20. Rafe
Chapter 20
Rafe
Stay alive.
I don’t know how many times I have to tell myself that help will come soon. But now the pain is all-consuming as my body slowly sinks into a sea of agony. It’s so bad, I feel like I’m drowning.
My lungs feel like they are struggling to take in air, and now every breath, every movement, every heartbeat is a torturous assault on my battered body.
Ricardo is pacing around me like a lion toying with its prey, his boots scuffing against the concrete floor as he watches and waits.
“Today is your last day alive, Rafe, unless you tell me what you know,” he says, the words dripping with an icy indifference that chills me to my very core. “Now stop boring me and tell me why Dante saved the girl? Why is she so important he killed my brother?”
His voice is matter-of-fact, devoid of the menacing undertone from before, as if he’s simply stating an inevitable fact—my impending demise, unless I comply with his demands.
“Just tell me.” The ease of his tone sends a shiver down my spine.
I had thought it was his voice when I had no sight. I’m not sure why he kept me blindfolded. But that’s stupid fucking Ricardo. I also knew the moment he removed the blindfold that he knows he’s going to kill me.
“No comment,” I grunt through gritted teeth, my throat raw from lack of fluids. He’s only given me enough to stay alive—barely.
“Hit him,” he commands with a dismissive wave of his hand.
Thud!
But I’m so weak, the thrust of the fist merely causes my head to loll, the impact no longer eliciting the same agonizing pain as before.
I no longer brace myself, somehow it helps.
A large part of me wants to surrender to the darkness that beckons, to let oblivion claim me and take me forever. I have an overwhelming temptation to give in, to slip into the sweetest embrace of unconsciousness, but that would be so damn easy.
Yes, it’d be a blessed relief from this never ending torment. But the fighter in me knows my time isn’t over yet; I’m not ready to leave this life.
Not when I have an anchor in Cade. We've fought for so long to be together that I can’t leave him or let him down now.
And then there’s beautiful Lia. The only woman who has taken a piece of my heart, as she has with Cade. The woman who Ricardo desperately wants to know about. The woman he wants to eliminate.
My head drops heavily as I consider everything. Once I’m gone, Dante will be hunted next. And while he’ll protect Lia with his life, I don’t know if Cade has the strength to endure.
The notion sends a pang of despair through me, and I force myself to focus. To clasp the delicate threads of my life with every ounce of my being.
Little by little, I work to loosen the ties around my wrists, picking at the restraints on what little strength remains.
Through narrowed slits, I watch him pace around me, his fists clenching tightly, as his calculating glance behind me quickens my heart rate.
“And again!” Ricardo barks, his voice edged with frustration when I don’t even make a sound as another blow connects, this time with my chest.
I sense his impatience intensifying, but other than gritting my teeth, I don’t react.
And suddenly, his voice takes on a sinister tone that sends a chill down my spine. “You’ll talk, you bastard. You’re not dying until you give me everything you know about her.”
He rushes behind me and before I can react, his arm encircles my neck, the crook of his elbow digging into my windpipe as he chokes me with a vise-like grip.
“Why did your brother kill my brother for her? Tell me who she is and where she is.”
Each shallow breath is a struggle, a battle for survival, as I fight against the darkness that threatens to consume me. A heaviness settles in my chest, but I try to focus against the suffocating grip.
“I… I… don’t…” I cough. “Know,” I rasp, my voice a strained whisper against the vice-like pressure of his arm.
“Then this should remind you.”
His arm slips from my neck, but the respite is short-lived as he moves in front of me, brandishing his phone like a weapon.
On the screen, a grainy video plays out. But I recognize it because I’ve watched it many times before.
It shows Nic Bianchi taking a young girl with dark hair down a corridor. Her face is staring at the floor, making her indistinguishable. The video shows Dante at the end of the hallway and when the door at the end of the corridor slams shut, Dante is heard making a call to me to erase some footage from the house.
“Only Cade would know how to do that,” Bianchi grunts in my ear.
“Umph!” Everything goes black.
The slap against my face jolts me back to the present. I don't know how long I was out for.
Seconds … minutes … even days.
He must have hurt himself too, as he holds his hand against his chest.
“Are you ready to talk?” His voice is a low hiss, dripping with malice as he leans in, his face mere inches from mine.
I remain silent, my jaw clenched in defiant silence. Because no matter the torture, no matter the pain, I won’t break. I won’t betray the ones I love, the ones I’ve sworn to protect. Even if that means I sacrifice myself.
“Boss, I think I just heard something outside. Do you want me to check?” one of his men asks. His voice comes from behind me. Probably the man who now has bloody fists from smashing my body.
“I have men outside. I’m sure we’d hear gunshots if we had a problem.” Bianchi tuts and leans closer to me. His hot stinking breath on my skin makes me wretch. “Don’t get your hopes up. Nobody knows who took you. Or where I brought you. The raid on the club was fucking perfect. I couldn’t have planned it better.”
I spit blood on the floor and say, “You need all the help you can get. You don’t have that kind of brain power.”
His lips curl back in a menacing snarl, but the thunderous pounding of footsteps reverberating through the silence freezes Ricardo in place, his body stills as he listens.
When gunshots rattle against the metal, Ricardo presses his gun against my temple as icy fingers crawl down my spine.
“Find out what’s going on,” he grunts at the three men still in the room. I don’t look at them. I’m staring ahead, wondering what’s happening. “Not you. You stay beside me.”
My heart leaps in my chest. Mainly hope, but a little trepidation battles there, too.
My blood races as more gunshots pop, and a bodyguard drops to the ground in front of me. A figure emerges from the shadows to my right. Mateo Conti pops out like a ghost materializing out of thin air. He lifts his hand. His movements are fast and fluid as he dispatches the other guard as he rushes toward him.
Two bodies down, two to go in here.
Romeo followed quickly behind his brother, killing the man who left me severely beaten. After him, a contingent of SWAT team members moves in, skillfully spreading out and securing the area’s perimeter with precise coordination. All guns aimed at Ricardo.
My heart skips a beat as I glimpse my brother, his hand steady, the glint of a gun reflecting in his angry eyes. He’s here. He’s found me.
Relief washes over me in a crashing wave, but a new dread takes hold. Dante has now placed himself in the cross-hairs of a psychopath. A madman who wants him dead.
Ricardo shakes, his entire frame trembling against my back as he presses the gun harder against my temple. “You...” he hisses, his voice dripping with poison. “You went against the oath. You killed another first son.”
Dante’s gaze is unnerving. “I don’t care,” he says, his answer leaving no room for argument. He squeezes the trigger on his gun. The blast reverberates in my ear before I hear a gun clatter to the floor. I realize Dante shot it out of Ricardo's grasp.
“Fuck you!” Ricardo yells as he rushes behind me, using my body as a shield.
Dante continues, “He was a piece of shit and deserved to die. But that’s not why you’re here, though, is it?”
A knowing smirk tugs at the corners of Dante’s mouth, and he pulls out his phone, his fingers dancing across the screen. “You’re not bothered that your brother died. After all, with your father dying, you’re now the head of your family. But what you want to know is who the girl is. Is she who you think she is? And if so, how powerful would she make you?”
There’s a crackle of static, and then a voice filters through the speakers. It’s Nicolai’s voice, a ghostly echo from beyond the grave.
“There’s a girl here, Ricci. She’s the double of the girl in photos that dad has. You know the one who the Syndicate killed, Aurora Moretti, and she’s here at Dad's Mafia party. What are the coincidences?”
“Get her name and send me a picture, and I’ll run it through the facial recognition software,” Ricardo responds.
The recording screeches, jumping forward in time, and Nicolai’s voice returns. “I really think it’s her daughter. Father told me there was a rumor she had one before she was killed.”
“Keep hold of her, and we’ll take her and question her. If it’s her, we’ll kill her. Wipe out the Moretti line forever. Just like dad wanted.”
"But if it's her. It would make me powerful."
"Don't be fucking stupid," Ricardo's voice grunts. "It would make her powerful."
The words hang in the air. From my periphery, I see Ricardo’s face contorting from a mask of fury to one of fear.
He opens his mouth, but before he can respond, another figure emerges from the shadows, his footsteps heavy and purposeful.
Antonio Conti.
“What … What are you doing here?” Ricardo asks, still hiding behind me.
“Stand up and be a man, not a fucking coward.” Antonio moves to stand beside Dante, his gaze fixed on Ricardo with an intensity that could shatter stones.
Ricardo stands up, but not before pressing a knife against my throat.
“You planned to kill my daughter,” Antonio growls.
“Daughter…” Ricardo chokes out.
And then another figure joins them. Standing on the other side of Dante is my father, his expression unreadable but his presence a palpable force.
The three men together look impenetrable, and my body feels like it’s finally giving out.
“And you think you’re going to kill my sons,” he rumbles, his voice carrying the weight of all the Dons before him.
The air is thick with tension, before a flurry of movement erupts from the shadows.
Antonio levels his gun at Ricardo, his finger tightening on the trigger with a deliberate slowness. “Nobody tries to kill what is mine. Nobody.”
The gunshot is deafening in the confined space. The flash of the muzzle sears my retinas. Dante already shot the arm carrying his gun and now Ricardo staggers, clutching his arm as a bloom of crimson spreads across the fabric of his other sleeve.
“It’s just a flesh wound … for now,” Antonio says menacingly.
Dominic is next, his aim resolute as he squeezes the trigger, the bullet tearing through flesh and muscle. “And nobody harms my children.”
Ricardo snarls in pain, his face contorted in agony as he slumps to his knees, his fingers pressing on the wound in his thigh.
Dante levels his gun at Ricardo, his expression cold and determined. “And nobody, including your brother, takes what is mine.”
A deafening roar fills the air as the bullet whizzes past. My body freezing at the sight of the crimson droplets spraying in every direction. Behind me, he howls in anguish, his hands clutching at the ruined flesh of his ear as he rocks back and forth, whimpering like a wounded animal.
And that’s when another figure emerges.
Lia.
Dressed in black from head to toe. She holds her head up high, but it’s her blue eyes that are ablaze with an unstoppable determination that could lay cities to waste.
With confidence, she points the barrel of her gun at Ricardo’s head.
“If your dick didn't control your brain, you’d have realized for yourself, in Mexico, how much I look like my mother,” she says, her voice laced with contempt.
Ricardo chokes out a pained sound, his hand clamped over his ruined ear as he stares up at her, realization dawning in his pain-glazed eyes. “You?”
A feral smile curves across Lia’s lips, one that sends a shiver of primal appreciation in my spine. “Yes, me. The woman who refused to be your mistress. Not that I would ever agree to that because you repulse me. Do you want to know the other reason?”
“I don’t fucking care.”
“Oh, you do.” She holds up her left hand, wiggling her fingers, drawing all eyes to the faint tattoo adorning her skin. “I’m already a wife.”
Turning around, she presses a soft kiss on Dante’s cheek; but her gaze doesn’t look away from Ricardo’s shocked face. “You wanted me dead. You planned to kill my husbands.”
“Husbands…” The word hangs in the air as a ripple of confusion crosses Ricardo’s face. “Husbands?” he hisses again, his eyes narrowing in disbelief.
Lia’s smile widens, a gleam in her eye. “That’s how initiations work, isn’t it? I can officially marry one man, of which Dante de Luca is my wedded husband. But every man who takes me through my initiation is my husband, too.”
Her gaze flicks at me, and I nod, a silent confirmation of her claim. The gesture of her saying this while everyone is here seems to solidify that she is ours.
"No! Every head has to take you through an initiation."
Lia shakes her head.
"No. You're incorrect." Dante says. "At the request of my mother, I made it my mission to protect Lia. And in doing so, I knew if I kept with the current ideas, she would die like her mother unless I hid her. But I found out those ideas are incorrect." Dante shakes his head as he continues. "Because there's a doctrine written five centuries ago that Giuseppe Rossi knew about, but he tried to hide."
Lia smiles as she stares at Dante.
"And I've studied the doctrine. I checked it over and over before I knew what I was going to do." My father and Antonio now stare at Dante. "The Moretti female only has to be initiated by one head or one future head. And I went one step further by her being initiated by me and Rafe. Then I protected her forever by marrying her. She's a Moretti married to a future head of a family of the Syndicate, and if I was to die, she is also initiated by Rafe. And once my father hands me his position, or Rafe, she is untouchable."
Antonio drops his head and stares at the floor, and I have a feeling it isn't because he's upset at hearing Lia is initiated. I suspect he knew. He's upset at learning something today that would've changed his life.
"Nobody's untouchable," Ricardo grunts. "My brother and father are dead. Where was their protection?"
“The doctrine repels disloyalty,” Lia says calmly. “And what’s also in the doctrine is an allowance for retribution, but only if the person does it themselves—no assassin, no help.”
She smiles at Ricardo and says, “That's why I could kill your father, and Giuseppe. Both men were instrumental in the death of my mother. Both men spoke to assassins to eliminate me.”
“How do you know that?”
“So tutto,” she says.
“What was that?” Ricardo replies.
She clicks her tongue.
“She knows everything,” I tell Ricardo what Lia said in Italian.
“You must know Italian.” She stares at him, shaking her head. “Your father was Italian. If not, he must have thought that was very disrespectful for his son—a son of a leader to not know his father’s tongue.”
“We live in Australia. Not Italy,” he grumbles, holding his ear as his blood drips on the floor. “You killed my father?”
“Si.” She smiles and says in a perfect Italian accent. “Secondo la Legge del Sindacato. La dottrina non permette a una famiglia di estinguere un’altra senza conseguenze.”
Ricardo growls behind me and only the excruciating ache in my ribs thwarts my laugh, leaving me with a stifled smile.
“Lia confirmed that as per Syndicate Law. The doctrine does not allow for one family to extinguish another without consequence,” Antonio advises. “And she is correct.”
“And I confirmed I killed your father, but I’m sure even you know a simple yes.”
Ricardo hisses, “You won’t get away with this.”
“I will. And my work still isn't done.”
Dante stares at Lia, confused.
She smiles and says, “I studied the original doctrine for two months before I came back here. And let me tell you, it’s a very interesting piece of history.”
"What the fuck?" Ricardo murmurs.
What the fuck, indeed. She's laying all her cards on the table.
Or she's letting everyone here know she’s always known who she is, and that now she's in charge.
Good fucking move.
“You made this personal when you tried to kill me." She looks at me. "And nobody causes my men pain,” she declares, her voice ringing with finality as fury burns in her eyes as she aims between his eyes.
“You can’t kill me. I’m unarmed. I'm the head of my family. I'm …”
“Oh, I can because…” She pauses. “I’m not only Aurelia Moretti-de Luca. I am La Capa di Tutti I Capi.”
Dominic and Antonio glance at each other and smile.
She continues, “And even if I wasn’t, I’d still do this for them. For what you’ve put my husbands through.”
Ricardo’s eyes are wide with shock and disbelief before he throws himself on the floor behind me. And crawls up the chair behind me and presses his knife against my throat.
“I’ll kill…” She doesn’t wait for him to finish.
Without a further word or shred of hesitation, she squeezes the trigger. The gunshot echoing through the cavernous space.
I almost see the bullet travel in slow motion until it hits him between the eyes.
Ricardo’s body jerks as the bullet finds its mark, punching through his brain and ending his life without question.
His knife hits the floor first, and then he crumples to the ground.
Only then does my body finally give out–and my world goes black.