Chapter 22
Black iron sconces light the way along the long, stone-walled corridor Kaz leads me down.
We pass a rotunda that splits off into two hallways, and a set of spiral stone steps that lead down to an underground floor.
In the center of the circular foyer is a small wooden table with a skull sitting in the middle.
I pause at the decoration. Deep red roses fill the skull.
“Um.” I tug on his hand to stop him. “Kaz. Is that real?”
He comes to stand beside me. “Yeah.”
“It’s a real skull. An actual human skull?” I swallow against the ball of trepidation climbing up my throat at the prospect of this afternoon’s meeting.
“Yeah.” He picks it up and turns it, pointing at what looks to be a bullet hole in the temple. “One of my father’s greatest enemies. He decided to keep the skull as a reminder to us of how to deal with those that try to take what’s ours.”
He places the skull back onto the round obsidian slab.
“And now it sits in the foyer of your secret club that you own with your brothers.” I nod along with him like this is completely normal behavior.
Growing up around my brothers, I shouldn’t be surprised by anything, but as horrible as they were, they never used a human skull for a flower vase.
“Yes.” He winks at me, then grabs my hand, tugging me along again.
“Nothing weird about that,” I mutter to myself as he brings me to a thick, dark wooden door, etched with curling designs that resemble both vines and veins. “Or this.”
I trace one of the etchings with my fingertips.
“I let Elana decide on the pattern for the door,” he says. “She was going through one of her dark, angsty stages as a teenager at the time.”
“Did you go through that phase?” I ask.
He deadpans. “Of course not.”
I laugh, because it’s obvious he’s lying, and the image of an angsty Kaz pops in my mind. He was probably even more broody and dark than he is now, but I doubt he had all this muscle and electric heat rolling off him.
He pushes the door open and gestures for me to enter first. The office offers a powerful vibe with heavy wood furniture and more iron sconces like the ones lighting the corridors. Worn leather chairs and the faint scent of cigars soften the atmosphere, making it feel more…Kaz.
It’s the sort of room built for making formidable deals and having dangerous, secret conversations.
“What about you? Did you hide away in your room, covered in black from head to toe while listening to depressing music?” He shuts the door quietly behind us.
“No. Brooding wasn’t really allowed.”
There’s a knock on the door before he can ask any follow up questions.
“Gerald.” Kaz swings the door open wide. “Come in. Thanks for meeting us here.”
“Not a problem.” A man in a dark gray overcoat breezes into the office.
“This is my wife, Sienna,” Kaz introduces me, shutting the door.
Gerald pauses in taking off his coat to nod toward me. “Yes, the wife. It’s good to meet you.”
“Thanks. Kaz says you can help us, but I’m not really sure there’s anything that can be done.” I move to stand beside Kaz.
Gerald tosses his coat over the back of one of the leather chairs and folds his arms over his chest. He looks very in command with his knitted brow and serious expression.
“Almost anything can be fixed. Where is the boy now?”
“Tommy? He’s at home. I was afraid to send him to school in case my cousin decided to go there again.”
Kaz gestures for me to take a seat in the armchair as he stands behind me, his hands resting on the back. The warmth of his presence wraps around me. Even when the man isn’t touching me, I can feel him.
“It’s been two days since you’ve brought him into your house?” Gerald aims the question at Kaz.
“Yes. We pulled him from the school yesterday,” Kaz responds.
“And nothing from your uncle or cousin?” Gerald turns his curious gaze on me.
“No.” I fold hands in my lap. “But my uncle hasn’t checked on Tommy since Tony’s death. Melody—that’s the aide that’s staying with us for now—said he only reached out to her to let her know Tony had died, and that he was Tommy’s guardian.”
Gerald digs out a small spiral notebook and flips through until he finds an empty page.
“What company does Melody work for? He probably sent the guardianship paperwork to them.” He holds his pen over the pad while looking to me for an answer.
“She doesn’t work for a company. Tony hired her when Tommy’s mother passed away. I think he went through an agency to find them, but he hired her on his own.”
“One caregiver for round the clock care? Does she never get a day off?” Gerald questions.
“She has a short list of babysitters she uses when she needs some time off. I’ve flown in to stay with Tommy when she took a week off for vacation. ”
Gerald’s brows raise. “So no central agency that pays her? Your uncle pays her directly?”
I shrug. “I believe so. Melody told me that after the call from my uncle, a deposit was made in her account for her paycheck. It wasn’t from Tony’s account though. She assumed it was my uncle’s.”
“So she never saw any guardianship paperwork; she just took his word for it?”
“I suppose so.” I look up at Kaz who seems to be soaking in all the information along with Gerald. “She’d met my uncle before, so it wasn’t like he was a stranger. Plus, I’d called her to be sure she knew what was going on. And then again when I was told I’d be moving here.”
Kaz moves his hand to my shoulder, giving me a gentle squeeze.
“Since Melody is his aide, and she’s staying with you as well, I don’t think there’s any case for kidnapping, so you can stop worrying about that.
” Gerald softens his expression for my benefit.
“I’ll need to see your brother’s will to determine what we can do about getting the guardianship of the boy moved to you.
Since your uncle doesn’t live in the country, you may have a case. ”
“May have a case? Gerald, I’m not looking for maybes here.” Kaz stands straight again, shifting into full authority mode again.
“Kaz, until I see the will I won’t know for sure what legal avenues we have. And outside of the legal aspects—well, that’s not my department.” Message received, if we can’t do this through the courts, he’ll step out of the way to let Kaz handle it how he handles things.
“My uncle is never going to just give up custody. Not when he can keep using Tommy as leverage.”
“He only uses him for leverage over you, and once he realizes you’re not going to be afraid of that anymore, he might back off,” Kaz says.
“You don’t know my uncle. Or my cousin. Marco learned most of his cruelty from Dante. My cousin is worse.”
“Do you have a copy of your brother’s will?” Gerald asks.
“No. I never saw it.”
Gerald’s pen hovers over the pad, his eyes swing up to mine. “You never saw it?”
“No. I wasn’t allowed at the reading. My uncle told me afterward about Tommy.” My stomach drops. “The will may not say anything about Tommy. My uncle could have been lying…then we’d have a good case, right?”
“Let’s wait until we see it before we get excited.” Gerald scribbles more.
“How much of this has to go through the courts? You know how I feel about the system.” Kaz says.
“Well, legally, you want as much of this to be on the up and up as possible so there are no problems later. The last thing you want is CPS showing up at your house and dragging the boy away.”
“That won’t fucking happen.” Kaz’s voice is hard
“No, not if we do things the right way. Because if we don’t, and CPS does come banging on your door, having a bunch of guns put in their faces isn’t going to help, either.”
“I don’t want Tommy put in that situation.
” I get up from the chair and walk the length of the office.
“If the will never actually stipulated a guardian, then getting custody won’t be hard.
Uncle Vicente doesn’t live here in the states, like you said.
And Dante doesn’t even know Tommy. I’m the only one who’s ever had any relationship with him. ”
“Then we’d have a solid case.” Gerald looks to Kaz. “But if we can avoid going before a judge, that would be best. Let’s hope the will doesn’t stipulate anything about the boy and we can negotiate with the DeAngelos.”
“Negotiate.” Kaz spits the word.
“Kaz.” I turn to him, my chest tight. “I can’t let Vicente or Dante get their hands on Tommy.”
“Do you think they’d hurt the boy?” Gerald asks.
“If it meant hurting me to get what they want from me, I have no doubt they would.” I let out a long breath. “Tommy’s not useful to them. It makes him dispensable.”
Just like me.
“First things first. I’ll work on getting a copy of Tony’s will. Find out what exactly is in it, then we can decide what to do. Right now, keep the aide with the boy; that way he’s with his temporary guardian. That keeps you within the lines of the law.”
“That’s not a problem. He’s used to having Melody around all the time. It might frighten him a little if that changed, too. Right now he’s having fun in the big townhouse, but that won’t last forever.” Tommy thinks he’s on a little vacation getting to run around Kaz’s brownstone.
Six-year-olds are more adventurous than adults. Where I had frayed nerves coming to stay with Kaz, Tommy has found all the fun parts of it.
“Okay, I’ll do what I do. And Kaz, try not to do what you usually do, yes? Until I get more information?” Gerald tucks the pen into the spiral of the notebook, then puts both into his jacket.
“Right.” Kaz frowns. “I want this dealt with today.”
Gerald stuffs his arms through his jacket on the way to the door. “Getting my hands on the will shouldn’t be too much of a problem. I’ll call you soon as I do.”
Kaz shakes his hand and sends him off, while I continue pacing the room.
“He could have told me anything. I never questioned him. I never questioned any of them.” I bite down on my thumbnail as I keep pacing. “He could have taken Tommy back to Sicily, and I wouldn’t have stopped him. I would have just let him do it.”
“Hey. Hey.” Kaz gently grabs hold of me as I pass him and pulls me into his chest.
“I’m a complete idiot.” I yank away from him, shoving my hands into my hair. “I just went along because it was easier…it was safer.”
“Sienna.” His tone hardens, and I know what he wants.
He wants me to stand still, to obey, to be the quiet, docile bride he bought from my family.
Well. Fuck. That.
“No. I’m not doing that anymore. Fuck it. No one in my family follows the fucking law. Your family doesn’t. Why the fuck do I have to? No.” I shake my head. “I’m going to take Tommy away from here. Away from my family. I’ll get a job, I can support us.”
“Sienna, stop.”
“No. That’s it. I can do that. They won’t come after me; it’s you they want to fuck over. So fine. You and they can fight it out. Leave me out of it. Hasn’t there been enough collateral damage? You’ve lost your sister, for fuck’s sake!”
As soon as the words fall from my lips, they register in my mind.
I cover my mouth, wishing I could shove them back in, but I can’t. They’re out, floating around between us.
He drops his hands to his sides. His left lid twitches as he stands silently staring at me.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean it the way it sounded.”
“You’re not running away from home,” he says in a dead calm voice as he takes determined steps toward me. “You’re not taking your nephew and going into hiding.”
“I can’t risk keeping him here.” Panic swallows me alive.
He cups my chin, forcing me to look at him.
“You’re not leaving me.”
“You didn’t know about Tommy when you agreed to this insanity. And at this moment, I’m not sure the truce agreement even matters, right? You said Dante is opening those horrible houses, and that was against the agreement. You can be free of me, now.”
His fingers squeeze into my cheeks, and his voice is low and controlled when he replies.
“Whoever said I wanted to be free from you?”