Chapter 1 Contessa #2
I resist his pull and press my back harder into the wall.
I can hear clipped commands now, and words spoken in a pleading tone.
Fed might be unconcerned about what’s going on below us but I’m not.
A flash of long chestnut hair catches in the corner of my eye.
Fed’s mama is standing outside the dining room, holding onto the wall, and her fingers are trembling.
I pull away from the wall and lower my gaze to the gap in the door, trying to see through.
A man dressed in a sharp, tailored suit shifts into view.
My breath scratches the back of my throat.
His height and build are nothing short of menacing, and his high cheekbones and full lips are the sort that lure in women like prey.
Everything about him is dark. Dark clothes, dark hair, dark brow.
I shudder. The Di Santos carry darkness with them everywhere they go. It only got blacker after Mama died, and I still blame them for her death, even though the bullet was fired by a member of a rival mob—a Marchesi.
Thanks to my father’s port, we’ve always managed to stay on the good side of Gianni Di Santo and his men, but I can’t say the same for other folk in this city.
And despite the mutual respect Gianni and Papa seem to have for one another, I know the don of New York can turn on a dime.
I’ve seen it happen too many times and the thought of it releases a sick sense of dread in the pit of my stomach.
The front door bangs open and a man with hair thinning on the top of his head bursts into the entrance hall. Fed steps forward to look over the rail. Then he grips my hand again and whispers, “Zio.”
It’s been a while since I last saw Fed’s uncle but I recognize the resemblance to his father in the pattern balding, jerky gait and long fingers that flex as he approaches the dining room door.
“Mario, no—”
Mrs. Falconi reaches out to stop him from going any further, but her plea falls on deaf ears when Fed’s uncle ignores her, presses two flat hands to the door and pushes it roughly.
It swings inward revealing the full, rich profile of the man in black.
He turns slowly to look at Mario but, no matter how hard I strain, I can’t see the details of his face from this angle.
“Shit,” Fed whispers beside me and we both lower our knees to the carpet to get a closer look. Fear pulses beneath my skin.
Two more figures come into view. They have their backs to the door but swing around when Mario enters.
My gaze narrows on them. I recognize one as Augusto Zanotti, Gianni Di Santo’s second-in-command.
He owns Alphabet City, near Mr. Falconi’s offices.
I don’t recognize the other man. Their gazes don’t dwell on Mario for long—if he thought he’d pose a threat to them, he couldn’t have been more wrong.
They’ve given him as much attention as they would the shit on their shoes.
I hear Fed’s papa stutter something incomprehensible, then Mario pulls out a gun.
A gasp tears from my throat before Fed claps his hand over my mouth and I realize my mistake.
The man in black takes a step backward and lifts his gaze to the landing.
His hand rests on black metal at his waistband.
Time stops as I take in his narrowed bronze eyes and tan skin marred by a scar that runs the length of one side of his face.
Everything about him is calm, controlled, unaffected.
Like the worst type of predator—deadly and carnivorous, as though he has the power to draw people to him like a magnet before gnashing his teeth around their limbs and eating them alive.
A hot flush coasts from my cheeks down my spine to my pelvis. This is what pure terror must feel like.
In fateful synchronicity, the sound of a gun cock fills the house, the bronze eyes dart away and Mario’s arm flies up, sending a bullet through the ceiling.
“Fuck—” Fed wraps an arm around my torso and pulls me backward. I always thought I was strong for my build but Fed’s muscles seem to have burst out of nowhere in the last few months. He manages to drag my stunned limbs a few feet along the landing. “Tess, come on!” he hisses in my ear.
I can’t take my eyes off the dining room door. Flashes of black move past the opening in quick succession. There’s a fight. There are guns. Mrs. Falconi screams. More bullets are fired, yet I still can’t move.
Mario’s form appears in the gap; a tan hand is holding his neck tightly from the back. Then a gun is pressed up to his forehead. I can’t see who’s holding it.
“No—” The word floats from my lips like a puff of air.
I don’t hear a sound over the ringing in my ears but I watch as Mario’s body falls limply to the ground.
Fed chokes out a gasp and pulls me harder.
This time, I move. I move faster than I’ve ever moved in my life.
I scramble to my feet and pull Fed to his, then he grabs my hand and turns, hauling me down the landing toward his room.
I twist back once to check there isn’t a gun pointed in our direction and there isn’t.
There’s something else.
A pair of hazel eyes, a heated glance, and most terrifying of all, a man unaffected.
I stumble to a bed in the center of the room while Fed shuts the door and bolts it.
When I turn around, he’s pressed his back against the door as if to protect us against anyone entering.
The man I just saw downstairs could snap Federico between his finger and thumb. The door would be a mere annoyance.
We stare at each other, our chests heaving with adrenaline, shock pulling at every nerve ending. The shouting below has quieted to barked commands and stuttered apologies. I jump when another door bangs closed, and only relax when the sound of tires on gravel rises up to the window.
Fed puts his hands over his face and that’s when I notice how large they’ve become.
He’s starting to look like some college football player.
The shake of his shoulders makes me stand and walk across the room, pulling him into me.
He cries silent, wretched tears while I hold him tightly, stroking the back of his neck with my palm.
He just saw his uncle being murdered in cold blood.
The thought feels strangely distant, as though I’m having an out of body experience. I should be able to relate to how he’s feeling but I’m numb. I feel nothing.
It feels like hours have passed by the time he takes in a long breath and pulls out of my arms. His eyes are raw, his heartbreak written across them in bright red ink.
“I’m so sorry, Fed,” I whisper.
He simply nods, closes his eyes and shakes his head.
When his lids lift, he looks off to the side and his mouth ticks up in one corner. The cheeky, mischievous Fed I know is back in the room.
“What?” I ask, confused as to how he can find something funny right now.
His lips then twist into a bitter line. “When I thought about getting you in my room, this is not quite what I’d imagined.”
A combustion of nervous relief makes me laugh, then his smile falls soberly.
A light tap at the door makes me jump. I take a step back, suddenly aware of how close we’re standing.
“Federico…” Mrs. Falconi’s voice is trembling. “Are you okay?”
Fed unlocks the door, and his mama pushes through it and collapses onto him. “Oh baby. Are you okay?” She holds his face tightly, moving it this way and that, inspecting him for damage.
When she’s satisfied he doesn’t have a scratch on him, the whites of her eyes take me in. “C’mere Tess…”
I walk into her arms for the second time this evening. My movements are mechanical. It’s like my limbs have shifted into autopilot. My brain has shut down but my body is still going through the motions.
Mrs. Falconi sobs into Fed’s shoulder and I press my forehead into his chest. It solidifies against my skin and something shifts in the air.
His voice is low and filled with conviction. “Papa…”
“He’s okay, Federico. He’s just dealing with—” A choked breath halts her words.
“I know Uncle Mario’s dead,” Fed confirms. “We saw it happen.”
She looks up, her eyes wide. “H-how? You should have been here, in your room.”
“It doesn’t matter. What happened?”
She closes her eyes and shakes her head. “Mario was stupid. He was so stupid…”
“Why were the Di Santos here?” There’s a bitter clip to Federico’s tone.
Mrs. Falconi falls quiet.
“Mama,” Fed’s voice is uncharacteristically deep and firm. “Tell me the truth. Why were they here?”
A long pause is filled with stuttered breaths before Mrs. Falconi responds. “Your papa is behind on the lease for the offices and the storage facility.”
Fed’s throat bobs against my hair. “Why?”
“We had a theft. One of the warehouses was broken into and half our equipment was stolen. Your papa had to buy more urgently, so he wouldn’t lose the contracts—it’s become so competitive out there. He didn’t have enough left over for the lease. He hoped they’d understand, give him some grace.”
“And did they?”
“I don’t know, Federico. Your papa… He’s cleaning up his brother’s corpse. I can’t ask him yet.”
“Why did they kill my uncle?”
Mrs. Falconi lifts her head and gaze flits between me and Fed.
“Because he was stupid.” When neither of us responds, she continues.
“Who the hell walks into a room of Di Santos and pulls out a gun, Federico? Let alone pulls the trigger.” She shakes her head and tears roll down her face.
“Only Mario Falconi,” she finishes, her voice cracking.
I stay in their embrace for a few minutes longer, the tension in my body making me rigid, then say the words I should have said an hour ago.
“I should really head home.”
Mrs. Falconi releases a shuddering sigh and tips my face toward her. “I’m so sorry Contessa. After everything you’ve been through…”
“It’s okay,” I reply, with a small, hopefully reassuring smile. In truth, I just want to get out of here. While I haven’t personally witnessed bullets being fired until now, I live every day with the aftereffects of murder, and the stark reality of it is threatening to singe my skin.
“I’m really sorry about your uncle.” My tone takes a sharp dip. “And for what the Di Santo’s have done.” Bronze eyes and a heated glance flash across my lids but I blink the image away. “They all deserve to go to hell.”
Mrs. Falconi’s eyes widen. It’s practically unheard of in this city to say a word against the Di Santos.
They’re supposed to be our saviors, maintaining law and order in the city and keeping crime at bay.
But they’re nothing but criminals themselves.
Criminals and murderers. Barely even human beings.
They’re the same breed as the Marchesi’s, who killed my mother.
They all deserve to die slow, painful deaths.
I don’t care how that heated glance pumped something effervescent into my veins, or infused my bones with a moreish warmth. It was just a look. And I live for the day I can show the owner of those bronze eyes he’s worth nothing, to anyone.
“Please accept my condolences.” I shake my head sadly, then I walk out of Fed’s room, down the stairs and out of the Falconi residence, unbeknown to me for the very last time.