The Mafia King’s Secret Baby

CHAPTER ONE

RAFAELLE

Hell is empty and all the devils are here.

Whoever said that first had no idea how right he was.

I twirl the lighter in my hands, repeatedly between my fingers, contemplating a cigarette as I wait. The muscles in my jaw flex as impatience bleeds into every pore of my skin.

This is taking way too long. I start to open the car door.

“It’s been five minutes, Raf,” Elio, my little brother groans beside me. “Surely even you are capable of keeping your cool for five minutes.”

“You’ve mistaken me for someone else,” I retort, opening the car door despite his protests.

I hear Elio mutter a couple of swear words in Italian before he’s stepping out of the car as well.

We both take in the building in front of us.

It’s a casino, all dark and looming. This place has been out of business for years.

The current owner inherited it from his father and subsequently abandoned it and refused to sell it because he couldn’t be bothered.

But the sight of it bothered my brother Matteo.

This street has a lot of businesses that we own.

He’s been trying to get this casino into our control as well.

None of my brothers even particularly like gambling.

It’s more about the principle. This is a way to show off our power.

To ensure that everyone in the city knows that we can get whatever it is we want.

Since the owner of this place landed in the city a couple of days ago, we swooped in and got him in our clutches. Right now, the Don and Matteo are getting him to sign over the deed.

“We’re supposed to wait for a signal when it’s time for us to move in,” Elio reminds me.

I smirk, “You’re such a good little soldier, Elly. I’m unsure if it’s a boon or a disgrace.”

“You’re a dickhead, Rafaelle.” He scowls.

“Let’s go in.”

He grunts one more time in protest, but doesn’t try to stop me, not that he could, as I saunter to the front doors of the casino. The men guarding it open as I approach. I enter and climb up the stairs to where negotiations are happening, taking in the men lining the walls as I do so.

It’s overkill. We don’t need nearly this many men for the asshole that was stupid enough to cross us. But this is all a show, to make sure that whoever could be planning on rescuing him thinks twice about it.

Elio stands in front of me before I can walk through the door.

“Your presence in the room will only spook him. He won’t sign if he’s scared of death,” he states.

I roll my eyes to show my affront, “Everyone thinks I’m such a barbarian. I can be sensible.”

“All evidence to the contrary.”

I push past him and head into the room with a table in the middle of it. My brothers occupy one end of it and Robert Castiano occupies the other. Apart from his crumpled outfit and greasy brown hair sticking up on the sides, he doesn’t look anything like a hostage. Salvatore’s growing soft.

The air in the room is tense, growing even tenser at my arrival. Robert tries to rise to his feet when he sees me, terror in his expression. But Sal’s guard has a firm grip on his shoulder, pushing him down.

“Hello, brothers, how’s it going?” I ask lightly as I walk towards them.

Matteo scowls, Salvatore glares, Robert looks like he’s about to wet himself. Overall, I seem to have thoroughly interrupted negotiations. My bad.

“What is he doing here?!” Robert wails, his entire body juddering. “You said you wouldn’t harm me if I signed the deed over to you.”

“We’re not going to harm you,” Matteo says quickly, glancing at the papers Robert had been in the process of signing. “Rafaelle’s only here to observe the negotiations.”

I smirk, “Yes, Robert, I’ve found myself curious about the boring business aspect of our business dealings.”

Every single person in the room knows it’s bullshit, but the idiot somehow buys it, relaxing slightly.

“Okay.” He nods. “But I want your assurances, and I want to hear the terms again.”

Matteo begins listing dryly, “We won’t go after your family or any of your family’s businesses on the West Coast. You’re to be paid in full for the building and will receive a commission from the casino every year once we’ve gotten it up and running.

And lastly, we won’t kill you for the obstinance you’ve shown over the years by refusing to sell the first time we asked. ”

Greedy bastard. I might not know much about business, but even I know those terms are ridiculous. Robert’s too stupid to wonder why we’re even agreeing to it at all.

“My old man loved this place,” he says in defense. His pupils are large and blown out. And he’s still shaking. It’s withdrawal symptoms. When we picked him up, he was heading back from a party where he’d gotten high on coke and fuck knows what else.

The man is a disgrace to the Castiano name, and he famously hated his father.

Which is why he ensured the place turned into a dump instead of making any moves to take care of it.

If he wanted to send a fuck you to his father from the grave, far be it from any of us to get in the way.

But by refusing us, he got himself high up on our shit list. We’ve been biding our time until now, though.

He’s nothing but small fish to fry. The Castianos have mostly moved to California since the death of their patriarch.

Robert was the one stupid enough to come back to our turf.

“I was only trying to protect it and keep it in the family,” he continues.

“You were toying with us,” Salvatore says, voice low and tinged with violence.

My hand twitches as I fight to reach for the gun concealed in my jacket. There’s way too much talking going on.

“No,” he argues. “I- I didn’t mean to.”

My elder brother narrows his eyes, “Sign the papers, Castiano.”

He gulps, taking us all in with fear in his expression.

Finally, he reaches for the pen and appends his signature on every dotted line.

Once he’s done, the guard beside him grabs the papers and brings them over to Matteo.

While my brother appraises the documents, Robert gets to his feet on shaky legs.

There’s no missing the relief in his expression.

“Is it over? Can I go?” he asks.

“Just one more thing,” I reply before finally reaching into my jacket.

The gunshot that rings out is deafening in the empty space. Robert falls to the ground with a cry and satisfaction pulses through every inch of me. In the wake of the shot, I look towards my brothers. Salvatore fixes me with an unimpressed stare.

“What?” I question, rolling my eyes. “If you didn’t want that to happen, you wouldn’t have asked me to be here in the first place.”

“We said we wouldn’t kill him,” Matteo points out, rubbing his jaw.

“He’s not dead yet,” I state, gesturing the barrel of my gun at the man clutching his arm on the floor.

I have impeccable aim and I made sure not to hit anything too important.

“What are you going to do to him?” Elio questions.

I shrug, “Considering Matteo’s annoying promise, I’m going to have to make sure he dies of natural causes.”

“And what are natural causes to you, fratello?” Matteo asks.

“Drowning, flaying, electrocution,” I list. “I figure as long as I’m not the one directly ending his life, we get to keep our word.”

Amusement slashes across my brother’s face.

“No! Please,” Robert cries. “My family.”

Salvatore steps forward and crouches so he’s looking the bastard directly in the eyes.

“If you thought you could actually get away with it, Castiano, you’re more stupid than you look,” the Don informs him.

“But don’t worry, we won’t touch your family.

After your useless excuse of a life ends, one of your brothers will be in charge.

The one that sold you out in the first place.

He was all too happy to tell us where you were in exchange for some meagre support. ”

“Shawn!” he spits, knowing exactly which brother would have betrayed him.

It’s cold and disgusting, watching them turn against each other. I couldn’t imagine that happening within my family. My brothers would die for me and vice versa. We might not have a lot of honor, but we protect each other fiercely.

Salvatore rises to his feet and turns his back on Robert, sealing his fate. He ignores his wails and cries for mercy as he heads for the door.

“Don’t drag it out too much, Rafaelle,” he orders.

“I’ll think about it,” I reply with a small grin.

Matteo glances at me once before following the Don out the door. Then it’s just me, Elio and a couple of guards who have moved in to watch the show. I grab a chair, pulling it behind me. It screeches against the tiled floor, and I watch as Robert’s face contorts in agony.

I spin the chair around and take a seat on it, back to front, folding my arms and resting my elbows on the top.

Apart from Robert’s groans, the room is silent as I wait for him to make the first move.

Then he proves he’s even stupider than I thought because he decides to spit in my face.

The glob lands directly on my nose and I grimace as I clean it off.

“Three hours,” I say vaguely.

“What?” he squints, looking at me with terror-filled blue eyes.

“You’ll be dead in three hours. I was going to make it two but that stunt just elongated your suffering,” I inform him.

“You sadistic bastard!” he growls, leveling me with a look of disgust.

Two of my men step into the room, dragging a large metal trunk across the floor. They place it beside me and pop it open to reveal an array of instruments. My favorite toys, so to speak. I grab a silver spear, its tip sharp enough to cut through metal. It glints in the light.

“I use this to poke bears,” I inform Robert. “Metaphorically speaking of course. By bears I mean the daunting ones, men bigger than me, arguably stronger. The ones with a lot of fight in them. This is a long-range weapon. You are more of a rat, though, aren’t you, Robert?”

I cock my head to the side when he doesn’t reply, a grin spreading across my face.