Chapter 4 – Cristiano
She never called the cops.
That knowledge was fuel to the fire of my obsession.
I had to keep busy so I didn’t go to her again.
Between the never-ending work of helping my father with his crew of Made Men and the gym where I was training my ass off, I found enough to do to occupy most hours of the day.
Punching the bag helped alleviate the stress.
Grappling with my brother gave me a challenge.
Vincenzo learned a few new tricks in prison that made his fighting style deplorable—which I fucking loved.
But each night, I found myself on her street, gazing into the festive windows.
The soft, cheery light beckoned me. I shouldn’t have touched her, but from the way she looked at me, with a hunger that matched my own, I gave in to the temptation that night.
I’d only meant to scare her when I chased her up the stairs.
When I found her, it wasn’t the fear that spiked my veins.
It was the way she gazed at me, as if I was the hero of her story, not the villain.
One taste was my damnation. I wanted to possess her. To claim her as my own—as it should be.
It was more than a carnal urge to take her, though. I wanted to be the one caring for the angel, but damned souls like me didn’t deserve to breathe the same air as something so pure, so polished and bright.
That was why I had to stay away, wandering the freezing silence of the night.
Nicole went abroad for art school after graduating from Thilton Preparatory School.
I knew she was talented. With a master’s degree under her belt, she stayed in Europe, consulting at historic sights and working for elite galleries.
My little angel was so fancy. But her last job, a prestigious one from what I gathered, seemed to have ended on a bad note.
She was no longer on their payroll, and they refused to give a reference when I contacted them under the guise of a headhunter.
That left me wondering if she was going to create her own masterpieces.
She was talented enough, that was for damn sure.
Walking into Mama Ana’s Bar & Grill, I headed straight to the back table.
Don Morelli sat there, sipping a Diet Coke with his two capos.
My father shot me a calculating look but didn’t give anything away.
While Nicola Messina encouraged me to pursue boxing, he wanted me to be knowledgeable in the business, should I need something to fall back on later in life.
It was common for me to join leadership when they met with the big boss.
They gave me the most important tasks, like blackmailing an attorney.
And when I told them Loring was still away, and that it was only one of his kids who was home, no one questioned me further on the matter.
Not even Vincenzo, who’s sat in the car the whole time. He had no love for that family and wanted no details about my adventures.
“Where’s Sammy D?” I asked, taking a chair and spinning it around to sit at the end of the booth.
“He’s got the flu,” Don Morelli grumbled. “None of us wants to catch it.”
I felt genuinely bad for the underboss’s wife. Sammy D was a crank at the best of times. It was hard to imagine him laid up, sick and peevish.
“Ginny’s been asking about you, Cristiano. Wants to know if you enjoy skating?” Matteo Deluca gave me a pointed look.
I must not have hidden my shudder of disgust well enough, because my father kicked me under the table.
But what was I supposed to do! Mat was Sammy D’s younger brother, and he must not know what a condom was, because he had a gaggle of chicken-armed daughters, whom he was always trying to set me up with.
Porca vacca! I’ll have to warn Vincenzo.
Now that my brother was back, he’d be eligible bachelor number two. The Morelli Famiglia liked tradition. And what was more traditional than an arranged marriage between the few families running the show?
“She can try to date the lad on her own time,” Don Morelli grumped. “We’ve got this business with the O’Toole crew to deal with.”
I sighed. It would be so much easier to start a turf war and show our rivals that we had teeth.
Given that we were a smaller organization, that wasn’t feasible.
It took skill and negotiation to stay alive in the Underworld, and cunning was useful to thrive.
With age, I’d learned to channel my drive for destruction, but damn if it wasn’t a hard-fought lesson to learn!
Iron control? Is that what you call chasing Nicky and fucking her with your tongue?
I slapped the inner voice—hard.
Nicky was different. She was back.
If there was a snowball’s chance in hell, I would make her mine. I just had to play it smart. See if she still showed any feeling for the dirty boy from the wrong side of the tracks. Not that we’d always been separated by wealth and status.
As the old men talked, my mind wandered back to a time in history when Archy Loring was an associate at a neighborhood law office. An up-and-coming brainiac, he worked closely with his old crony—my old man—and by default, Don Morelli.
Our dads sat at the kitchen table. Garh, they were so boring! I was never going to be like them. I was going to win the title belt for boxing, buy a sick beach house in Florida, and have Nicky paint every room a different color.
I grinned at my friend. Her puffy pink jacket and matching snowpants made her look like a peep. The winter wind cut through the backyard, making her cheeks glow bright red.
Man alive, what would it be like to kiss her? I’d thought about it a lot. She was thirteen now, and at Christmas, I tried to trick her under the mistletoe. She’d stuck out her tongue and run away.
But I could always take her behind the garage. There were some icicles there we could harvest for our fort’s kitchen. How did I do it? Just…surprise her? Ask her to kiss me?
“Hey-Yo, Messina!” Rake Heart called. “You stink like a girl.”
Although the slur was meant for me, Nicky bristled. She hated when other punks implied that girls were too delicate to keep up with the boys. Which was probably why we were such good friends, because I challenged her instead of insisting she hang back.
From inside our fort, Vincenzo and Amanda poked their heads up. The pale yellow cap on Nicky’s sister looked like rabbit ears. She fiercely defied anyone who said bunny ears couldn’t be worn by a fourteen-year-old.
My brother and I shared a look. With a war yell, Enzo began chucking our stash of snowballs at the neighbor kids coming at us.
I grabbed Nicky’s mitten and tugged her back to the safety of the fort. Mounting the defenses, I scooped a pile of balls, turned, and began pelting the oncoming kids.
Rake glared at me. That kid was trouble—but if what Dad said about his parents and the monthly bar tab was true, it made sense.
Winding back his arm, Rake prepared to launch a ball at me.
“Tino! Watch out!” Nicky cried.
I knew what was coming. I saw the ball whiz through the air. Men of honor didn’t flinch in the face of battle. Messina men held their ground.
A burst of pink shot in front of me. Nicky reared up, arms and legs spread wide like a starfish.
The snowball thwacked her skull.
“No!” I yelled, wrapping my arms around her fluffy middle and dropping backward into the fort.
Nicky whimpered.
My brave, fearless friend never cried. Not when her mom served their dad papers at Thanksgiving. Not last summer when they put the family ankle biter down.
But now, tears leaked from her eyes.
What was worse, red trickled from her forehead.
That beady trail of red set a livid fire in my veins. The unholy rage was like nothing I’d ever felt before.
I surged to my feet, ready to destroy something.
“Tino, it hurts,” Nicky whispered, reaching for her head.
I shot a death-filled glare at Rake. He’d put ice in the snowball. I knew it. I’d seen it. And now the scrawny fucker was going to know exactly what it felt like to mess with something that was mine.
“What, need a girl to protect you?” he taunted.
“She’s hurt, you ass wipe!” Amanda shouted, scrambling over the fort. “Dad! Daddy!”
“Oh shit,” one of Rake’s posse shouted. As one, the group turned and fled.
I’m coming for you, I promised the punk.
Bending over, I tugged off my glove with my teeth and then took off Nicky’s mitten. “I’m here. I’ve got you, pretty girl.”
Nicky nodded, not even teasing me about the cheesy nickname that didn’t feel wrong.
I’d stayed with her as long as I could. When she was sitting at the kitchen table, face pale and vomiting in the trash bin as her dad prepared to take her to the ER, I held her hand while the adults ran around shouting.
That was the last time I saw Nicole and Amanda up close.
Mr. Loring didn’t allow them to visit, saying the neighborhood was too rough for them.
By the time the snow melted, Loring took a job at a fancy firm and cut ties with the underworld.
He might have turned legit, but I never forgot his daughter—my girl.
There hadn’t been a way to reach her. She went to a classy prep school, transferring out of the public system.
I caught glimpses of her at a few football games, but with the change in her dad’s position, I wasn’t supposed to approach them.
If it was just a money thing, I would have.
But the orders came directly from Don Morelli.
We didn’t interact with our old lawyer, and he didn’t turn us over to the law.
Fair and square. It would have been nice if that was the way things ended, but right after graduation, Vincenzo was nabbed.
Loring’s firm prosecuted the situation, and while we couldn’t confirm it, we felt the betrayal as personal when my brother was sentenced to eight years upstate at the maximum-security penitentiary.
“We need the UTTER-Bax Corp to back off,” Don Morelli growled.
His capos nodded in agreement.
“Unfortunately, their corporate stooge wasn’t home when I made a house call,” I drawled. “Are we sure Archy is our way in?”
Don Morelli fisted his diet soda. “He’ll do it for old time’s sake. Put some pressure where it hurts.”
The risk of exposure was great. Loring hadn’t hurt us in the years past, but any new action was a dangerous balancing act on the knife’s edge.
“Consider it done,” I said simply. Anything for a reason to watch the house—to be near her.