Chapter 27
TEMPEST
Man is an animal who needs a master. — Immanuel Kant
My dad was dead.
My hero was gone.
And my husband’s hands dripped with his blood.
I wanted to ask what my dad did to deserve it, but I knew his list of sins was long—I knew better than anyone that he wasn’t perfect.
That he’d made mistakes. He hated talking to Mom about it, and once Grandpa had a bit of a heart-to-heart with Dad about me wanting to be made he shared more and more in hopes that one day I’d change my mind.
He never held back.
The stories of gore and blood and innocent lives lost were vast.
Everyone in the five families praised us for being fair.
But we purposefully held the truth from them. In war, there was never a good side or a bad side. There was only the best decision in the moment with the least amount of casualties—there was still death—there would always be death.
I didn’t let Louis’s words penetrate my soul. My insecurity flared to life though. It told me that he was right. In what world did I matter? But he was shaking and it wasn’t from the adrenaline of it all. His eyes were clear, his body language so stiff that he looked ready to collapse on himself.
Footsteps sounded behind me. I quickly blocked the door with my body. “Yeah, Dad got a call, he’s going to be in a meeting for the next hour or so.” I forced a smile I didn’t feel. “Start dinner, we’ll be right up.”
“Sure!” The staff member was new, I hadn’t known I’d been followed.
My first mistake.
And my last in this house.
I quickly grabbed the gun from the table and then I reached for Louis’s hand.
He jerked it back. I grabbed it again and pulled him toward the back door, it was hidden.
My dad had shown it to me when I was little and said he wanted to know I was safe even down here.
The small safe room was just beyond the indoor shooting range and led to a hallway that would bring us outside near the garage.
Wordless, I walked him through each step, and with each passing moment I sucked in sharp breaths so I could remember the scent of the hallway—of the house I would never be returning to.
I would not be welcome.
We would not be welcome even if Louis had possessed every reason in the world—he’d just started a war between the five families and the Vescovi’s.
No chance in hell was it over something small.
No chance in hell did he kill my dad over money or power.
The week went by a in a blur.
It was time to attend another funeral, and as I stepped out of the car, as my heels crunched against the gravel, I took quite a different walk to the graves I used to visit on a weekly basis.
This time I didn’t stop at Grandpa’s.
I stopped at my father’s.
I knelt down and dropped my rose after Uncle Nixon.
I watched as Uncle Chase wiped his eyes beneath his sunglasses, I tried to hold in my choked sobs when King and Junior held my mom in place to keep her from collapsing.
Sergio and Maksim stood over by Nicolai, and one by one it was like seeing a flurry of old bosses and new, like leaves changing with the seasons.
They’d all come so far.
From taking over the five families at Eagle Elite University—killing in cold blood in order to do so, and raising all of us to be better—to do better, handing over the reins one by one to the second generation, encouraging us to build more families, to laugh just as hard as we cried.
I sniffed as Raven and Ace stood next to Ivan and Bella. The De Lange boss, who wasn’t supposed to have a heart, was now part of the five families in a way nobody could have predicted a decade ago, joined by the syndicate, and off very far away where I could barely see them…
The Vescovi Family.
The family that had spun things into motion.
The family I would never forgive.
The one my husband owed his allegiance to.
“He marked him,” Uncle Nixon whispered the day after my dad died.
I stared into my wine glass. “He marked him an Alfero that day because he didn’t want the burden to lay on any one of us, and Louis was willing to be the one to carry it.
Not all warriors run headfirst into war screaming, some silently bleed for years and years on the sidelines taking hit after hit so the rest can shine.
Louis took that hit for the five families and every fucking time he looks at you he’ll take it again until the breath leaves his body.
Your dad wasn’t perfect, none of us are.
He made a mistake. It was a mistake, but mistakes we own up to, and he knew his time would be shortened because of it.
The truly beautiful thing is a secret was uncovered, a family hopefully restored, a man vindicated, and now we have a man with the only family willing to threaten us.
He doesn’t want to be with the enemy. Louis stands watch in their camp—so you can sleep soundly in yours. ”
“How do I forgive him?” I whispered.
“You don’t eat a hot cookie unless you want to get burnt.” He nudged me. “It takes time to cool. Give it a few days, then you talk, yes?”
“Yes.” I frowned and stared down at my hand. He’d slid a note into it. Neatly tucked, not normal behavior for Uncle Nixon. I held it tight.
The grave was covered in roses. It felt so final.
I would never tell my twin what I knew.
That I waited ten minutes.
And in those ten minutes my husband took my dad’s life.
I would take that to my grave.
We all had our secrets.
This was mine.
People slowly came and went and in those moments I looked down at the note in my hand and carefully unraveled it and read it to myself.
I’ve always seen you.
That’s how it starts? Really?
You’re one of the brightest spots in my life, came into this world screaming, demanding to be noticed, seen, and I knew that the biggest threat to your life would never be a gun or knife—it would be a man telling you no.
Hot tears streamed down my cheeks.
Control isn’t in telling you what to do it’s in allowing you to figure it out yourself and being there when you needed me most. I knew you chose him for a reason and I knew you had your secrets too.
In the end, a price was on my head and if it wasn’t him, it would have been any one of your cousins who would have had to do it.
Sacrifice one, save the many, you know the rules and a long time ago I was brazen, I took an innocent life out of rage for what had been done—and I knew one day it would come back to haunt me.
He had every right. A life for a life. So I’m not angry that it was Louis.
I’m relieved he was able to get closure, relieved he can come to you a man broken by his past, broken by what he thinks may no longer be his future, and a woman who sees him the way she’s always wanted to be seen.
His air. Become who you were born to be Tempest Alfero.
You were never born to sit on the sidelines, take your position in this family, become a made woman, an underboss, help lead the Alferos with Louis’s help.
It’s up to you now to do the hard thing.
It’s up to you to see what others do not.
The time for innocence is gone. I love you with my whole heart.
You were born for such a time as this, you were born for this moment, breathe it in and make me proud. —Dad.
I couldn’t see anything. I could barely concentrate beyond his words. He knew. Dad knew. He knew everything. He saw everything. Me. God how did I get so lucky? And now he was gone.
A car pulled up. I didn’t look. I knew who it was.
Slowly, Louis emerged from it and walked toward us.
While he worked for Vescovi as a made man, he was still an Alfero through and through and Cassian had one stipulation upon returning to his rightful place, that Louis would remain unharmed for life.
His best friend.
Another lie.
Or maybe an omission, that the person who protected Cassian when he was young was Louis—that the reason he’d missed people breaking into his own home was from exhaustion trying to keep Cassian safe, keep everyone safe.
Because he was good.
Louis, despite every rough choice he was given—always chose to sacrifice for others, even the situation with my sister.
He abandoned his own happiness.
Whispers erupted, and then I smelled him. To my right. Louis stood in head-to-toe black. He was so handsome it hurt. His gloved hand reached into his pocket, he pulled out a white rose, stark against the sea of red. “A promise is a promise.”
“Why white?” I asked.
The corners of his mouth curled up. “You know better than anyone—how much your dad really hated red.”
“He really did.” I sniffled. “Why didn’t I think of that?”
“He figured you wouldn’t, that rose was from you.” He reached in and pulled out another one, this one red. “That’s for me.”
“One life,” Cassian whispered. “Buys a thousand silences. Thank you for your sacrifice.” He continued and then turned toward me and bowed, pulling my hand into his, and kissing the top of it.
He’d dyed his hair, it wasn’t this beautiful red anymore, it was a dark blonde.
His eyes sharp, expression cut from steel. Royalty.
He cut a path back down the hill to the waiting car. Phoenix stood there along with Uncle Chase and a few Secret Service men.
So, he would quite literally get transported back.
Flags stuck out of the black sedan, gold and white flags with a hint of black. It looked like a coin with two profiles facing a different direction.
Without thinking, I reached for Louis’s hand.
He took mine.
We walked hand in hand in silence toward the waiting cars. I took a deep breath of the fresh afternoon air and finally looked up at him. “I’m ready now.”
“Ready?”
I nodded and stared back at the graves. “Take me home, Louis.”
The thing about poison?
I’d rather know I’m drinking it.
Don’t mask it with sweetness and lies.
Let me taste the bitterness.
Let me know it’s truth.
Give me the burn so I understand the scars it leaves.
So I remember why I swallowed it in the first place.
Forget sweet.
Give me honest.
Sometimes life hands you a bitter pill.
What happens next?
That part is up to you.
The end.