21. Never get caught
I’m fuming.
You should never get caught.
And fucking especially for something you didn’t do. My dad would be so fucking disappointed. I’m almost glad he’s not here to witness this. I hope I’m out of here before my mother hears about it. She doesn’t need the heartache; she’s been through enough.
Of course, that bastard Addams would pin this on me. With Mia being Giulia’s ex, I’d have a motive. And with the—founded—rumours surrounding me being in the mafia, I’m a fucking treat on a silver platter.
If there is one thing I know about Addams is how much this election means to him. We are very much alike on that front. He ran for Council last time and lost. He’s always been evolving in the high spheres of power and wants to grab it for himself. The network this election would give him is too big an opportunity to pass. What he’d do with it remains to be seen. And since losing the pre-elections polls last week, he’s been more aggressive in his speeches.
Bitterness tastes foul in my mouth until it’s replaced by the tang of copper. I bit my lip with how tight I clenched my lips shut to avoid insulting an officer of the law and making matters worse.
The Chief of police himself came to my home to pick me up. There’s no love lost between us, but I thought he and I had an understanding.
He reads me my rights and tightens the cuffs around my wrists, but I don’t give him shit.
“You do not have to say anything. But it may harm your defence if you do not mention now something which you later rely on in court. Anything you do say may be given in evidence.”
“You can’t do this!” Giulia complains behind us.
It’s no use.
If Taylor himself is making the arrest, they must have evidence. Or a kernel of it, at least. The only thing that pops into my mind is that I left my ride in the middle of the fucking cornfield when Giulia sabotaged it, weeks ago. My precious bike was left unattended until I asked Nico to toll it and bring it to our garage for repair. It must have been hours. Enough time for anyone trying to pin shit on me to get my hand prints, maybe hairs.
“Sweetheart, listen to me. Call Nico and get our solicitor on this. I’ll be back before you know it.”
“I wouldn’t count on it, Capaldi. You’re going away for a long time for this,” Taylor replies, and there’s a tinge of regret behind his words.
I don’t resist as he drags me to the police car parked on my manicured lawn. The muddy tire marks make my jaw tick and my teeth grind. Before sitting down, I turn to Taylor. “Come on, you know I didn’t do jack shit.”
He speaks in a hushed tone, quickly glancing at the officers standing by the second car on our right. I don’t know them. They look like rookies, which means they’re not on my payroll. “Tell that to your handprints on the victim, Capaldi.”
He’s giving me clues. Good.
I know what my solicitor needs to look into. Taylor’s taking a huge risk sharing that information with me outside of the legal proceedings.
Giulia follows all the way down to the car where the two officers are ready to pull out their firearms despite me being in cuffs and my wife in her little sleep shorts and now muddied white sneakers. The fact that they can see what belongs to me so blatantly adds insult to injury. I turn a murderous gaze to them and one shifts uncomfortably under the harsh light of the car’s front beams.
The other officer doesn’t bother, pushing it to giving me a little smirk I’ll wipe off his face with his own fists when I’m out of my shackles. He pisses me off, and he knows it, trying to provoke me into assaulting an agent of the law.
“Keep looking at me and I’ll be the one to gouge your eyes out with a rusted spoon,” Giulia spits before her hands frame my face. Taylor admonishes her, but she gives him the middle finger and I hear him sputter, shocked into silence.
That’s my girl. She could be in trouble for that, but she doesn’t give a shit.
“Listen to me, guerrieritta. Call DeRossi and look into the handprints. And that jackass,” I add. She knows who I’m talking about by the glare she sends his way. If looks could kill, he’d be six feet under already.
“I’ll get you out. Trust me.”
Her lips descend on mine in a punishing kiss that steals the breath from my lungs. I don’t fucking need it if I have her taste on my tongue.
It’s the first time she’s initiated anything between us and my skin tingles at the knowledge that she’s finally mine, but then I remember we have an audience of pigs for a moment that means everything to me.
My hands are tied behind my back. All I want is to lift them to her face and touch her. Any minute, any hour we spend apart will be too fucking long. She runs her hands to my shoulders, my upper arms, pressing our foreheads together, connecting us like we haven’t before.
“I trust you,” I whisper against her mouth, and she kisses me again, frantically.
I can count people I trust on one hand. My brother. My mother. And now the most exquisite creature I’ve ever laid my eyes upon.
My beautiful warrior.
I finally enter the car and don’t look back.
* * *
When we arrive at the police station of West Hill, the officers place me in a cell, taking off my belt in case I’d consider ending my life with it.
I have something to live for, thank you very much.
They take my wedding band from my finger. An icy type of calm spreads under my skin. I clasp my hands together and fix the indent of the ring on my finger with single-minded focus, entering an altered state of mind where only Giulia and I exist.
I berate myself for having been married to Giulia for three months and still not having sealed it with real rings. I’m a fucking idiot. She deserves all the fucking gold and diamonds my money can get her.
I’m daydreaming about fucking my wife with nothing but my ring on her finger, the one I’ll get from her dad, when the custody officer delivers me the notice explaining my rights and my charge sheet.
Then come the pictures, fingerprints to match those they already have and DNA samples. How did they even fucking get my fingerprints when I’m not in the West Hill police database?
I know everyone at the station so they’re all being respectful and on their best behaviours. Except Taylor, I’m sure most of them know I won’t spend more than seventy-two hours here.
Since I’m being charged with murder, I could be held here for up to ninety-six hours and then transferred to a prison until my court hearing. But I know my solicitor can at least get me bail. A court hearing could be months from now and I’m not rotting away in jail when Addams wins the fucking elections and takes everything I want.
Taylor comes into the cell and clears his throat.
It’s gonna be a fucking waste of time for everyone. DeRossi isn’t here, they’ve assigned a legal advisor to my case who’s probably gonna piss themselves when they see me and ask me to “cooperate”.
Pain lances behind my eyeballs at the fucking headache this mess is.
When the interview is done, and everyone’s frustrated, I’m brought back to a cell. No one else occupies it because apparently, I’m high risk, so I might hurt other people. That’s fucking bullshit, but I’m content to have the space for myself. It’s late and I’m sure nothing will happen tonight on Giulia’s side.
I know I won’t stay long in whatever hell hole Taylor will drag me to, but it doesn’t help the sensation that all my carefully constructed image just exploded. My face will be on all the news channels by morning.
I sit with my elbows on my knees, grappling at my roots and pulling. Trust isn’t something that comes naturally to me but locked in between four grey walls, there’s nothing else for me to do but wait and trust. In DeRossi, in my brother, in my wife.
Laying on my back on the small cot at the end of the room, a hand behind my head, I close my eyes, and it’s green I see. Deep green with speckles of gold. I see dark sheets and red hair. I smell the leather of the seat I always use to watch over my wife. My body’s reaction is visceral and I groan, squeezing my cock and willing it to soften.
I’m not getting a hard-on in fucking prison.
Despite my best intentions, my thoughts trail back to my beautiful warrior and how her lips landed on mine earlier tonight, how fierce she looked tearing that officer a new one. She can be so sweet when her guard is down. But only for me. Only ever for me.
I imagine sitting on the club seat facing her bed and watching her sleep in her silky shorts and random cotton shirts. It doesn’t hold a candle to the real deal, but it will have to do.
I don’t know how long I’m going to rot in here, but every night I won’t spend watching her is time getting me closer to madness. She’s my calm in the raging storm of my thoughts and plans and emotions.
For the first time in years, I ask myself if this road to politics is the right one. I’m not sleeping better for it. My brother isn’t safer for it. Nico will always have violent tendencies and even at the highest power, I won’t be able to protect him. Only I can do that in the shadows. I know the leaders of the underworld aren’t happy about my path and I’ve built relationships with these assholes and cut-throats that’ll last longer than political alliances. Nothing passes the test of time better than favours and debts inked in blood.
The only positive is Giulia. That’s how she entered my life, but even I know she isn’t a saint and would rather deal with death threats from a rival scorned than with the snakes of politics. Though she’ll shine wherever she goes. That’s her gift.
Am I fooling myself with that path?
In the musty cell, I lose sight of why I decided to walk it.