Chapter 8
RAFFAELE
“Raffaele DeLuca,” I barked into my phone. I knew who was calling, but I wanted to establish exactly who the fuck he was talking to right away. And I wasn’t just referring to my name.
“I demand to speak to my daughter,” Vivienne’s father growled.
“Your demands mean nothing to me, Franklin.” I deliberately used his first name to make it clear that I viewed him as being beneath me.
He didn’t speak at first, and I almost smiled when I pictured his face turning purple with anger and indignation.
“If you’re not going to let me talk to Vivienne, why did your goons insinuate that you were waiting for my call? They’re terrible at their jobs, by the way. I spotted them the second I walked out the door of my house.”
I sighed, then spoke to him as if he were a child who needed to be schooled. “If I’d wanted my men to be invisible, they would be, Franklin. You think I’d fuck around with that shit?”
Franklin muttered something under his breath, then asked, “Why didn’t you call me?”
I barked a laugh that held no humor. “Because people come to the boss, not the other way around.”
“The boss?” He tried to sound shocked, but I knew better.
“Come now, Franklin. Cut the bullshit. You may not run in the highest circles”—it was a petty dig, a level I rarely stooped to. But this was about Vivienne, not me—“but I know you’re aware of who I am. Who my family is.”
He grunted. “This is a waste of time. I want my daughter returned to me immediately.”
Unlike his quiet pouting, my extended silence was chilling. Finally, I asked, “Why the fuck would I deliver her to people who served her to a motherfucker like Chet Chanler on a silver platter?”
Franklin sputtered briefly, then mumbled, “Don’t believe everything Vivienne says. She can be a little overdramatic.”
My eyes slid closed, and I pinched the bridge of my nose, praying to St. Monica for patience. As shitty of a parent as he was, I didn’t think Vivienne would forgive me if I killed her father.
“If what you are saying is true, then I suppose she caused the black eye and split lip by hitting herself?”
“Her what?” Franklin croaked.
I wondered if I’d finally gotten through to him. Perhaps he cared more about his daughter than I’d given him credit for.
“When she came running into the parking lot at the event last night, not only was she fucking terrified, but her cheek was red and swelling and there was a cut on her bottom lip.”
“Well…well…I—” He stumbled over his words for a moment before grunting, “I’m sure there’s an explanation. There are two sides to every story.”
Any thoughts that he might have a soft spot for his daughter were obliterated.
“Give me my daughter.” His voice was full of false bravado, but he couldn’t fully disguise the tremor of fear beneath it.
“I don’t take orders from you, Franklin,” I responded cooly. “And I won’t let you hand Vivienne over to a monster.”
He scoffed. “You’re calling Chet a monster? That’s a bit hypocritical, don’t you think? I mean, you're in the Mafia!”
“Even if you’re right about me”—I wasn’t about to confirm his accusation when there was a possibility he was taping the conversation—“I am in no way comparable to Chet.”
“Right,” Franklin sneered. “Okay, I’ll bite. Enlighten me?”
“Very few things in this world surprise me anymore, and even less that I consider more important than my family and duty. But I knew from the moment I met Vivienne that she was worth more than anything or anyone that I have or will ever know. I will worship the ground she walks on, treat her like a queen, and I would fucking die to protect her.”
“Chet probably feels that way about her, too,” he argued weakly.
“Now, Franklin, we both know that’s not true. But even if it was, there is one more vital difference between me and that asshole when it comes to Vivienne.”
“Which is?” he spat.
“I would never be stupid enough to let her go.”
His silence was priceless. He had no rebuttal for that and was well aware that I knew it.
Perhaps it was Vivienne’s influence on me, but for someone who was usually very pragmatic and skeptical, I found myself hoping once more that Franklin would surprise me and show even a sliver of care for his child.
But my pragmatism was justified when he once again demanded that I let them come get Vivienne or have someone bring her home.
“Evidently, you have misunderstood our entire conversation, Franklin. Vivienne is home.”
“I’m warning you, DeLuca. I know people. I can make your life hell. Shed a spotlight on your dirty activities that will get you—”
“Franklin,” I deadpanned, cutting him off. “I suggest you stop wagging that tongue of yours before you lose it.”
He gasped. “Vivienne will never forgive you if you kill me.”
“First, I believe I insinuated something about you being hurt, not killed. Second, what my angel doesn’t know won’t hurt her.” Truthfully, her parents were safe from my physical wrath because I didn’t want to hurt Vivienne. But Franklin didn’t need to know that.
“Now, I’m tired of running in circles with this conversation, so I’ll spell it out for you one last time.
Vivienne is mine. I will not ever let her go.
If she wants a relationship with you, that’s her decision, but your efforts to separate us won’t end well for you.
Trust me, Franklin, you don’t want to get on my bad side. ”
“She will never love you, DeLuca,” Franklin taunted in a pathetic last-ditch effort to feel superior over me.
“Everyone knows you lack emotion. You’re a ruthless killer who feeds on the power trip it gives you to take a life.
You’re a robot, and Vivienne is desperate to be loved.
One day, she’ll realize you aren’t capable of feeling anything for her, and she’ll come running back to us. ”
I allowed a rare smile to appear since he couldn’t see it.
He wasn’t wrong in one respect. I was ruthless, and a killer, and I often lacked emotion.
That reputation gave me power, discouraging anyone who contemplated making a move against the family.
And the fact that he didn’t know I had a whole other side filled me with satisfaction.
The parts of me where love, desire, hurt, and pain resided were reserved for family—and I didn’t mean the Family. What I felt for Vivienne, though, was more than I’d ever experienced. It shed light on my darkest corners and made me feel alive. I wasn’t about to share that with anyone but her.
“You might be right,” I lied. “But it’s a chance I’m willing to take. If someday you and your wife decide that Vivienne is worth fighting for, all contact is to go through me. Do not try to circumvent this rule, Franklin, or you’ll see just how merciless I am up close and personal. Capire?”
After a few beats, he gritted out, “Yes.”
“Bene. Arrivederci.”
I ended the call, then glanced up at the door to my office when I heard slow clapping.
“Impressive,” Domenico murmured with a smirk. “Hopefully, you still have an ace up your sleeve, though.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“I have a feeling you’re going to need it to convince your woman to stay when she finds out who you really are.”
Before I could formulate a response—one that didn’t give him the smug satisfaction of knowing he was probably right—Dario and Leo entered my office.
“We have a situation,” Leo grunted. “Someone spooked Umberto, and he took off.”
“Cazzo,” I snarled. “His family?”
Dario’s expression was dark as he crossed his arms over his chest. “Currently being rounded up and brought to the warehouse for questioning.”
I nodded but didn’t say anything else as I raised my eyes to the ceiling.
My mind was on the angel waiting for me.
Handling this shit was my job, but I hadn’t been fucking with Vivienne’s father when I told him she would come first from now on.
If I wanted to convince her to stay and make her fall in love with me, I needed to spend time with her now.
Not leave her alone with her thoughts so she could question everything.
My gaze shifted to Dario. He would never be strong enough to be a Capo di Provincia—someone who was in charge of a branch of the Family.
But he was a steady and reliable lieutenant.
Nic had urged me to give him more responsibility, but I could be a bit of a control freak and had never been very good at delegating.
Nic had told me many times that I needed to figure that shit out because I’d have no choice when I had a family of my own.
I’d blown his advice off, convinced I’d remain a bachelor and pass my role on to a nephew like my great-uncle Giuseppe had done.
Not everyone was destined to find the love of their lives and do the whole picket fence thing.
Figuratively speaking since he and his wife, Anna, and their kids lived in a Manhattan brownstone.
My cousin was going to laugh his ass off when he found out I’d proved him right.
“Can you deal with this on your own?” I asked Dario.
His brows shot up, and his eye probed mine, trying to discern if I was serious or fucking with him.
“I need to take a few days off, and it will be up to you to take care of anything I can’t do from my home office.”
Dario’s brown orbs—the same color as mine—glinted with determination as he nodded. “I can handle it,” he assured me.
I shifted my focus to Domenico. “It’s unlikely that Vivienne and I will leave the house. Help Dario with whatever, and I’ll let you know if things change.”
He lifted his chin in acknowledgment, then listened without comment while Dario, Leo, and I went over a few more things.
When we were finished, the men filed out the door, with Domenico taking up the rear.
“Domenico, hold up for a second.”
He turned around and leaned his shoulder against the doorjamb.
“It’s been over a year since the last time my life was threatened. Maybe it’s time to take you off bodyguard duty.”
Folding his arms over his chest, he regarded me thoughtfully for a minute, then shook his head. “Where you go, I go, boss.”