Chapter 18
Dante
As I guide Camille through the throng of people on the sidewalk as they mill about in the mid-morning sun, I tell myself that a booth one spot back still counts as space.
Lucia goes to the diner every morning, and Camille needs to eat. We’re having breakfast. That’s it.
Well, that’s the story I tell myself as we approach one of my security personnel who followed Lucia to the diner this morning after she delivered her overnight guests safely to a shelter on Del Ora Street.
It’s a lie.
The truth is, I’ll take any excuse that allows me to interact with Lucia without barging my way into her space. I’m drawn to her to an extent that makes restraint more a discipline than a virtue. If I don’t keep myself in check, I’ll cross a line without realizing it.
As we slow near the entrance of the diner, Camille squeezes my hand, already buzzing with anticipation at seeing Lucia again.
Just as fast, my instincts stiffen.
There’s a shadow in a doorway across from the diner.
A dark-haired man is half-turned toward the street, waiting for someone—or pretending to be.
His coat is expensive, his shoes are polished, but unlike the guard who greeted me with a respectable dip of his chin, respect never reaches his eyes when our gazes align.
My pulse doesn’t spike when recognition dawns. It goes cold.
When I stop walking, Camille peers up at me, confusion crinkling her nose.
I soften the groove scouring my forehead before crouching to her height.
“Go inside, stellina. I’ll join you in a minute.
” She hesitates, uneasy about my request. I usually do everything I can to bring her close to me, not push her away.
Fortunately, I only need six short words to change her stance.
If only it were as easy with the woman I use to bribe my daughter to conform. “Lucia is inside, waiting for you.”
Her eyes brighten at the name, and that’s all it takes for me to signal to security to remain close but unobtrusive. I don’t want him scaring either Camille or Lucia.
“I’ll be in as soon as I can.”
Camille nods, trusting me without hesitation.
That trust burrows deeply in my chest as I guide her through the café’s entry door.
The bell rings, and I catch a glimpse of Lucia’s concern when Camille races to her side without anyone in tow.
Her eyes slide toward the entrance, so I step back, hiding in the shadows of the alcove.
Her expression is scared, but not for herself. She’s only worried about Camille and me.
That’s all I need to know to confirm I made the right decision.
Straightening up, I cross the street and beeline for the perv in the shadows. His throat bobs when he notices my approach, but he remains still. Dumb prick.
“Dante Caruso,” Edoardo croons like we’ve bumped into each other at a charity gala instead of outside a diner that suddenly feels too good for him. “Fancy seeing you here.”
“You don’t belong here.” My voice is a little ominous.
My brothers have worked tirelessly over the past twenty-four hours trying to unearth a connection between Lucia and Edoardo.
Every lead they’ve chased has led to a dead end.
If Lucia has a child, it isn’t in any records.
There isn’t a single snippet of her existence in any form, both through legal channels and the one my family prefers to use.
Edoardo’s smile sharpens. “That sounds an awful lot like concern.”
“It’s a warning.” I move close enough that he has to crank his neck to maintain eye contact. He’s on the cusp of six feet, but that’s midget territory compared to my height. “Whatever business you think you have in this town, end it. Now.”
As he rubs his hands together, his gaze flicks briefly toward the diner window. Toward Lucia.
I step to the left, blocking his view.
“That ends now,” I continue low enough that only he can hear. “You don’t go near her. You don’t breathe in her direction. You don’t exist in her world.”
Edoardo chuckles, but there’s calculation behind his arrogance now. “I’ve heard you’re extremely protective. Careful, Dante. That kind of protectiveness can be misunderstood.”
My snarl is vicious. “Misunderstand this. If I see you here again, we won’t have a conversation with words. I’ll use my fists, then my gun.”
Behind me, through glass, Lucia laughs at something funny Camille does.
Edoardo hears it too.
A mask slips down his face. Annoyance, maybe. Or perhaps even interest.
Even with my instincts begging me to punch him in the face, I keep my fists loose at my sides and my expression bored. I’ve played these games many times in the past thirty-four years. This is the first time it’s been about a woman, though.
Edoardo snickers like this is merely a stop on his leisurely walk through a city he thinks will bend for him. His smile is lazy and practiced, the type men wear when they wrongly believe they’re in control.
I have news for him.
“Walk away,” I tell him. “While you still can.”
Like a fool with nothing to lose, he says, “Have you asked Lucia what she wants?”
I don’t answer him.
He takes my silence as permission to continue interrogating me.
“Because from where I’m standing”—he angles his head arrogantly—“it isn’t you.”
I study him the way you study a man you’re considering breaking, but he acts ignorant.
“I’ve seen you the past couple of weeks hovering like proximity equals ownership.
” When he chuckles again, I struggle not to wipe his smile off his face.
I wouldn’t hesitate if I didn’t feel the eyes of my daughter on me.
“But no matter what you do or how much money you spend, she keeps walking away.”
My jaw tightens, but my voice stays smooth. “Because I’m trying to show her how real men do it.”
“Real men?”
“Yeah, Edoardo. That’s all you’ve seen. A man acting like a man. Not this preppy-boy, treat-them-mean-to-keep-them-keen bullshit you wrongly believe is working.”
“Is that what you call being a man? Standing back while another man leverages your girl?”
I inch closer until Camille’s view of him is blocked before I throw my fist into his stomach, bending him in two.
“Fools mistake restraint for weakness.” Fisting the collar of his jacket, I drag him so close that his bloody breaths tinge the air with a copper smell. “You don’t force women into relationships, corner them, or treat them like a fucking asset you own.”
His smile thins when he hears the utmost certainty in my tone, but even when they’re losing by a mile, some jockeys still flog a dead horse. “Moral superiority won’t win wars.”
“And neither will desperation,” I reply, snarling.
With Giovanni’s warning that Lucia’s ties with Edoardo could spark a mafia war, I push him back with force. He slams into the wall, the strength of my push winding him.
Turning on my heel, I head back to the diner. “Stay the fuck away from Lucia.”
In the reflection of the diner’s steamy window, I see him reach into his coat. I spin on a dime, my gun drawn and pointed at his head before he can blink.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Edoardo stammers, stepping back. “I was reaching for my phone.”
Slowly and deliberately, he slides his hand into the breast pocket of his coat and removes his phone. Even with danger nonexistent, I don’t lower my gun. If anything, my finger hugs the trigger firmer when he turns the screen to face me.
His screensaver slices through me better than any bullet could.
It’s an image of Lucia in lacy lingerie. Her head is only visible from her lips down, but I’d recognize that body anywhere.
“That was taken last night,” Edoardo says, stealing my focus from the image clearly taken within the last sixteen hours. The patched-up entrance between our apartments is behind Lucia’s left shoulder, and it’s bordered by a sheet that smells like sex and us. “Is that cooperative enough for you?”
While snarling in warning that he better adjust his tone, I return my eyes to the photo.
Lucia is vulnerable in a way she’s never allowed me to see, but the tilt of her lips is wrong.
It’s a racy shot, there’s no doubting that, but not in an intimate way.
It was demanded, not willingly given. I’d put money on it.
My finger itches to pull back the trigger, but I don’t move or breathe.
Camille is mere feet from me. Lucia is there too.
The reminder alone keeps me from exploding.
I refuse to let scum like Edoardo Cordoza undo all the work I’ve done these past six months to prove I’m not the monster my daughter’s mother told her I am.
“You have five seconds to remove that from your phone,” I say slowly, eyes locked on the screen, “or I’ll ensure that your respect for women grows tenfold with one bullet.”
He tests the authenticity of my threat with a mocking smirk. “And how the fuck will you achieve that without breaking the rules? You can’t kill me, Dante. There are rules not even you can ignore.”
“I didn’t mention anything about killing you. Yet.” My last word is for me, but he hears it. “But I don’t need to kill you to make your life miserable.”
I move close enough that he finally loses his smile before I grab his belt buckle, yank him forward, and then stab the barrel of my gun into his groin. “There’s barely anything there as it is, so I doubt there’ll be anything left once I’m done with you.”
He’s scared now. Fucking petrified.
Good.
“Just because you have a dick doesn’t mean you get to fuck with her life.
It doesn’t give you permission to collect pieces of her soul like souvenirs.
” He whimpers when I dig my gun in far enough for his cock to wilt—like it can get any smaller.
“And it sure as fuck doesn’t give you permission to taunt her into thinking she needs scum like you in her life to get by. ”
His confidence is smashed to smithereens, but he continues to push.
It’s understandable when he exposes the hand he’s holding.
It’s a royal fucking flush.
“You’re right. But considering the world we live in, and that she’s my wife, I’m sitting fairly pretty right now. Wouldn’t you say, Dante?”
I don’t respond. I can’t.
His claim changes everything.
We’ve governed by the rules that brought the Cosa Nostra back from its deathbed after internal conflicts almost wiped out every family from the map in 1981. Those rules explicitly state I can’t touch another sanctioned man’s wife. Rival or not.
I glance toward the diner window where my daughter’s silhouette and the woman who makes her life simpler just by existing are reflected. Then I look back at Edoardo.
I hear Giovanni’s growl from here when I say three words that could destroy the Caruso dynasty. “Name your price.”