20. Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty
YOU HAVE TO PAY
Aaliyah
I’d seen grown men crumble under this drug faster than a bullet, but Marianna refused to budge. No matter how much I bruised her body, the gunshot to her foot or how much I threatened to take her life, she still would not give us the name of the person she was working with. She screamed, she begged, but still would not give up the name.
“What do you want to do?” Antonio asked.
I hated to do this in front of him. While I loathed this woman, she was still his mother. Even though he knew this had to be done for us to even have a life together it still didn’t change the facts.
“I need you to leave.”
Confusion clouded his expression as his brows furrowed.
“She’s still your mother,” I said. “There’s one more thing I can do to get her to talk to me, but I refuse to do it with you in the room. I do not want to leave you with that image.”
“Aaliyah...”
“Tony, we need this name. Do you want to be here when I end it? If not, you need to say your last goodbyes.”
I made it clear that there would be no discussion. If he wanted to watch his mother die it was his decision. But she would die today, and he wouldn’t be able to stop me.
“I’m staying,” he said.
My eyes were fixed on my husband, taking in every detail of his handsome face. I could see the unwavering determination in his eyes, which only intensified the empathy I felt towards him.
His mother was a cunt. More worried about power than her children. More worried about appearances than the happiness of her son. She didn’t deserve to be called mother, and she never deserved his love. While I was not sorry for what I was about to do to her, I was sorry he was about to witness her death.
“Okay.”
There was nothing more for me to say, the silence hanging heavy in the air. He had made his decision, but I hoped he could live with it.
I walked back to his mother, the sound of my footsteps echoing in the silence. Standing in front of her, I tucked my gun back into the waistband of my slacks. Her breathing quickened as she squirmed against the tight grip of Luca and Franco. Tears streaked her face, leaving trails of black mascara on her cheeks. Blood pooled on the floor from her injured foot. She looked like a woman who was about to meet her end. And I couldn’t deny it, although I felt sorry for Tony, I felt absolutely nothing for her.
“Once last chance, Marianna.” I grabbed her hand. “Who are you working for?”
She turned to Antonio, her eyes silently pleading for help.
“Don’t look at him,” I said. “He cannot save you.”
“Your father never loved me!” she yelled. “I gave him everything! And he couldn’t let that bitch go. Then he expected me to treat her child like my own!”
This was something we already knew. Tony had explained the dynamics of his parents’ relationship. It was the same type of relationship he was raised to have. No love. Only the advancement of the Rizzo empire. And it was a relationship he wanted to avoid at all costs.
Why in the hell wouldn’t she want her children to have something different from what she had?
“I gave up marrying the man I loved, for someone who would never love me! Dante loved me!”
“So, you didn’t want me to be happy because you weren’t! You put my wife in danger! That’s unforgivable and a death sentence.”
“Antonio, please!”
“Do what you need to do, Bella .”
With a nod, I forcefully pushed one of her fingers back, the bone snapping and drowning out her screams. While I had avoided bone breaking because I knew the drug enhanced the pain and I wanted to lessen my husband’s pain. She left me no choice. I would get a name before I ended her life.
“Who are you working for?” I asked as I pushed another finger back until it snapped. “I can do this all day, Marianna.” Then, I grabbed her middle finger. “After I finish with both hands, I will move to your toes.”
I applied pressure to her middle finger, causing it to snap with a sickening sound. “Three down, Marianna. Who are you working for?”
“Sal... Salvatore,” she mumbled before she passed out.
“Luca, give her the smelling salts,” Tony ordered.
Luca grabbed the smelling salts and held them under Marianna’s nose without hesitation. As she groaned in pain, I forcefully grasped her hair and jerked her head upwards, forcing our eyes to meet.
She screamed, and I hated to admit it, but joy surged in my soul.
“What is Salvatore’s last name?” I asked.
She groaned, and I pulled on her hair harder. “Last name, Marianna, or I break another finger until I get it.”
“Grasso.”
I looked at Antonio. We already knew the name Grasso, but we needed to confirm that this Salvatore Grasso was Camorra.
My focus shifted back to his mother, and I could see the fear in her eyes. “Organization?”
“Camorra,” she mumbled.
“And Agent Grasso?” I asked.
She nodded. “Camorra.”
Tony walked confidently towards his mother, his arms crossed firmly over his chest. I took a few steps back, giving him some space to say his goodbyes.
“What is done against a Cosa Nostra Donna, is also done against a Cosa Nostra Don. You better than anyone should understand that,” he said all trace of love, understanding, or mercy gone from his voice. “Blood in.”
“Please...,” she whispered, her voice trembling with desperation.
I retrieved my weapon from the waistband of my dress slacks, approached her kneeling form, and pressed the cold barrel of the gun against her forehead.
“You have to pay for the sins of the father,” she said.
All the tears had stopped and by the look on her face she was resigned to her fate.
“And you have to pay for the sins against the son. Blood out,” I said, squeezing the trigger.
The silence that followed was both deafening and strangely satisfying. Armed with a name and organization it was time to finish this. We’d take care of Salvatore Grasso and anyone else connected to this plot.
“Luca and Franco, get rid of the body,” Antonio ordered. “And get this cleaned up.”
“Yes, Don,” they replied in unison.
As he pulled me into his arms, I could feel the warmth of his embrace and the tenderness of his kiss on my forehead before he let me go. As he left the study, he reached into his pocket and retrieved his phone. I was sure he was calling Alessandro to let him know that it had been done. What had just happened was a burden on him, regardless of whether he voiced it or not. He just gave a death order to his own mother and his wife was the one who took her life. It had to be a lot to deal with.
Without regret, I watched as they callously wrapped Marianna’s lifeless body in the rug in the study. Chance after chance I gave her to accept me as her daughter-in-law and as her Donna. Now that she was gone, it was time to find and eliminate the last threats to my husband and myself.