42. Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-One
Alessandrio
T he smell of piss greets me on the landing of the fourth-floor walkup. It’s a scent more overwhelming now because of my heightened senses, as I take in the chipped paint of the door to the grimy apartment. Someone’s painted over the peephole, and I guess that’s good for us. Turning, I rake my eyes over our Greco men—Dante, Matteo and Luca. Their guns are drawn, bloodlust written on their faces. I know my own face is twisted with the same feverish look.
Marco Galdano and Riccardo Dolmino should have known better. They disrupted my calm, brought chaos literally to my door and thought to cow me. Chaos was my constant. The freshly forged peace that a certain grey eyed vixen has given me is something new and unexpected. I find myself desperate to protect that peace and her. So a familiar bloodlust has snapped at my heels, the reminder of what I am and what I was made to do. He’s here. Riccardo Dolmino is behind this door. It’s the mantra on repeat in my head. Riccardo is the true target. Galdano will just be my favourite kind of collateral.
I remove a gun from its holster, letting slip the image of the woman who is at the centre of my purpose from my mind. No distractions. The sound of pulsing base bounces off the tiles and metal of the stairwell from some of the lower down apartments. An excellent cover for the sounds of gunshots that will be inevitable because he’s here. I gesture to my men, preparing them for my next move, and they nod, eager eyes flashing back at me. They are my back up; I wanted to go this alone but Emilio demanded we go in prepared. Brute strength might not be enough if there are more of the Outfit inside. He and Lorenzo wait in the back alley, at the bottom of the fire escape, in case any of them try to flee from our wrath.
My heartbeat pulses in my ears as I raise gun and paw, the latter planting itself in the wood. It’s too fucking easy. Wood splinters as I blast the door open with a kick. The stench of cigarettes and sweat greeting us on the threshold as we burst into the dingy apartment. Two men I recognize as Outfit look up from their tv stunned. One reaches for the gun on the low coffee table, but my bullet catches him between the eyes before his fingers can even touch the butt. He falls face first on its surface, the cheap wood giving out beneath his dead weight.
“Motherfuck—” Dante cuts off the other words by firing two rounds straight into his chest.
His body convulses back against the couch, the surprised look of shock and awe frozen on his wide-eyed face. I don’t stop to make sure he’s dead. There’s another pop and I know my men are taking care of it as I move deeper into the apartment, down a dark corridor. A door opens to my left and I don’t even bother with my gun. The man’s face is that of pure terror as he sees the monster waiting in the darkness. My hand punches out, deadly claws tearing through his jugular. Hands come up to seize my wrist, but it’s no use. I curl my fingers and rip back, spraying blood across my black clothes. When my father made me, he knew what he was doing. I don’t even bat an eye as the man crumples at my feet. Death is inevitable in our world, and only the lucky die of old age.
There are footsteps and I aim my gun, but only find Luca hot on my heels. I gesture for him to check the room the dead man just left before moving to clear another myself. I nudge a door open with my paw and instantly cover my nose. The stench that greets me is just as familiar as the blood in my apartment. I point my gun into the gloom, every nook and cranny. However, there are very few places where someone could hide in this barren space, which only contains a lonely mattress pressed against the wall, piled with blankets. On silent paws, I move closer to the mattress, not breathing through my nose. Death is here. I can smell it in the stale air, the cigarette smoke hid it from me in the hall, but this room is rank with it. Reaching down, I pull the blankets away and my blood runs cold.
Straightening, I walk to the window and rip the moth-eaten curtains back. Afternoon light illuminates the dust in the air, the yellow faded wallpaper and the worn wood beneath her burial site. Pulling my phone from my pocket, I open my messages.
Me: I found Monique.
Emilio: Inevitable.
This was inevitable. I don’t know how she got involved with these men, but when you lay with dogs, you tended to get fleas. With the Mafia, you get an unhappy end. She let them into my apartment, gave them access, and for what? I will never know. Even now my rage simmers, and yet there is pity beneath its yoke. Burying that pity, I move back across the room and close the door. Emerging back into the hall, I spy Luca and Matteo at the last door, the latter reaching to push it open. There is a creak of old hinges in desperate need of oil.
Pop.
Fuck.
Pop.
Matteo’s reaching hand clutches at his chest as the impact propels him backward into Luca, who catches Matteo’s weight.
Pop.
Luca couldn’t move, even if he wanted beneath Matteo’s dead weight. A round explodes from the room and splatters his brains against the wall. Furious rage surges through my veins at the sight of them, Luca cradling Matteo’s dead body where they both fell slumped against the wall.
“Fuck!” Dante shouts over my shoulder.
I put my arm up to keep him back as more rounds explode from the wooden door, one after another, bullets finding their mark in my already dead men. When silence reigns, I make my move, letting my long legs carry me the rest of the distance until I reach the doorway. Brash. Overconfident. Sure of myself. I smash through the old wood and feel a burn in my bicep as I propel myself against the man in the armchair. Our collision was one of five years in the making. The armchair flips backwards as I slam into him, my claws ripping at his wrist as he raises his gun.
“Cunt!” he screams, and those same claws rip through muscle and sinew as I smash his hands with a bone crunching crack against the floorboards, the gun clattering into a dark corner.
I hear running footsteps and see Dante enter the room, eyes wild and full of rage, gun pointed as he clears the surrounding space. I stare down into the black eyes of Marco Galdano, his face a shade paler than usual as he glares up at me.
“You’re the next best thing,” I snarl into his face as I rise over him and grip his throat to lift him up.
A slight movement and I see the blade as it slashes at my gut, but the pain makes him sluggish, and I render that wrist useless as I catch it. The knife clatters to my paws as I pull him in close.
“Time for your confession,” I croon and watch a flicker of fear ignite in his soulless eyes.
“Who killed Leonardo De Luca?” Emilio snarls.
“You did,” Marco pants, face lined with pain.
I watch from the corner as Lorenzo stands in the centre of the room, phone in hand, filming the proceedings. We cleared the apartment and there was no sign of Riccardo. I couldn’t hide my anger or disappointment as I restrained Galdano in the chair, not bothering to be gentle with the wrists I smashed and gouged as I did so. He killed two of my men, and I don’t take lightly the shedding of any Greco blood.
“Where is Riccardo Dolmino?” my brother asks quietly.
He won’t get very far, but he doesn’t need to. He has me. This is his prelude, his opening act. Marco will grow cocky, as my brother does nothing. It will fill him with a sense of entitlement.
“Fucking your wife,” Marco coughs out, smiling.
I watch my brother pull away. He turns and smiles at me, but as quick as lightning, he back hands Marco for the insult. The sound of flesh on flesh as loud as a gun. Galdano spits a tooth and blood out onto the dirty floor boards and turns to look up at Emilio.
“Is that the best you got, motherfucker?”
I chuckle at that. I know his game, have seen it before.
It’s a ploy. Marco will taunt Emilio, hoping my brother will snap and end him. That would be too easy, too nice. The Hanged Man doesn’t deserve that kind of gift. After I cleared the apartment, I went back to Monique, saw the obvious signs of violence on her skin, the black and blue of her face, the imprints around her neck. I don’t know who did it, but I know that this man would have likely watched if not participated in her torment. She suffered at their hands and although she sold me out, she played a part in making me feel less alone. I owe her this moment, to get revenge, not just for her, not just for my men, but for the sake of anyone else who might fall prey to this piece of shit.
“I dunno. Drio, is that the best I’ve got?” Emilio asks me with mock confusion.
I push away from the wall and move toward them. “No, brother, but you don’t have to get your hands dirty when I can do it for you.” My eyes slide to Marco, watch his face contort into dread.
With every step I take, more of the white in his eyes becomes visible. I drop to my haunches before him.
“That was some nasty work you did to De Luca,” I say low as if it’s just him and I in this room. “Whose idea was it to cut his cheeks out? Yours or Riccardo’s?”
“Fuck you, you ugly bastard,” he spits.
“No, motherfucker.” He doesn’t see it coming, my reaching fingers, the intent. “Fuck you,” I whisper, punching claws through the meat of his shoulder.
He screams and tries to wrench away, but I rip my claws out and grip his head in my hands, squeezing as I bring our faces close. I’ve been idle for too long, playing a hero I had no right to be for a woman who seems to have stolen my heart, but this, this brutality, runs at my very core.
“Who killed De Luca?” I murmur low.
“You’re going to kill me anyway,” Marco Galdano whimpers, sweat breaking out on his forehead.
“That’s right, but you get to choose how painful that death is,” I croon, and tighten my hold on his head.
“I did!” he bursts out as the pressure of my grip doubles. “That cock sucker deserved it. He was weak.”
I look over my shoulder at Lorenzo who nods, phone still held aloft, capturing this confession. Emilio beside him looks relieved, as if so much hung in the balance of those words. Emilio gestures for me to continue.
“Whose idea was it to take his cheeks?” I ask Marco and watch his eyes widen.
“That was Riccardo,” he says frantically. “That motherfucker is crazy.”
I hold his face again, turning it this way and that as if inspecting his cheeks, deciding where to bury my claws.
“Where is that crazy motherfucker?” I hold my breath the moment the question is out.
“No fucking ideas. He left us, said he has business to attend to.” The smile on Marco’s face makes my stomach churn. “He can’t wait for his family reunion, you know?”
My tether snaps, and I use my claws to rip through his hollow cheeks right to the bone. He screams like an animal, high and full of pain, his body writhing in his chair. I wrap the fingers of my other hand around his neck and begin squeezing, slowly at first, giving my brother and uncle a chance to intervene.
“That girl in the other room…” My voice is deadly quiet and barely audible over his garbling cries. “This is for her.” I tighten my fingers, feeling bone and muscle give under my grip. No one stops me as I squeeze the life from him. A good deal might actually celebrate this end, the way they might for my own.