Chapter 38
DANTE
I ’m married.
To a woman I despise, while the woman I want is married to someone else.
My head hurts but there is a deeper pain in the center of my chest.
My brother has been with her. Fucked her. She doesn’t regret it.
I stay up late talking to Leon in my apartment. He left not long ago to check on the club. I thought about going with him, but it’s supposed to be my wedding night, and so, for appearance’s sake, I don’t.
Which leaves me alone with my thoughts.
Standing in the lounge, I stare out at the skyline of the marina, and in the distance, the city of Chicago. From here, it’s little more than a jagged collection of towering structures, framed by the glistening expanse of Lake Michigan.
I’m restless. It’s hard to keep my thoughts from spiraling. The memory of Carmela—and my brother—are always close to the surface. Layered over this are the broader plans and the conversation with Helena.
The long game we have been playing is coming to a head. Only the future I wanted is becoming murky.
My cell buzzes in my pocket.
Leon: Need to speak urgently. Coming up.
Brows pulling together, I tap out my acknowledgement. My mind flashes through a dozen scenarios. None of them are good. Leon arrives a few minutes later. His grim expression sets pinpricks across my skin.
“Something is going down at Ettore’s home,” he says. “He’s called a bunch of soldiers in.”
“Do we know why?”
He shakes his head. “Perhaps now would be a good time to tell me what happened with you, Carmela, and your maniac brother, so I can get ahead of the curve on this.”
What happened is none of Leon’s business, but, in light of whatever might be going down, it also is.
Ettore might have surveillance that Christian doesn’t know about…
Someone might have seen me or my brother going to or from her room…
Ettore stumbled upon Christian and me having more than words. That’s got to pique his interest.
Jesus fucking Christ.
I still hesitate.
“Dante?” There is a warning in Leon’s voice, one that is rarely directed at me.
“I fucked her. On her marital bed. Christian came into the room while I was—preoccupied. He didn’t get involved, if you’re wondering.” Fuck my life. “But he has been with her—a lot.”
“Fuck,” he mutters. “He was supposed to be watching your back. Took the assignment a little too literally. If someone saw you—” He breaks off, takes out his cell phone and lifts it to his ear.
“Increase security, discreetly… Have all other teams put on standby, also discreetly. Let someone overhear you mentioning it’s to do with Dante’s marriage to Helena, and their child arriving tomorrow.
How he doesn’t want to fuck up and disappoint Gallo… Good.”
He slips the cell phone back into his pocket—no one would even question that the orders come from him and not me anymore.
How often has he been fucking her? How reckless have the two of them been? There is a faint tremble in my fingers as I draw them across my jaw. “You think this is to do with me?”
“Do you?” His eyes drill into me.
“I don’t fucking know. If I’ve put her in danger, I’ll lose my fucking mind.”
He offers no words of comfort. I don’t deserve them. While he was definitely aware I was going to speak with her, he would be right to be pissed. I’m pretty fucking pissed at myself for taking such a stupid risk. I might have fucked up everything: I might have put her in the crosshairs.
“And what about this little ménage you have going on with Christian? Is that going to present a different problem.?”
“You’re just going to go there? Right now?” I trust this man with my life and my darkest secrets, but I could happily beat his head into the nearest wall for asking that question.
“There’s no good time for the question, and I still need to know what I’m dealing with. I’ll ask you once more: is this going to be a problem?”
“No.” It’s not a lie, more a statement of intention not to let this be a problem.
“Good; make sure that doesn’t change.”
We wait.
And wait.
In the early hours of the morning, as light invades the city skyline, we get word that Cosmo is dead.
I wasn’t expecting that.
Three hours later, Christian turns up. There’s blood on his shirt, his face is busted up, and his knuckles are split and swollen. His eyes are wild.
Leon and I are both on our feet, watching him as he paces back and forth. The urge to strangle him is gone; I’m just freaking out for whatever happened to him… and her. “Christian?”
“You need to move your plans forward,” he says.
“What happened?”
“Tell me you’re going to move up your fucking plans!”
“Chris!” Leon’s sharp reprimand brings my brother’s restless pacing to an abrupt stop.
His bloodshot eyes swing my way. I’ve never seen him like this, and it ramps up the sense of foreboding. “Is she okay?”
His laugh has a tinge of mania to it. “No.”
I lunge for him. Leon cuts me off before I get to him. “Tell me what the fuck happened right now, or I swear to fucking God, I will finish what somebody started!”
“Cosmo attacked Carmela.”
The fight goes out of me. I don’t feel like I’m connected to the real world. Leon’s head whips around. He releases me slowly and turns to face Christian.
My brother flings himself onto the couch and lets his head roll back against the cushion.
“I found him on top of her, trying to fucking rape her. He didn’t.
She was still mostly dressed, but he’d come over her ass.
I thought Ettore was going to fucking end me for letting it happen on my watch.
Still don’t know why he didn’t. Gave me a knife and told me to have fun.
So I did. Cosmo’s dead. He suffered…” He rolls his head forward, leans up, plants his elbows in his knees, and puts his head in his hands.
“I can’t get the image of her out of my fucking head.
The sounds she made… Like I felt them inside me, under my skin.
He’d bitten her—fucking animal. Killing him once wasn’t anywhere near enough. We need to escalate the fucking plans.”
“Understood,” Leon says.
Christian lifts his head. “No, I don’t think you fucking do.
This isn’t about what Cosmo did. He’s just the latest pile of excrement in her life.
We left her with Ettore. Let him put his hands on her, knock her around, let him rape her, telling ourselves it was okay because her father set it up, it’s legal, and they’re married.
That’s bullshit. I’m telling you now, she fucking hates him, and she sure as shit never once welcomed his attention or warranted his fists.
She deserves better. It’s time we do fucking better. For her.”
I swallow past the tightness in my throat. “Can we do this now?” I turn to Leon in question. I can’t string coherent thoughts together.
“Are you giving me a choice?” Leon asks.
Am I? “No. We need to make this work.”
“What’s the plan?” Chris demands.
“We take Carmela,” Leon says slowly.
“He’ll go fucking nuts,” Christian says. “You didn’t see him with his own brother.”
“Good,” I say. The thoughts that eluded me only a moment ago are suddenly crystal clear.
“We want him to. We want him reeling and weak. He failed to protect his wife from his own brother. Word will get out about that soon enough. Family is everything in this world. Everyone knew Cosmo was a problem and he didn’t deal with it.
The capos won’t be impressed. If she disappears, there will be speculation she fled, which will likewise make Ettore look weak. ”
“He might try to blame other parties,” Leon adds. “But I doubt anyone will buy into that. Profits are good at the moment. If he wants to start a war, he’ll need proof, a body, or a ransom demand. When he gets none of those, people will assume she ran.”
“So, we take her. And after? You want me to continue working for him?”
“Yes, for now,” Leon says.
“Then you need to take her when I’m not on watch.”
“Correction. You need to take her when you’re not on watch.”
Christian’s chuckle has a dark, unhinged edge to it. “Well, alright then. Fucking finally. I’ve already done some scenario planning. I’ll need a clean white van with fake plates, half full of Amazon delivery parcels, left in a city center lock-up.”
Leon lifts one brow. “Scenario planning…? On second thoughts, don’t answer that. Consider it done.”
“So, where are you going to keep her?” Christian says, leaning forward in his seat. “I got distracted at this point in my scenario planning given she was bound and helpless in the back of the van.”
Jesus Christ! I can almost feel my fingers around his throat. “In my apartment.”
The murky waters suddenly turn clear. She’s still mine. She came all over my dick.
She’s still wearing the necklace I gave her.
Christian’s brows knit together. If I suffered any delusions about his feelings toward her, that look clears everything right up.
He’s in deep. Obsessed and committed. My brother doesn’t do anything by halves.
It’s all or nothing with him. I wonder if my future wife even knows the kind of man she willingly allowed into her orbit, and her body.
Maybe she did, and maybe she didn’t. Over the coming weeks, I’m betting on her finding out.
This is far from resolved. But now is not the time. Not when she’s in danger.
It’s time to get her out.