Chapter 52 Vin
Vin
The Edge is all concrete floors, steel beams, and thick rusting chains. Screams don’t carry here, which makes it perfect for our purposes.
“You look like shit, figlio mio,” he says, his thick Italian accent dripping with mockery. “What’s wrong? The crown too heavy already?”
I don’t answer. Matti stands to my left, Tommy to my right. They’ve been watching me all night like I’m a bomb about to go off. Maybe I am. I haven’t slept in days. Can’t eat. Can’t do anything but drink and think about—
I shove the thought away before her face can form in my mind.
“Vin,” Matti says quietly. “You good?”
“Fine.”
“You don’t look fine,” Tommy adds. “You look like you’re about to—”
“I said I’m fine.” I know I’m too loud to be convincing. They exchange a look, and it makes me want to break something.
Aurelio laughs, a wet, phlegmy sound that makes me want to vomit.
“Oh, this is beautiful, beautiful. You’re falling apart and you’re not even boss yet.
” He spits blood on the concrete. “What happened to my ice-cold son? People say you’ve been fucking that little Bellamorte puttana.
I hope that isn’t the cause of this little breakdown I see. ”
I have my gun pressed under his chin before he can blink. My hand is steady even though the rest of me is shaking. “Say her name. I fucking dare you.”
Aurelio grins, blood on his teeth. “There he is.”
“Vin.” Matti’s hand lands on my shoulder. “We need answers first.”
I want to pull the trigger anyway, watch his brains paint the wall behind him. I just fucking want this to be over. But Matti’s right, so I lower the gun and step back, my jaw clenched so tight it aches.
“The restaurant,” I say. “Sophie’s restaurant. You bomb it?”
Aurelio raises an eyebrow. “Sophie? You call a puttana by her name? And here I thought you were just using her to get back at her father for calling the cops on your little party.”
Ice floods my veins. I fucking knew it. “So you—”
“Know about Salvatore Bellamorte?” He laughs again, his accent thickening. “Please. You think I forget about this piece of shit man and his whore wife and daughter? I forget nothing. I’ve had eyes on that family for years.”
My stomach turns, staring at Aurelio’s scar, thinking of Sophie at 12, defending her mother with a knife. The same girl who crawled to me with a washcloth in her teeth. The same woman who looked at me like I was the only fucking person in the room every single time.
I let out a dry laugh. “You mean you kept tabs on the people who know that that little girl is the one who scarred up your fucking face.”
Matti’s eyes pop open wide and Tommy whips his gaze from me back to Aurelio as Aurelio snarls. “Lies. All lies.”
I laugh again. My Sophie never lies. She doesn’t have to. “Yeah, that’s what I thought you’d say.”
Aurelio’s face turns red, his scar shining in the light. “No little puttana—”
Matti grabs me as I lunge for him, and Tommy quickly interjects. “But you did bomb the Arsenal.”
“No.” Aurelio blows out a guffaw that shakes his whole 350 pound body, sweat staining his armpits.
“Salvatore called a mutual friend about the party, and she called me. I sent in the police in my pocket to take advantage and get to you while you were distracted. But the restaurant?” He shrugs. “That was someone else.”
“Bullshit,” I growl.
“So stupid, figlio. Why would I bomb a restaurant when I could just wait for you to come home and put a bullet in your head while you’re sleeping next to her?”
I blink, seeing that image play out in my head: Sophie sleeping beside me, her hair spread across the pillow. The way she’d curl into my chest in the middle of the night like she belonged there or take my cock in her mouth as she slept.
“Someone else wanted to send a message,” Aurelio continues. “Someone who knew you were staying with her. You know I don’t use bombs. They are too flashy, too much noise.”
So then it was Rocco. But he’s not smart enough to be the mastermind, so Aurelio must have told someone else. Or Rocco wasn’t working for Aurelio at all.
“Still lying,” I say, but my conviction is slipping.
“Believe what you want.” Aurelio leans back as much as the zip ties allow. “But here’s truth, Vincenzo: You’re already distracted, already weak. You think you can run a family like this?”
“Shut the fuck up.”
“Your mother, God rest her soul, she understood her place. Never questioned me, never got in the way. That’s what a boss needs. Not a woman who makes you soft.”
“Is that why you put your hands on her?” The words are out before I can stop them. “Because she ‘understood her place’?”
His expression darkens. “Watch your mouth.”
“Or what?” I step closer, sneering, gun still in my hand. “You gonna teach me a lesson? You’re tied to a fucking chair, old man. Your empire is gone. Your men abandoned you. You’ve got nothing left except the next few hours of your miserable life.”
For the first time, I see something flicker in his eyes. Not fear exactly, but recognition. Like he’s finally seeing me as something other than the disappointing son who wouldn’t fall in line.
“You love her,” he says, almost surprised.
I don’t answer, not even in my head. Because I’m realizing for the first time how much Sophie is like my mother. And that Matti was right when he said, You’re acting just like him.
A low buzzing sounds in the quiet, and Matti pulls out his phone. As he reads the text, his face goes pale.
“Siena,” he says, voice tight. “It’s time.”
Shit. The baby.
Everything stops. The warehouse, Aurelio, the war, all of it fades into background noise as I watch my brother’s face shift from killer to terrified soon-to-be father in a heartbeat.
“Go,” I say.
“But—”
“Go, Matti. Tommy, go with him.”
Tommy frowns. “I’m not leaving you alone.”
“I’m not alone.” I meet his eyes. “Both of you, go.”
They hesitate, but only for a moment before they’re moving, Matti already on the phone, Tommy grabbing keys and weapons.
And then it’s just me and Aurelio.
“You’re really going to let them leave?” he asks, shaking his head. “Weakness. You are at war and you stop for women and children.”
I stare at the scar on his face. The one Sophie put there when she was just a child. She was so brave, braver than I am now.
“It’s none of your fucking business,” I snarl. “You’ve done enough with your fucking contracts with the Irish dictating my life.”
“What, Vincenzo, what…. You are angry because what? Because you have a hard dick for a soft woman? So fuck her! Marry the Irish girl and fuck who you want.”
My jaw clenches. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I know better than anyone.” He leans forward. “Better to fuck her and get her out of her system. Trust me. Otherwise, you are distracted when she takes another man’s cock.”
The idea of Sophie feeding someone else, taking another man’s cock in her mouth makes me physically ill.
“Stop.”
“When she eventually marries one of them,” Aurelio continues, voice cruel and cold. “And you will smile and send a gift because she is family to Matti.”
Marrying someone else, having another man’s babies.
“Stop.”
“Or maybe she won’t get married. Maybe she’ll be alone, ruined for anyone else. Maybe she spends the rest of her life wondering why she wasn’t good enough.”
The crack of my fist against his jaw echoes through the room. Blood sprays, and his head snaps back.
I’m breathing hard, knuckles split, and all I can see is Sophie’s face when I told her she was nothing, my hand on her throat. When I offered to keep fucking her like she was just a warm body instead of the woman I—
“There it is,” Aurelio wheezes, spitting blood. “Took you long enough.”
I stare at him, at this man who beat my mother, who terrorized his sons, who built an empire on fear and violence. The man I’m about to become the minute I pull this trigger.
Unless I do something different.
My phone buzzes again. A text from Matti:
At the hospital.
It’s happening
fast. You should
come.
Fuck.
I look at Aurelio, bleeding and smiling like he’s won something. I want to stay and beat this fucker down. But that’s what he would do. He would choose violence over family every single time. And I’m not going to be him.
His laughter follows me down the hall as I give the guards their orders, and get to my car as fast as I can.
I drive to the hospital with my foot pressed to the floor, Aurelio’s words echoing in my head. Every red light feels like a lifetime. Every mile between me and the hospital is another mile away from my brothers and from the possibility that I might not have to be the man my father was.
The hospital is bright and sterile, the opposite of the Edge. I find Tommy and Giovanna in the waiting room looking pale.
“How is she?” I ask.
“Screaming,” he says. “A lot of screaming.”
Giovanna grimaces, her hands at her stomach, and groans.
“Gi?” Tommy asks, leaning down. She groans again and looks up at him with big eyes. “Fuck, okay. At least we’re at the hospital, right? Let’s go, sweet girl. Time for you to have these babies.”
Despite everything, I almost smile. Three new Demonio babies coming on the same day. It’s a fucking beautiful moment.
And then I see her.
Sophie is coming down the hall carrying a large insulated food bag. Of course she’s bringing food. Even in the middle of Siena’s labor, she’s taking care of people.
She hasn’t seen me yet. I could leave. Maybe I should leave. But I dont do anything except stare.
She looks thinner, tired, with shadows under her eyes. Is that because of me?
And then she looks up. Our eyes meet across the waiting room, and the world stops spinning.