6. Obi
OBI
“Okay, so what are we going to do about the Camorra?” Leona asked as she stood from Ryuji’s lap.
He squeezed her thigh and drew more heat to her cheeks.
My cock stirred. I shot him a warning look.
Any more of his hands on her would kick off a sequence of events I did not want in front of Volpe. “Obi, what’s your plan?”
I’d been playing chess against the Camorra for years, but with their latest move, it had broken down my entire strategy. I needed to regroup and reconsider.
I let out a breath through my nose. “Everything has changed with their arrival in New York. I never imagined we’d have to face them here, with such low resources and limited power.”
Leona sat down on the chair next to Caspian. “What does that mean? We can’t do it?”
I shook my head and stood. I paced the room with my hands clasped behind my back and my mind turning. “It means we are not ready. We are at a disadvantage, and they hold the upper hand.”
“Fuck them,” Ryuji said. “We can take them.”
Ciel sat forward and cleared his throat. “What do we n—need to get the upper hand ourselves?”
“For starters, we need information.” My eyes flicked to Volpe.
If he wanted to live, he’d give me his knowledge.
Without it, we were fighting a losing fight from the start.
“Greco’s last known whereabouts were at Volpe’s estate.
We need to know what he’s doing, who he’s speaking to, and how he operates. ”
“I can work on that,” Ciel offered. “I’ll find him.”
“I can help,” Wynn added. “If he’s at Max’s house, I can stake it out and follow him. I can try to get close enough to take him out.”
My lips pursed. “Watch and learn first. We don’t hit him until we’re ready.”
Information was the start. There was too much at stake to make mistakes by attacking Greco directly before we had the power to take him down.
“What will he do next?” Leona asked. “Do you have any guesses?”
“In Italy,” I began as I paced around the room, “the Camorra’s power comes from two main pillars.
They’re untouchable because of their unlimited monetary resources.
They also have all the important public officials bought and paid for, so there are rarely repercussions for their actions.
My guess is that they’ll try to take control of the mafia’s economy—drug sales, money laundering, protection schemes, gun smuggling—in order to secure their financial power.
They want the money to flow through them.
They’ll try to buy the social elite so they can act without interference.
Law enforcement, politicians, anyone who could oppose them through legal channels.
If they control the law, they hold the power. ”
“Money and power,” Leona said.
“Correct.”
“But this is why you did all those favors,” Ciel pointed out. “To have people in your pocket when the time came. That’s why we took the clients we took.”
“Yes,” I answered. “We have resources we can use. However, we don’t have as strong a hold across New York—or the world—as I had hoped for. We’ll just have to use what we have.”
We only had so many pieces on our board. They had to be enough. Once I took the Camorra down, once we’d eliminated them…then I would hold the power and safety I needed to keep my family safe.
“They came too fucking early,” Caspian griped. “We could have prepared better.”
“We should have just given them Arion Vokshi,” Wynn said.
“Too bad Max ruined that plan,” Ryuji sneered, flipping his knife over and over.
Leona stole a glance at Volpe. He stared at his clasped hands, but a tilt of his head showed his eyes snapping to hers for just a breath before he looked away. What was that look?
“So we tell our men to fight?” Caspian asked. “We can’t let the Camorra take over our territory; that’s where our money and power comes from—”
“Max killed Arion Vokshi because he threatened and insulted me,” Leona interrupted.
Everyone went silent.
I braced my hands on the back of the couch. “Explain.”
She interlocked her fingers with Caspian, swallowing while she leaned against his shoulder. She again looked to Volpe, but he said nothing. My grip on the couch tightened.
“Vokshi said…disgusting things.” Her eyes went distant while her voice went low. “He saw my pictures. He was talking about how he jerked off to them, how all the Vokshi men had. Max shot him after that.”
My fingers dug into the fabric of the furniture while rage coiled in my chest, pushing against my ribs like magma trying to escape a volcano.
“Is that true?” Caspian asked Max. “You said it was unavoidable.”
Volpe’s mask slipped back into place. He shrugged, but said nothing.
“Speak, Volpe,” I commanded, voice corded with anger. “What happened with Vokshi?”
“Fine,” he said with a gust of breath. “What Leona said is the truth. It was necessary, and I’d kill him a thousand times over and again before I gave up that bastard to the Camorra.
His death by my hand was the best decision I’d made in fucking years.
What he said, the look in his eyes—” His voice cut off as he dropped his head and rubbed his eyes.
“Would any of you have done something different?”
Ryuji and I exchanged a look first, and the same rage I felt simmered behind his eyes. Wynn and Ciel shared a similar glance full of emotion. Caspian put an arm around Leona while I stared back at Volpe unflinchingly.
“Would you?” Volpe demanded of each of us. His eyes burned, rimmed in red. “Now it’s your turn to tell the fucking truth. If you heard him insult her, degrade her, speak about her body that way, would you not have killed him where he stood?”
Ciel cleared his throat and spoke first. “I would have.”
Wynn nodded.
Cas wrapped an arm around her shoulders and kissed her temple. “You know I would have, princess.”
“I would have tortured him slowly instead of shooting his brains out,” Ryu answered. Volpe rolled his eyes.
My gaze went back to Leona. Possession swelled inside my chest. She was ours. Death would come to anyone who threatened or harmed her. The Albanians deserved far more suffering and pain than they got in the end, especially Arion Vokshi.
I walked around the couch until I stood at her side. My palm found the back of her neck.
“I would have skinned him alive.” I gripped her firmly. Her golden brown eyes bored into mine. “And then I would have taught you how so you could exact your own revenge.”
She pressed her lips together before she gave me a tight nod, moisture beading at the corner of her eyes. How could we blame Volpe for Vokshi’s death when my brothers and I would have done the same?
“Fine, we will put that matter to rest.” I brushed my thumb over her cheek. “What’s done is done. We must focus on the Camorra.”
The rest of my brothers were quiet until Caspian cleared his throat.
“Giulio was asking for orders,” he said. “Do we want our men doing recon, too?”
I inhaled and exhaled slowly, trying to center myself again.
“Yes, get as much information as possible. I want eyes and ears on all movement throughout the boroughs. Caspian, talk to Enzo Rossi as well. I want to know if they pressure him or try to take over his territory. They’re going to increase their smuggling operations and probably start pressuring local businesses to pay the pizzo, the tithe for their protection.
If they get control under our nose, and we lose our territory, we will have nothing. ”
Caspian nodded. “I’ll start moving our men around. Quiet to start, but if we can get a sense of their patterns, we can start hitting them where it hurts.”
“I’ll call Kostya and the Russians, too,” Ryuji said as he pulled out his phone. “Warn them about what’s coming. The Russians have always clashed with the Italians. I bet Greco will go after him just for the hell of it.”
“Agreed,” I said. “Our alliance still stands, and we need a united front against them.”
“What about the Camorra’s money?” Leona asked.
“They launder money for rich businessmen, and they smuggle weapons. We’ll try to undermine both.” I looked to Volpe, and he stared back, eyes shadowed by his bruises. “What do you know about either?”
He wrung his hands for a second and then leaned back in his seat. “I know what ports they use for the guns, and who else buys from them. I also know a few of the businessmen they’d probably try to get control over for laundering. Rich, shady men.”
I paced the room again, letting my fingers brush across Leona’s back as I passed.
“I want a report immediately. Work with Ciel and Wynn on their shipping habits, their transportation routes from here to the rest of the eastern seaboard, and the ports they use. Then make a list of the businessmen and provide it to Leona and me.”
We would need to increase our supply of weapons to keep up with theirs. After this, I’d get in contact with Anton Felix, our dealer out of LA, and our Chinese suppliers. Once we had the capacity, we’d try to interrupt their flow of money.
“What about the MTA director?” Wynn asked. “Can we use him for some of this?”
I smirked while nodding. We’d caught the Motor Transit Authority Director, Sean Porter, partaking in trafficking operations at the club in Philadelphia, The Obsidian. We’d let him live, knowing that we’d probably have use for him again. It would pay off now.
“Yes, exactly, Wynn. I want you to put pressure on him to monitor two things. First, try to limit the Camorra’s numbers.
They’ll send their men in waves, probably through false travel documents or underhanded travel methods.
We need to stop them. Use the Director’s contacts and influence to manage customs and deny entry to the Italians Greco brings over—whether through boat or air travel.
Second, use him to give us an advantage with the ports.
We need him to stop or reroute shipments of guns so we limit their firepower. ”
Wynn nodded. “I’ll pay him a visit in person.”