yells, his voice slicing through the noise.

“Antonio, no!” I cry out, desperate to keep him from running into the hail of bullets.

But he’s already moving, weaving through the firefight like it’s second nature, his men covering him as he advances. My heart races as I watch him with terror gripping me. I’m afraid he’ll get hurt.

My father steps forward, his gun raised, and everything slows.

“Stay where you are, Mancini!” he growls. “Take one more step, and I’ll kill her.”

Antonio doesn’t stop.

A shot rings out, loud and sharp, and I scream, clamping my hands over my ears as the sound reverberates through the night.

My father staggers back, his face contorts with rage and… pain. Our eyes move at the same time to the gun wound on his stomach. There’s blood spurting out.

“P-papa.”

His eyes go wide with shock as they lock on mine. He doesn’t fall to the ground immediately. Instead, he raises his gun at me. “Bitch.”

Before he can pull the trigger, Antonio fires at him one more time. He falls to the ground with a thud this time, and soon, he’s in a pool of his own blood.

My mind goes blank. I don’t know if I should be worried or relieved, but the image of my father lying almost lifelessly will haunt me forever.

“Fuck!” Salvatore yells. He’s only a few steps away from me now, but before he can make a move, Antonio reaches me, grabbing my wrist and pulling me to my feet. His grip is firm but not painful, and the warmth of his touch sends a strange rush of relief through me.

“Come on,” he says, his voice low but commanding.

I hesitate, glancing back at my father, who’s bleeding out on the cold, concrete floor. His face has gone pale, his eyes almost rolling in.

The next bullet is from Lorenzo and goes right into Salvatore’s head. The old man convulses for a few seconds before falling to the ground. His death rattle lasts a minute, then he goes still, his lifeless brown eyes peering at Antonio with so much hatred.

Antonio wraps his arms around me, kissing my forehead. “I’m so sorry I came so late.”

I’m allowing myself to cry freely now as I wrap my arms around his neck. “No, you came right on time. I’m so sorry I put myself and our baby in danger.”

He presses another kiss to my forehead. “What happened is not your fault,” he says. “It’s okay now. Everything is fine.”

I pull back. “Angelo and Luca were shot.”

His eyes grow cloudy. “Luca will be fine.”

“And Angelo?” I ask, refusing to let myself breathe until I hear that he’s fine, too.

“He died.”

I collapse against Antonio. “Oh God, this is all my fault. I should have listened to you. I shouldn’t have gone to see my papa.”

“Shh,” Antonio whispers. “You’re safe now, and that is all that matters.” He cups my face, and I tilt my head up to peer into his eyes. “I thought I would lose you. I was so afraid.”

“I thought I would never see you again.” I sniffle. “I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be.” He brings his lips to mine and whispers. “I love you, Viv. I love you so much.”

“I love you too, Antonio.”

He claims my lips, kissing me in the midst of the chaos like our lives depend on it. And maybe it does. Maybe our lives and happiness depend on how much we love each other.

And there is nowhere else I would rather be than with Antonio.