Chapter 2
STEFANO
Deception flashed in Val’s eyes, giving her away. Her promise to stay—and to keep her damn hands off my son—meant nothing. Just another one of her attempts to manipulate me.
Mia bellissima diavoletta.
My beautiful little devil.
I moved in close to her mouth with mine.
She dug her front teeth into her bottom lip and forced me to part her pretty lips with my thumb. I pressed a hard kiss on her mouth. No tongue. No tenderness. Only a clear warning for her to stop the fucking lies or suffer the consequences.
“Make no mistake—you’ll pay for the lies you tell me,” I said. “Every one of them, Valerie.”
Christ, ten minutes ago she’d been happy, content, ready to take on this life with me. Ready to raise our son with me.
Ready to tell me the truth.
But in the span of a minute, she’d gone from angry to terrified, her perfect ivory skin turning a stark white, the hollow of her neck fluttering with panic.
Not a moment went by when I didn’t want to touch her there, when I didn’t want to hold her throat and feel her life pulsing beneath my fingers. To own it. To own her.
To own her fear...
I wanted her to fear me and only me.
Not whoever the fuck frightened her now.
I wouldn’t tolerate something like that coming between us, someone else taking that from me.
Nor would I let another man hurt her.
Ah, but someone from her past waited at my front door.
God help him if he wanted to cause her pain, if he tried to ruin my future with her. I would kill him. If he’d hurt her in the past, or tried to take my family now, I would bathe in his blood.
At the staircase, I cast one more glance over my shoulder at Val and repeated my order.
“Go to our son. Stay with him until I’m done with this.”
She nodded, but her eyes said something else.
Good thing I’d planned ahead. She wouldn’t get far.
Earlier, I’d ordered every window, door, and gate on the estate to be locked down. Not because I worried she would run, but for my family’s protection. I suspected the Commission might pull some violent bullshit to force me into taking that seat.
That security detail may have been for the Commission, but it would also keep my girl inside this house.
After realizing someone other than my own men was involved in the shit downstairs disturbing my discussion with my woman, I had first assumed the unwanted visit came from Edgardo Lordi’s order to intimidate me. The dumb fuck.
Why the Commission would use threats to build my loyalty was beyond understanding. But they would do it, and it would only prove Don Lordi had become as short-sighted and foolish as my father had been.
I would deal with the Commission and their ultimatums and backstabbing after getting rid of the motherfucker making demands at my front door.
Tony, Bruce, and some of my other men stood gathered in the foyer as I approached, forming a barrier while Tony continued trading verbal jabs with our unwanted guests.
“Enough,” I ordered. “Let me through.”
Dread abruptly struck me in the gut as my men parted.
Fuck. I should have put Val and Enzo in the safe room and armed myself, but these men had already seen me.
Bring it on.
Whatever hell waited, I would handle it.
After that, I planned to take Val to the church and have us married in the eyes of God and the State of New York. She would go, by force if necessary.
She would come to understand one thing if nothing else.
Yes, I was indeed her fucking future.
She would learn to be grateful for it, and like it or not, she would tell me all her secrets before anything else came back to bite me in the ass.
While upstairs with Val, I had heard one man mention something about his sister. That couldn’t be right.
I had a theory about what they really wanted.
Val must have stolen from them. I wouldn’t put theft past my pretty little liar. It explained all the money she had hidden in her apartment.
A barista shouldn’t have that much cash on hand, not even if she owned the place, not unless she’d squirreled it away for years without paying any of her bills.
Even if that were the case, I knew as an astute businessman that Con Amore couldn’t be making that kind of bank without some laundering going on.
My girl. A liar, and now a thief.
It seemed cleaning up after her and keeping her tail clean could very well become a full-time job.
In the meantime, to get the immediate situation resolved, I would happily return the money she’d taken from these men and pay whatever interest they considered fair. A small price to pay for my wife to be free of Chicago’s influence.
Then I planned to make Val pay her debt to me in trade.
On her knees and in my bed.
My cock twitched at the thought, and a smirk tugged at one corner of my mouth. I shook my head to clear it.
Back to business, Vignali.
One of the men had a foot and hand braced against the door to keep it open, while the older one stood there quietly.
He wasn’t much older than me, mid- to late-thirties, similar height and build, wearing a black, well-tailored suit that legitimized his menacing presence.
Discomfort settled in my gut.
He had the same almond-shaped, light blue eyes as Valerie.
The asshole with his grip on my door was much younger.
His eyes matched hers too.
This one had tattoos covering his neck, disappearing into his hair. Scars marred some of his skin, and I would have wagered the ink covered more scarring. Marks that hid a story he didn’t want to share. A baby-faced thug with a past.
I could see it all in a single glance. One of the benefits that came with being the only surviving son of a crime family.
Yes, I’d seen this pairing many times before.
The businessman and the enforcer. The heir representing his family in a professional manner and the thug who broke bones when deals couldn’t be brokered. One offered a dangling carrot while the other held the stick.
Christ, I was bored with their cliché-as-fuck show of force.
“How can I help you, gentlemen?” I asked.
Really, I just wanted to go back upstairs to Val and demand answers from her. Tie her to my bed and edge her until she gave in and spilled all her dark secrets. Not boring at all.
Young Thug snarled at me.
The Heir stepped in front of him and extended a hand, offering me respect.
“Don Vignali,” he said, “I’m Marco Moscatelli, and this is my brother Santo Moscatelli. We’re here from Chicago because you’re currently in possession of something that belongs to our family, and we’d like to have that back.”
I arched a brow. He could keep his fucking handshake.
“You being here on my doorstep violates the New York–Chicago treaty. I’m sure you understand I can kill you for that.”
The treaty existed for a reason. Chicago lacked the civility for which the New York families were known. At least we smiled cordially before stabbing you in the back, and we did it only to protect the bottom line.
Always about the money.
Money drove New York City in every way, which meant the prominent dons could be reasoned with if profits were shared. Sure, at times some of the made men got too greedy, but even then, New York had a method to its madness.
Chicago had no such compunction. They craved violence for the sake of violence, money be damned, blood first. Anyone could find themselves in a lucrative deal in Chicago and die the next day just because one of the bosses felt like offing them.
Wars in Chicago broke out constantly. The news couldn’t stop reporting all the shootings. Stupid fucks.
Not only did an underground war cost everyone millions, but it also cost lives, and a family couldn’t easily replace those lives. Every made man had a dollar value tied to his experience and skill.
Wars also brought publicity.
Politicians only worked with a don they could pretend wasn’t a mafioso. Hard to portray a legit businessman when your mugshot graced the front page of the newspapers.
“Who took what?” I added. “We can come up with a civil arrangement, put it behind us, and you can go back to your second-rate city.”
I noted the hostility in my voice. This was my house. They were on my doorstep. They needed to keep that in mind.
Young Thug took another step forward.
Marco Moscatelli put a hand on his brother’s shoulder before the kid could open his mouth. Enforcers were typically loose cannons, but Moscatelli seemed smart enough to keep his brother on a short leash.
“I assure you, I understand the terms of the treaty, Vignali. We’re not here to cause New York any trouble or to disrespect you personally. A member of our family strayed, and we’re only here to retrieve her. Same as you would do.”
Then Moscatelli reached into his breast pocket.
Tony and Bruce raised their guns, aiming at Moscatelli’s head.
The younger Moscatelli drew his pistol.
Without sparing my men a second glance, Moscatelli pulled out a photo and handed it to me while his expression remained professionally blank.
I accepted the photo and studied the image in my hand.
Valerie. My Val.
Young, like when I’d first met her, but there was no mistaking her features. The shape of her face, her eyes, her lips.
She stood on a pedestal in what looked like a high-end dress shop, her dark hair piled on top of her head, and she wore a white wedding gown. With her porcelain skin and her lips painted pink, she looked like a doll.
So pretty, but with lifeless eyes.
Her rounded shoulders and her arms hugging her abdomen revealed fear. A sad, frightened girl without hope. Nothing like my foul-mouthed barista, so full of light and fire.
Fuck. I finally saw her truth.
Val had said she didn’t want to be with a killer, and I still believed that, but it wasn’t the only reason she wanted out.
Now I could see it. When she left me after finding out my real name, after learning my family worked in the gray and the black, she knew our relationship was forbidden.
She knew it would bring death.
She’d been hiding from her family.
A Chicago family—my rivals, my enemies.
My girl was a runaway princess.