Chapter 53 Wicked Games
Chapter fifty-three
Wicked Games
Marco
Play with fire, and you’re gonna get burned.
That’s how I find myself back at Raf’s office, staring at the battered and bruised faces of my best friends.
The purple smudge of no sleep under their eyes and hair mussed from hours of running their hands through it in agitation.
The visible reminders of what went down also bloom in the form of blue-black bruises on their faces and knuckles, tinged red and bloodied.
“Can someone please tell me what the fuck is going on?” I demand.
“Last night, a couple of heavy hitters came into the club, and it turned into an all-out brawl. The three men that instigated it made threats against Sophia and Arabella,” explains Seb.
“I swear I recognized one of them from the other night when we went to find Arabella,” chimes in Luca. “Rizzo might have given you his word and made some Mafia shit pact with AJ, but I am fucking telling you, he’s behind this!”
I glare at Luca, willing him to shut his fucking mouth, but it’s too late. Seb and Raf both swing their questioning gaze in my direction. Seb speaks first. “Marco, what aren’t you telling us?”
My throat closes in as realization dawns that I’m starting to feel tangled in a web of my own little white lies.
Small omissions of details all for good reason—to protect the ones I love most—but whether my dad or Seb or Sophia will see it that way is starting to weigh on me.
After the conversation with Dad on the way here and feeling the full force of my best friends’ imploring glares, it’s abundantly clear I need to have some important conversations about some hard truths before I’m strangled by my own doing.
I give both of my friends a rundown of events that have led to this point, with a promise to Seb that we will sit down and have a proper conversation about it. I feel shit about keeping him in the dark when Bella Donna is his club, too, and my actions affect him just as much as me.
“Have we pulled the security footage yet to try and get some facial recognition?” I ask.
“Yeah, I’ve sent it to Avery and he’s combing through it all now,” says Seb.
There’s no way any of this is a coincidence. This is Arty’s way of using his connection to Rizzo to send another message to me.
“Does your dad know? Because that’s all I fucking need,” I say.
“He hasn’t heard it from us, but once he gets wind of it, he’s going to be livid,” snips Raf.
“I’d say he’s had his fill of family drama,” I return.
“Knock, knock.” And I’d know that pretentious, nasally lilt anywhere. I turn my head towards the door.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” I snap.
Instead of heeding my warning tone, Arty walks further into the room.
“Good to see you again, Marco. Truly, there’s no need for the hostility.
As you may have heard, I was at the club with Arabella’s brothers when this most unfortunate situation unfolded.
I stepped right in to help defuse the situation.
I’d hate anyone to get the wrong idea about what type of patrons frequent Bella Donna. ”
He’s goading me. I know it and he knows it.
I grind my molars but tamp down my instinct to react.
Clearly satisfied he’s won that round of our verbal sparring match, he looks over to my worse-for-wear friends sitting on the couch.
“How are you guys holding up? That was quite the scene. Let me know if you need me to reach out to my connections,” he says pointedly.
“Obviously the Belmont boys are more than happy to give a witness statement, too, if you need it.”
It doesn’t take a genius to work out he’s trying to weasel his way into my best friends’ good graces. There’s nothing good or graceful about this fuckface. Forget weasel, I bet he’s the fucking mole that orchestrated the entire thing.
“You need to leave. This doesn’t involve you.” The tension in the room is simmering.
He lifts his hands like he’s surrendering.
“I’m just trying to help, but I can understand why you might be skeptical of me, Marco.
” A sly smirk tips his lips, and my fury is burning me from the inside out.
I want to fucking throttle him. Given his previous threats, that’s exactly what he’s hoping he’ll push me to do in front of witnesses. I don’t bite.
“I have a deep respect for Patrick, and I know that he hoped Sophia and I might become more than just good friends. I did too.” He pauses for effect, and I step forward, cutting him off. I refuse to let this prick intimidate me.
“Arty, listen to me very carefully. The only reason I’m letting you near Sophia is because she wants to continue working on the Law Gala, and I’d never stop her doing something she wants to do.
” My voice is low and lethal, even though it’s taking all my restraint.
“Outside of work, Sophia is completely off limits. As for the incident at Bella Donna, we’ve got it handled. ”
I don’t miss the way he locks his jaw, or how his expression turns almost ominous. He quickly regains control of his emotions. He fixes the mask of politeness in place, so he can keep up the charade of being upstanding and affable.
“We’re adults, so let’s put our differences aside, shall we.
I fully respect you’re with Sophia now. I’ll be no trouble.
Besides, it’s important we can work together, especially considering Vault Security is being offered the contract for the Law Gala.
It’s on you to make that the safest event it can be. ”
There’s no missing the insinuation in his tone before he flips the nice guy switch again. “Speaking of which, I best be going. I need to find Sophia to continue our planning from the other evening.”
I ball my fists. I know he’s taunting me with mention of Friday night, but I don’t take the bait. He goes over to extend a soft, limp handshake to Seb then Luca, before crossing to Raf.
A knock at the door pulls my attention from thoughts of all the ways I want to make Arty’s life a living hell. My incredible girl stands there, and I just want to wrap her up and go back to the weekend when we shut out all the noise and it was just us.
“Arty, I’ll meet you in the boardroom. I have Evie dialed in on speaker ready to be briefed,” she announces brightly, but her eyes are trained on me and filled with worry. I give her a subtle nod of my head and a small smile to put her at ease.
“Well, that’s my cue. My co-chair is cracking her whip already.” He laughs at his own joke but soon realizes he’s the only one. He clears his throat and looks to each of us. “I trust you’ll get to the bottom of this. As they say, the truth always has a way of prevailing.”
Sophia’s interruption may have spared me the handshake, but the glare he gives me as he delivers his parting words doesn’t miss.
Ironically, the joke’s on him. The skeletons hidden in his closet are enough to hang him.
And when the time is right, I’ll take delight in stringing him up and pulling the rope.
Just before he walks out the door, he turns to face us again. “Oh! Can’t wait to hang out at the Natalia Hirsch exhibition. It’s going to be phenomenal.”
A message notification chimes. It’s from Chiara. She’s finished at her meeting and needs me to pick her up.
“Boys, I’ve got to go, but we’ll speak soon, yeah?”
I just need to get through this week. Then I’ll figure out how to have the hard conversations beginning to suffocate me.
Until that right time presents itself, I need to call in a favor with my other business partner. No one hurts my family and gets away with it. He more than anyone will understand Arty needs a heavy fucking dose of his own medicine.