Lorenzo's Mafia Bride

Chapter 1

LORENZO

“Hey Lorenzo!”

The pretty blonde gives me an air kiss and come-hither look.

She’s part of the pack of svelte socialites who’ve been frequenting my nightclub of late.

Or at least since it’s become the darling of the Manhattan Social gossip column that’s a reading staple of the Big Apple’s movers and shakers.

I flash a smile, just engaging enough so she can tell her friends Lorenzo Ricci ‘noticed her.’

That’s big currency among the women in this club.

At the bar, a mixologist pours with grace, finishing the forty-dollar cocktail with a precise flame.

I pause long enough to meet his eyes.

“Keep pouring like that and I won’t have to teach the next guy how to do it,” I quip with a half-smile.

It’s a typical Thursday night at Dante’s Inferno.

The ‘Dante’ in this case happens to be my older brother. He created the nightclub and its underground, VIP casino to hide illicit activities related to the family business.

And the Inferno part is because of all the glorious mayhem that happens within these fashionable walls.

Bass from the speakers thumps directly against my skull, a dark, heavy rhythm that keeps the chaos synchronized.

Now it’s twelve midnight. The witching hour when the club’s pulse turns lethal.

On the packed floor, uptown girls in couture dresses dance alongside working girls in short body skimming dresses.

Maybe they’ll never make the society pages.

Yet these hotties know exactly how to earn a VIP’s attention for the night.

From the $10,000 tables bordered by polished black velvet ropes, the city’s real power elite watch the action.

They’re the billionaires who flash their Black Amex like loaded guns. They don’t need to charm any of the dance floor girls to get laid.

That’s what the hospitality floor is for.

“Trouble in Sin City,” Max says through my earpiece.

His voice is tight, slicing through the synthetic electronic beat pounding through the house speakers.

“On it,” I say, letting the chatter of the club wash over me as I stride toward the private elevator bank.

The code means one of our girls is in trouble.

At Inferno, we have a strict ‘girls first’ policy that never ends well for the man responsible, VIP or not.

If you cross our threshold, you respect our currency.

Max, my best buddy since third grade and now my head of security, falls in beside me as we head down the isolated hallway.

It leads to what can euphemistically be called the ‘relaxation rooms.’

In the mirrored walls we resemble matching weapons. Same tailored charcoal suits, same crisp white collars, same cold, unyielding patience.

“It’s Sonia,” he says grimly, his hand already resting on the heavy brass handle of the corridor door. “Drago’s in there now, collaring the perp.”

The fact that it’s Sonia makes the muscle in my jaw tighten.

We call her the nightingale because she’s working here to support her more meager earnings singing opera in a chorus.

Beautiful voice. Beautiful girl.

Innocent looking, too.

We move fast.

I kick the door hard enough to splinter the mahogany frame, the loud crack echoed by the sound of breaking plaster.

Sonia’s not so beautiful now. She is slumped against the wall like a discarded porcelain doll.

What must have been an elegant silk dress is left in bloody tatters, barely covering her nude body.

The coppery scent of fresh blood fills the enclosed room, mixing with the smell of spilled liquor.

Drago, my main muscle, is busy punching out the guy who did this to her.

His heavy, brick-like fists make a wet crunching sound against the guy’s hard flesh.

I cross to Sonia without hesitation, dropping to one knee. Her eyes look glassy, but she’s alive.

I feared worse.

“Max, call the club doctor!”

“Look at me,” I tell Sonia, lifting her chin with two gentle fingers.

I examine her face for knife wounds I can’t see beneath the blood.

Only superficial cuts, thank God. Though the red lines starkly contrast against her pale skin.

“You’ll be okay,” I say, keeping my voice steady despite the fury threatening to crack my ribs. “Doc will fix you up so you’re as good as new.”

Sonia manages a shaky nod.

I shrug off my jacket and guide her bloody arms in its sleeves, covering her nudity.

When the nurse arrives with the wheelchair I help Sonia into it, making sure my jacket stays wrapped securely around her.

Then I turn my attention to Drago.

“What the fuck are you doing?” I say as soon as Sonia’s out of the room. My voice drops to a lethal whisper. “You know you don’t lay hands on anyone without my authorization.”

Drago’s massive chest heaves under his black shirt. “Did you see what he did to her, Lorenzo? He used a blade on her.”

“Step aside.”

He does.

The perpetrator against the wall is breathing hard, slumped over a shattered side table.

His expensive white shirt is soaked in his own blood as he dares sneer up at me through a swollen eye.

He isn’t one of our regular VIPs.

I know every face that has clearance on this floor. Every politician, every old-money heir. This man is a phantom.

“Who are you?” I demand, stepping over the glass shards. “How did you get up here?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know, Ricci,” he spits, a bloody grin showing through cracked lips.

I roll up my sleeves slowly, the fabric folding in precise creases over my forearms.

“Max. Take him to The Room. Drago goes with you.”

The smirk disappears instantly. The man starts shaking his head, raw panic finally cutting through the alcohol-fueled arrogance.

Odd how these wiseguys don’t mind being punched until they’re unconscious by Drago.

But any mention of ‘The Room’ where the real interrogation tools live scares the shit out of them.

“No. Not that. Look, I’ll tell you—”

I turn my back on his pleas.

Then I watch as Drago hauls him up by his collar and drags him down the hallway like the sack of garbage he is.

The sound of his frantic protests fades as they disappear around the corner.

Three hours later I’m at my desk.

Through my two-way mirror window, the club below me is finally bleeding out for the night.

The strobe lights are dark. The music has slowed to a low, predatory thump of bass.

I watch the last of the VIPs disappear into private town cars waiting on the rain-slicked curb. Their pockets lighter and their secrets safely buried inside these soundproof walls.

The hospitality floor is new for us.

The idea came from our uncle Silvio before Dante put two rounds in his chest.

When Silvio suggested we keep a stable of beautiful girls on hand for the high rollers, Dante and I both thought it was a crude idea.

We were wrong.

Hospitality girls and the easy, confidential fix they offer our VIP clientele upped our casino revenue nearly a thousand percent.

Which is the reason why we’re facing so much drama with our liquor license and the Russian Bratva.

Success breeds predators, and the Petrov organization is smelling blood in our water.

Dante strides in without knocking.

Rights of an older brother, the club’s official owner, and head of the Manhattan mafia.

“Heard about Sonia. How is she?” he asks, walking over to the decanter and pouring himself a dark splash.

“Doc stitched her up. She’ll live,” I say, rubbing my temples. “The bastard who cut her was Petrov muscle sent to spook us. We must send him back to them in pieces. A clear message.”

“No.”

I look up, my hand pausing on my desk. “No?”

Dante settles into the leather chair across from me. “We dispose of the body quietly and let the Petrovs wonder what happened to their man. Reacting loudly now fucks up the chess game in my head. I need them blind, not agitated.”

I lean back, the leather creaking under my weight. Sometimes my brother’s Godfather Part 1 restraint feels like a slow chokehold. I prefer an immediate strike, but Dante sees the whole board.

“Now on to a more pleasant topic,” he says, pulling out his phone and sliding it across the polished desk. The screen illuminates the dark wood.

“Take a gander.”

The girl in the photo is young. Her pale skin’s enlivened by a sprinkling of freckles across the bridge of her nose.

“What the hell is this, Dante? A candid photo of some NYU social studies major?”

I take a closer look.

In the photo, the girl’s prim, white blouse is buttoned so taut against her throat it threatens to strangle her.

Her pink lips are pressed together in a hard, uncompromising line.

Oddly, her thickly-lashed eyes seem to catch my own. As if she’s irritated that she can somehow see me looking at her …

…and hates that she can’t do anything about it.

Yet even in the photo, her hair captures my interest.

It’s that hard-to-name color some call auburn, and others describe as brick red.

The way it’s caught in a high ponytail, combined with the challenge in her jade green eyes intrigues me.

“Who the fuck is this?”

“Your bride.”

Dante had briefly mentioned the need for a temporary wife to solve our political gridlock.

I hadn’t given this temporary wife any thought, knowing it would be a transitory arrangement of just a few weeks.

But now the girl has a face and form.

And not one I welcome.

“Like hell. I’m not marrying that.” I gesture to the phone. “She looks like she’s collecting donations for injured pigeons.”

“Too late. It’s wrapped and the wedding is this Friday.”

“I agreed in a general way, Dante. Not a getting-married-on-Friday kind of way. And did you see that sardonic twist on her lips? If anyone’s going to wear a smirk in my family, it’s me. And look at her grooming, her hair, her clothes. It’s like she’s in training to be a nun.”

“Emily’s uncle sits on the State Liquor Authority,” Dante says, his voice flat and unyielding.

“He is the swing vote we need to keep Inferno legal and clear the Petrov block.”

I’m about to speak, but he cuts me off.

“You’re the price of his cooperation, Lorenzo. With you married to his niece, he can recuse himself from the vote based on a family conflict. It gives him a legal shield to step off the board. The Russians can’t force his hand if the city’s own ethics rules bar him from casting a ballot.”

Rage flares hot in my throat, but I shut my mouth.

Dante knows how I feel about my independence, but family always comes before personal comfort.

“Don’t worry, Lorenzo. As soon as the liquor authority renews our license, the marriage can end.”

Dante stands, retrieving his phone. “Anyway, it’s just for a few weeks. A month at most. Relax.”

“But you said she needs to move into my apartment…”

“So what? You’re always here, at the club. Continue chasing your models, your actresses. Enjoying your jet set lifestyle. Just keep her under your roof so the press buys the romance.”

I recall her photo in my mind.

She looks like she’s meant to live in a convent or work in a library or museum.

Not wedded to a man for whom killing and getting killed is an occupational hazard.

That red hair is going to clash horribly with the blood that regularly gets spilled on my floor.

“This Friday. Six o’clock,” Dante says, closing my office door behind him.

I turn back to my spreadsheets with a tight, dark grimace. Our late mother always taught us never to judge a book by its cover. Looking at Emily’s rigid, frozen expression, I hope to God that in this case, my mother was right.