Revenge & Ruin (The Prince’s Guild #1)

1. Teo

1

TEO

T he church bells set my teeth on edge. They shouldn’t. I should be celebrating my best friend’s wedding, but I haven’t been inside a church since my parents died.

I haven’t heard those bells since I buried my eight-year-old sister.

It’s easier to fake a smile once we leave the church, trailing behind Cassandra Moretti’s long, white dress that does nothing to conceal her ever-growing baby bump. Something that her new husband, Rocco, seems unashamedly proud to showcase to the world.

And the world indeed showed up to see. I wasn’t aware that Rocco even knew this many people. But being the don of a prominent Italian mafia family comes with all sorts of perks, and the Guild has everything to celebrate today.

“Teo!”

Someone yanks at my arm as I approach the head table at the reception. It’s resplendent with a display of white opulence with golden detailing, the signature color scheme of the illustrious Plaza Hotel that even extends to my suite’s bathroom.

I look down at the woman clutching at my arm and almost laugh at how she seems to exist in pure defiance of the clean decadence of our surroundings. Her fiery red hair is frazzled from the pressure of her position within the wedding party and her lips are curled into a perpetual grimace.

“Mia,” I reply lightly. Mia Chiavari poured drinks at the Guild's Candelabra like she belonged there, but I knew better—her real work happened in the shadows, just like her father had taught her.

Her grip on my arm does not ease. “Alessandro is fucking drunk already and keeps mouthing off about how Rocco is too distracted to run the Guild anymore.”

I try not to wince. Alessandro, one of Rocco's most trusted men, is an asshole, but he’s not the first person to mention how lax Rocco’s control of the Guild has been as of late. If Rocco had been less adored, someone might have taken advantage of his engagement, wedding, and child in utero to wrestle some of his power away.

I glance over to where Alessandro is tilting back in his chair, shooting greedy looks toward the head table. He makes me think some might try to anyway.

“I don’t see why Alessandro is my problem,” I point out.

Mia levels me with a glare that could bring down the entire building. “You are the best man, Teo. Anything that threatens this wedding is your problem.”

“And if the Maid of Honor is wound up so tight she wants me to cause a scene at said wedding, does that make you a threat, too?”

When I behold her fury, I can’t help but be reminded of our tumultuous teenage years, forced together as the unwilling children of our mafioso parents. Our hatred for one another has never quite managed to mature into anything more than contempt.

This is why I’m not surprised when Mia hisses back: “Listen here, princeling, if anything goes wrong today, I will personally see to it that your balls become permanently detached from your body. Do I make myself clear?”

I do wince this time. Not at her threat, though I don’t doubt she’d make good on it. I wince instead at the nickname she’s been using since she discovered it was a point of irritation for me. It’s a button she likes to press to remind me that I am somehow beneath her.

In many ways, I wish the Prince’s Hand, the organization my parents ran through the backrooms of casinos throughout New York City, had died with them.

Instead, I must live on each day, knowing that their killers have likely warped my inheritance beyond recognition.

I’ve made a point never to cross the Brooklyn Bridge and set foot in New York City while the Natali family remains in control of the Prince’s Hand. Revenge is never too far from my thoughts.

But my fury does not extend to the woman before me, despite her petty attempts to rile me up. “Been thinking about my balls, have you, mio caro ?”

I don’t wince when Mia moves, quick as lightning. She presses something cool, hard, and sharp into my neck. How she kept her knife concealed in her flowing rouge bridesmaid dress, I don’t really want to know.

“Give me one good reason, Teo Vitale.”

Ting, ting, ting.

We simultaneously turn to see Rocco, now standing at the head table, with a glass in hand. He’s directing a very pointed look at the both of us.

He clears his throat, and we scatter to opposite ends of the table, dutifully taking our chairs next to the rest of the wedding party. Around us, the happy chattering of the reception fades to near silence as everyone stares expectantly at the don.

“Friends,” Rocco begins, his voice relentlessly strong and commanding despite the occasion. “Please allow me to introduce, for the first time, Mrs. Cassandra Moretti!”

Beside him, Cas flushes a perfect shade of pink as the room erupts in applause. Rocco adopts the most heart-wrenching look of awe and pride as he gazes lovingly down at his wife. I can feel my smile straining at the sight.

Rocco has been my brother in everything but blood since I arrived on his doorstep seventeen years ago, orphaned and alone. I’m happy that he found love, happy that he is clearly so irrevocably happy about it.

And yet…there’s that darker side of me that yearns to snatch it away from him, to claim something of it as my own.

But that’s the thing about brothers, I suppose. We always want what the other has.

“I want to thank so many of you for joining us here today,” Rocco continues when the noise dies down. “I appreciate that it has been an unsteady time for the Guild as of late. But we hope that today will be cause for a multitude of celebrations.”

Despite my previous dismissal, I instantly lock eyes with Alessandro in the crowd, hoping my expression alone is enough to stop him from heckling anyone. I watch with no small amount of satisfaction as Alessandro slides further down his chair.

“As many of you know, in a few short months, Cas and I will be expecting a baby boy.”

This is met with another, far louder round of applause.

“And so, it is my privilege to announce that, in preparation for his arrival, I will be taking a sabbatical. Indefinitely.”

All sound is immediately sucked out of the room. It’s as if somehow we’d all been launched into space without warning, with nothing to tether us back to reality.

“Rocco,” I hiss desperately. “What are you talking about?”

But he doesn’t acknowledge me. It’s Cas who reaches over to give my hand a comforting squeeze, but something glows in her eyes that tells me she knew this was coming.

“My father’s legacy is not one I care to repeat. He was neither a good don nor a good father, although an attempt was made at both achievements. And now, the time has come for me to choose which I will be.”

As Rocco breathes, you can hear a pin drop.

“The Guild deserves a leader who will be able to put them first, and I can no longer make that claim in good conscience. My heart will forever belong to my wife and my son, and I will not risk their safety to protect yours.”

A murmur begins to break out at the back of the room, but Rocco raises his hand to silence them.

“Therefore, until such a time that I am willing and capable to return, I will be appointing a new leader of the Guild.”

A hollow sense of dread suddenly grabs hold of me as Cas squeezes my hand once more. I stare at her, not quite ready to accept what I know Rocco is about to say.

“Teo Vitale. My brother, we owe you our lives.”

I force myself to look away from Cas’ watery smile to Rocco’s earnest stare.

“There is no one else I trust more to lead the Guild into a new era.”

My heart stutters to a stop. He has to be joking. This has to be some kind of elaborate prank.

I don’t know how long I sit there, gaping at them both, but I can feel the piercing gazes of everyone in the room practically nipping at my skin.

I should say something. I should accept. I should tell Rocco to shove his proclamation right up his ass. I should punch him in the face and tell him to knock it off. I should run away and not look back.

My savior comes in the form of Dante Grasso, my fellow groomsman and the man chuckling at my other side.

Without warning, he grabs my wrist and pulls us both up and out of our seats, hoisting my arm in the air and declaring. “Teo Vitale!”

There’s a beat of tense silence before…

“Teo Vitale!” the room echoes back.

The sheer level of noise hits me like a tsunami. Without Dante’s firm grip, I would have certainly staggered back a few steps.

The aftermath leaves me with a ringing in my ears. I’m vaguely aware that Dante slaps me on the back, guiding me back to my seat. On my other side, Rocco continues talking, but try as I might, I can’t listen.

What is happening? What is happening? What is happening?

My daze lasts until the entrees are served. With our audience distracted by the meal, I abruptly stand and march off, unsure of where I’m going, but I am banking on the fact that he’ll follow.

I don’t have to wait for him long. I’ve only just begun to pace around the deserted meeting room nearby when the door opens again.

“What the fuck Rocco?!”

To his credit, Rocco has the decency to look sheepish. “I thought you liked surprises.”

“In front of everyone? On your fucking wedding day?”

“You wouldn’t have said yes otherwise.”

“This is coercion.”

“This is what’s right, Teo.” Rocco slaps me on the shoulder. “You think I don’t know what they’re saying about me? The Guild needs strong leadership that isn’t tainted with the history of the Moretti line.”

I look at the man before me, and for a moment, I see a fifteen-year-old boy stifling tears outside his father’s office door.

He never let me see him cry, even when I moved into the bedroom next door to his. “You are not your father, Rocco.”

“No, I’m not. That’s why I have to leave.” Rocco offers me a sad smile. “When I took over from him five years ago, I was shackled by the demands he made in order to go quietly. Demands that crippled the Guild so badly I could barely keep things afloat.”

“You did what had to be done. No one blames you for that.”

“I should have killed him back then, but I wasn’t strong enough. I see that now. But it was you, Teo, that liberated the Guild from his chokehold.”

My mind flashes back to that day, only a few months ago, at Giuliano Moretti’s penthouse. The ex-don was inches away from killing both Rocco and Cas in his crusade for power, only to be stopped by my own hand.

“You’re glamorizing his murder,” I say lowly.

“I am congratulating my friend for fixing my mistakes.”

I stare at him, wondering how on earth he can say this so flippantly. That he could celebrate the death of his father while I would do anything to bring mine back.

But I can’t blame him. Not really. Giuliano was a piece of work, capable of inflicting all kinds of horrors on others even after he’d stepped down from being don.

I shake my head. “The Guild….they’re not going to agree to this.”

“Then make them,” Rocco insists. “My father’s list, the demands he made when he stepped down, everything on there is yours to dismantle as you see fit.”

That damn list. Things that Giuliano Moretti insisted were to be protected before he would consider handing the Guild to Rocco—decrepit club venues that couldn’t be destroyed, employees that couldn’t be fired.

Families that couldn’t be found.

“The Natalis,” I whisper. The realization hits me like a hundred-ton truck. “They’re no longer under his protection.”

“I’m giving you the power to avenge your family, Teo.”

My head swims with the possibilities. For so long, I’ve been kept on my leash. Even after Rocco became don, I couldn’t touch them.

But now…

But now revenge is so close I can taste it.

“Rocco?”

We simultaneously turn toward the sound of Cas’ voice from the corridor outside. I see Rocco visibly relax at the sound.

“Listen,” Rocco hisses quickly, “all I know is that their son, Leon, is leading the Prince’s Hand right now. Rumor has it, his father, Tobia Natali, passed away last year.”

“What about his wife? Ida?” I demand.

The only face I remember from that night, the one that still haunts my nightmares.

Rocco shakes his head. “She’s like a ghost. No one has seen her since I took over the Guild…”

“...But Leon will know where she is,” I finish for him, a plan already forming in my mind.

“Rocco?” Cas calls again, closer this time.

Rocco steps away from me. “I meant it, Teo. You’re the only one I could trust with the Guild. Don’t let me down, all right?”

“No pressure then, boss?”

Rocco smirks as he reaches the door. With one last look over his shoulder, he says, “You always work better under pressure.”