Chapter 16
Saint
The church is packed.
Every family. Every captain. Every soldier who ever owed Antonio Marini loyalty. They're here to pay respects to a man who ruled part of this city for forty years.
And to see if his nephew can fill his shoes.
I stand at the front, Gemma beside me in black. She looks pale. Beautiful, but pale. Like she hasn't slept in days.
She hasn't.
Neither have I.
Four weeks since the alleyway. Four weeks since Antonio died.
Four weeks of planning this funeral, managing the captains, fielding calls from every family in the city asking if the Marinis are stable.
None of us expected to wait this long, and yet, Antonio had specific instructions, which pushed the timeline of his burial out an obscene amount.
Not that I was angry about it. The focus on Antonio meant I didn't have to think about my wife and her betrayal.
Whatever progress we made over the past few weeks has withered to nothing. We've barely talked during these last few weeks.
But today, we're united.
Today, we're the perfect Marini power couple. Everything Antonio and Bianca would have wanted to see. And it's a complete fucking farce.
The priest drones on about eternal rest and God's mercy. Antonio would have hated this sermon, even though he wrote the damn thing. He didn't believe in mercy. Didn't believe in rest.
He believed in family and duty, and doing whatever it takes.
"Promise me you'll do what's necessary. For the family. Always for the family."
I promised.
Now I have to deliver.
Too bad I don't know how the fuck to do that.
The service ends after what feels like hours, and we file out to the cemetery. The coffin is lowered. People offer condolences that mean nothing.
It's all a blur as I focus ahead on the next steps.
I'd grieved Antonio weeks ago, which is why I can scan the crowd instead of focusing on my uncle's lowering coffin.
That's when I see him.
Alexei Morozov. Standing at the back of the crowd. Smiling like a fucking lunatic.
He has the audacity to come to Antonio's funeral. To stand on Marini ground and smile like he hadn't been fucking around with my wife. Like he didn't want to use her, harm her the way he has every single woman in his life.
My vision goes red, and I'm moving before I can think too much about it.
"Saint—" Gemma's hand on my arm. Her fingers dig into my bicep in warning.
I shake her off, ignoring the desperation in her tone.
Marcello appears beside me. "Don't. Not here. Not now."
"Take Gemma to the car," I order.
I've been itching for violence these past weeks. Things have been too unsettled. I'd been unable to get out and exact the vengeance I crave. Thankfully, my enemy has come to me.
What luck.
"Saint, please—" Gemma's eyes are wide, and she looks between myself and Marcello, begging me to stop.
"Go with Marcello."
"Saint—"
"Now." I don't look at her. Can't look at her. If I do, I'll remember she's the reason I want to strangle the life out of him. She's the reason he has something on me. And I'll do something I'll regret later.
She realizes this, and I watch as her shoulders fall.
Marcello takes her arm, pulls her away. She goes, casting one look back at me, and I know she wants to beg me. Months ago, I might have found that intriguing, but now, I hate the idea of her on her knees.
I want to kill Alexei, and no one is going to stop me.
The crowd parts. They know what's coming. Some try to stop me, Julian grabs my shoulder, Dominic steps in front of me, but I push past them.
Alexei doesn't run. He doesn't even stop smiling. He's fucking loving this.
"Saint. My condolences—"
My fist connects with his jaw before he can finish.
He staggers back, blood spraying out. His men move forward, but he raises a hand, stopping them. His smile is still wide.
"You come here?" I hit him again. "To my uncle's funeral?"
He laughs, and I hit him again. "Go ahead," he goads. "Get it out, boy."
I'm on top of him now. Pounding his face into the cemetery grass. Blood flies everywhere. His men are shouting, moving forward. They don't know what to do. Igor isn't moving. Alexei told them to hold, and they are listening, but it goes against their nature.
He's going to be dead before they can stop me.
Someone fires a gun into the air, and I hear my men shouting.
"Saint!" Marcello's voice. "Saint, stop! You're going to kill him!"
Good.
I want to kill him. Want to beat his face until there's nothing left. Until he's unrecognizable. Until everyone knows what happens when you fuck with Saint Marini.
Hands grab me. Multiple people pulling me off. I'm fighting them, trying to get back to Alexei's body on the ground. The fucker's face is a bloody mess, and yet, he's still laughing, which means I didn't hurt him enough.
Marcello's in my face now. "You've made your point."
I'm breathing hard.
Igor grabs Alexei, hauling him to his feet.
He's conscious, barely. Looking at me through swollen eyes, a smirk on his face.
"This isn't over, Podonok," he laughs. "Not by a long shot."
I'm about to put a bullet in his head, but Marcello stands in front of me. "Think about where you are," he snaps.
And I do. Looking around, I realize the crowd is silent.
I turn to face them. Every captain. Every soldier. Every family representative who came to pay respects looks on at me with disgust.
"Antonio Marini built this family." My voice carries across the cemetery. "He made us strong. Made us feared. And as his successor, I will continue his work. Anyone who threatens us—" I gesture to where Alexei was. "—will face the same fate. Or worse."
No one speaks. But I see the looks. The doubt. The fear.
They don't trust me. They think I'm unstable. Dangerous.
They're right.
But some fucker said it was better to be feared than loved, and I wouldn't be the first Don to manage the family with that philosophy.
The reception is at the house.
Gemma is hosting, and the sight of her sad smile and thin body does something to me I don't want to focus on. So instead, I hide in my study with ice for my hand and a glass of whiskey for my mood.
There's a knock on the door, and I want to ignore it, but I know I can't.
"Come in."
Marcello peeks around the door. His eyes, so much like his father's, take in the scene before him. Me—bloodied and drinking. "We need to talk."
"Not now."
"Yes, now." He sits across from me. "Before you do something else stupid."
I look up. Marcello is always measured. Always calm. It's the lawyer in him. He's not any different now though there's judgement in his expression.
"Say what you need to say and leave."
He rolls his eyes.
"The captains had a meeting. Three days ago." He leans forward. "They don't want you as Don."
The words hit like a physical blow. "What?" I place the glass down with too much force, and the amber liquid sloshes over.
"They think you're too volatile. Too young. Too...dangerous." He grimaces. "The thing with Alexei today didn't help."
"He showed up at Antonio's funeral—"
"He's the head of his family. It would have been disrespect—"
"Fuck that," I snap. "He came to prove a point. Not pay respect."
Marcello shakes his head. "Doesn't matter. You're Don now. You can't beat the shit out of everyone you fucking hate."
"I don't," I say. "The list would be long."
"I'm serious, Saint. You showed weakness today, and the sharks are circling. They smell blood in the water, and you are going to end up chum if you don't get your shit together."
I lean back in Antonio's chair. Marcello isn't wrong, but I'm not going to admit that.
Not to him. We're only a few years apart, and we've always been wildly different, but we were close growing up.
There are few people who would hold my feet to the fire the way Marcello will.
And even less people whose advice I'd take.
"Then how should I have handled it?" I ask. "Allow him to think he can play us?"
"You do it quietly. Later. Where no one could see." His eyes are hard. "You made a spectacle. You made us look unstable."
I stand, move to the window. Outside, people are mingling.
Gemma is talking to someone, one of the wives.
Playing her part. She's always acting. It makes me wonder if she was playing pretend at the beach house or was that the real her?
Is there a real her or does she just adapt to whoever she's with?
"What do they want?" I ask. "The family?" I fucking hate that I even need to ask. This was what I was worried about, not being ready. Antonio knew I wasn't ready, which is why he pressured me to have an heir.
"They want me to take over," Marcello says plainly.
I turn. "You?"
"Surprised?" There's something bitter in his smile.
"Not really," I say. "Though I'm surprised you would consider it." I look him up and down. "You should know what I'd do to someone who'd betray me."
Marcello snorts. "Easy," he holds up his hands. "I wouldn't be here telling you if I was about to stick a knife in your back." He stands beside me. "Antonio didn't just make you a weapon, Saint. He made me one too. Just a different kind."
I study him. Really look at him. See the calculation in his eyes. The coldness that I thought was just lawyer detachment.
"You want this." It's not a question.
"Of course I wanted this. I'm his son. But he chose you, and it's yours by right. Your father would have been Don." No resentment in his voice. Just fact. "And I respect that. I accepted it a long time ago."
"Why?"
He sighs. "Because even if I sometimes fucking hated my father, he was brilliant. He held power for four decades. If he thought you couldn't do it, he wouldn't have named you his heir."
"Then why are the captains breathing down my fucking neck?"
"Because you're sloppy." His voice is sharp now. "Because you let emotion control you. Because you married a woman who is a ticking fucking time bomb."
My jaw tightens as he mentions Gemma. "Careful," I warn.