Chapter Eleven
“What do you know about someone taking over the Russo Mafia?” Vincent said.
This was not quite how Massimo intended to ask the question but his father always had different methods. They were not the same.
Vigo smiled. “Ah, so you can confirm there is unrest in the Russo Mafia?”
“There is no such thing,” Massimo said.
“Just speculation,” Vigo said, looking from him to Vincent and back again.
“What is your connection to Luiz Gutterman?” Massimo asked.
Vigo cursed. “Bastard. He thinks he can take from me. That piece of shit had what was coming to him.”
“Did you order the hit on his family?” he asked.
“No, but whoever did it, the Gutterman family deserved it. I won those businesses in a card game—winner takes all—and Gutterman was the one who paid to join that card game. He wanted to do business, and I figured I would see how the card game went, then consider it.”
Massimo frowned. “You own the property you won.”
Vigo’s expression turned into that of a sneer. “I won fair and square, and for one week, I was left to run the business. Then it was taken. My men were killed. My women were disposed of, and Gutterman laughed in my face and called me Bratva scum. I do not do business with Mafia pricks.”
“We had nothing to do with that deal,” Vincent said.
“As far as we were aware, you came in, stole the business, and took over,” Massimo said.
“I don’t do that, not with Russo Mafia.” Vigo ran a hand down his face. “I know Russo does not cheat, but Gutterman and others do cheat. No business with them.”
“Who?” Massimo asked.
Vigo looked toward him in confusion.
“Who else do you do business with?” Massimo asked. “King has already told me he was made aware of a place in the Mafia, that Russo was about to have a takeover.”
Vigo smiled. “You and I both know that no one will take the Russo Mafia while you’re around. Without you on their side, Russo Mafia will fall. But you’re loyal to Russo, which is why I didn’t take the bait.”
Massimo frowned and looked at Vigo.
“It’s Diego,” Vincent said.
He turned to look at his father. There was no way he would air their dirty laundry for Vigo to hear, only his father wasn’t looking at Vigo but down at his cell phone.
Massimo looked at the text message that had come from Isabella: Diego is going to kill us!
“What the fuck?” Massimo asked, taking the cell phone from his father and seeing the messages. Isabella texting that she and Adelina believed she might be pregnant and wanted to go the pharmacy. Adelina and Isabella had been taken, and somehow his sister was able to text.
He looked toward Vigo. “Did you know?”
“Did I know what?” he asked.
Massimo grabbed Vigo around the neck, aware of the guns being drawn, including the woman behind the counter. Vigo had never been alone but Massimo hadn’t expected anything less. He held onto the man’s throat and stared at Vigo.
“You do that, and they pull the trigger,” Vigo said.
“Yeah, but you’ll be dead,” Massimo said. “I don’t need a weapon to kill.”
He stared into Vigo’s eyes, and like so many men before him, he watched the fear that he tried to fight. Most men attempted to fight that fear of death, but it was pointless. Everyone feared death, the end, the final breath.
It would be so easy to kill Vigo.
“I don’t know what your cell phone is telling you, but I know nothing.”
“Diego has my wife!” Massimo said. “Is that what the game plan is? Distract me? Let them take my wife?”
“I have nothing to do with that piece of shit. He is a betrayer. A traitor. I don’t know who turned on Russo Mafia. All I know is that you have several traitors amongst you, and no one is safe.”
“Massimo, he is telling the truth. We have to go.”
“I need to know where Diego is!” Massimo said, and if that meant killing the leader of the Bratva, then he was more than willing to do that. His wife was in danger.
“I know where she is,” Vincent said. “Isabella has turned on her cell phone GPS. We can find her.”
He looked at Vigo, then pulled his hand away. Vigo fell as he took a deep breath. He might have been holding onto the man’s neck a little too tightly, but he did have his reasons.
“We will consider this even,” Vigo said.
Massimo nodded his head. Without another word, he headed to his car, and his father was close behind him. Putting the car into “reverse,” his men already knew they needed to follow him. Pressing his foot to the gas, he started to take directions from his father.
“How the fuck did Diego get to her?” Massimo asked.
“The pharmacy.”
“You don’t think someone is working for him? Someone close to home?”
“The only person who is close to Adelina right now is your sister, and no, I don’t think she would sell her out to the enemy,” Vincent said. “This is pure coincidence.”
“Dad, if she was going to the pharmacy and if what that says is true, you know what that means, right?”
“Yes, I do.”
He was going to be a father. Adelina was also in danger.
“I can’t let anything happen to her.”
“Nothing is going to happen to her, son.”
“Dad, you don’t fucking know that.”
“I do know Diego has no idea Isabella is able to text us. I don’t know how your sister is doing it, but she is communicating with us. Have faith in that.”
Massimo felt that rage bubbling up inside him, threatening to explode to the surface.
He couldn’t control it. It was an overwhelming sense that he needed to kill.
He just couldn’t handle the very thought of anything happening to Adelina.
Through his mind, she changed, that smile looking at him with such warmth, and then each time he saw her.
The moment she stepped close to him and made a teasing comment, about there being drool on the floor, or that could have been the second time. He wasn’t exactly sure, as he realized they had experienced many conversations.
Being around Adelina allowed him the ability to breathe. It gave him a reason to keep fighting, and he hadn’t even realized it was missing until right this moment. Adelina was his woman, his wife, his soul, his very fucking reason for breathing, and he couldn’t imagine life without her.
“Is that what you felt with Mom?” he asked.
“You get it now.”
“Then why did you ... with that woman?” Massimo asked.
“Because, when you become a desperate man, all you can think about is how to get out. I wanted out, Massimo. I wanted the world to end, and I thought the best way of doing that was to get myself killed. I’m glad you get it now, but you will never have to face what I did.
We’re going to get Adelina back. Trust me. ”
His wife had won Vincent over. She had given them all a reason to fucking live, and no one was going to take that away from them.
****
“For fuck’s sake. Piece of shit phone.”
Adelina frowned as she came to, and blinked in the darkened room. There wasn’t much light coming into the room, but as she became accustomed to the darkness, she was able to make out Isabella.
“You’re awake,” Isabella said.
“Yeah, what’s happening?” she asked.
“Bastard Diego punched you in the face, and you went down. Then you woke up in the van, passed out again, and now we’re here. It’s some kind of motel, I think. I’m not sure. We’re locked in the basement. There were other women here, but they’re gone now,” Isabella said.
“Other women?”
“Yeah, I heard one of the soldiers mention a sale,” Isabella said, wrapping her arms around her legs. “That’s not good.”
“No, that’s not. That’s human trafficking.”
“I know Diego’s been rumored to do stuff like that, but I thought Russo wasn’t part of that, and I don’t think they would accept us Salvatores being sold.”
Adelina went to the other woman and wrapped her arms around her. “It’s fine. Okay. It’s going to be okay.”
A door opened, and light came through.
Isabella started to visibly shake and Adelina felt sick. She had heard plenty of horror stories over the years, horrible tales of women being sold. The pain and degradation they had to go through. Most of them ending up in the sex trade.
This couldn’t be happening, just as her life was getting so good. She was potentially pregnant with Massimo’s baby, and now this ... no, she couldn’t accept that.
When the person came toward the cages, the light cast enough of a glow to show exactly who it was.
“Lily-Mae,” Isabella said.
The other woman put a hand to her lips. “You’ve got to come now.”
Was this a trap?
“Why should we trust you?” Adelina asked.
“Look, I know you don’t trust me, but if you don’t let me help you, and Massimo doesn’t come in time, you’re going to get sold, or worse, beaten for sport.
I ... I never knew what was going on. Now that I do, I know this is not the Russo way, and I like my life.
I like being able to afford nice things and live my life.
This is going to get me killed, and as much as I hate that you got Massimo, I don’t actually want to see you hurt. ”
“And you know if you let anyone hurt her, Massimo will not hesitate just because you’re a woman,” Isabella said.
“There is also that. Look, we don’t have a lot of time. Come on, before someone finds us,” Lily-Mae said.
She had the key in her hand, and Adelina didn’t trust this woman. Something didn’t feel right to her, but now it was her only chance to escape, and she wasn’t going to let this opportunity go.
Rushing forward with Isabella, they stood at the cage, and she kept expecting Lily-Mae to laugh at them. To show that it was all a horrible trick.
The cage opened, and they were able to step out, and Lily-Mae urged them to follow.
They went up the stairs, and the motel they were in was dirty.
Wallpaper peeled from the walls, and she saw black mold in the corners.
There were cobwebs, and there were crumbling parts of the wall actually on the floor.
When she looked up, she saw signs of water damage across the ceiling.
“Come on,” Lily-Mae said.
They walked down the long corridor, but they heard voices, and then someone turned a corner, and they rushed into a room that smelled like human feces. Adelina put a hand to her face and tried not to vomit.
“Oh, God,” Isabella said, looking across the room.
Adelina gasped and even Lily-Mae cried out as the body of a naked woman, covered in blood, had been left on the bed.
“What the fuck?” Isabella asked.
This was not good. She felt her sister-in-law was close to losing it.
“Let’s go,” Lily-Mae said.
They left the room, and it felt like they were going in a maze.
“Hey!” the loud, booming voice came down the hallway from behind them.
“Oh, shit,” Lily-Mae said. “Run, just run.”
And they started to run, and Adelina couldn’t stop, even if she wanted to.
She had to get away. She felt this new rush of need to make it out of there alive.
There was nothing else she could do but think of her baby, of a life with Massimo.
She wasn’t going to get any of that without running.
This was her life. This was her future, and she was not going to allow herself to be taken, hurt, or to be away from the love of her life.
“Up ahead,” Lily-Mae said.
Adelina saw the door. She saw the freedom, and just as hope bloomed in her chest, the doors opened, and for a moment, she truly thought she was going to be able to save her life. This was it. The end of the road.
But then, she saw who had stepped into the room. They were not soldiers. Right before her was Massimo Salvatore. Her husband.
He pulled out a gun but he was not aiming for her. She ran into his arms, and he caught her as he fired his weapon.
Vincent was there as well.
Isabella had gone to them, and Adelina held onto her husband as the soldiers came down.
Massimo held her tightly, and when she didn’t think the noise could get any worse, it was like chaos erupted in the motel. She heard the screams as Russo soldiers descended on the motel.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
She looked up toward Massimo, as he glanced around.
“The Russo Mafia, they’re here.”
“I told them,” Vincent said. “You think we were going to take out Diego and not make Russo aware of what was happening right under his nose? Fucking hell, no. That shit is not happening. Diego is going to get what is coming to him.”
Massimo cupped her cheeks. “I’ve got to deal with this.”
“But—”
He kissed her, and then pressed his lips against her ear. “I love you, Adelina Salvatore. You own my heart. I’ve got to do this, but I promise you, I am coming back to you.”
Adelina watched him go, and then she was being pulled out of the motel by Vincent. She couldn’t believe what was happening.
Life just moved in fast motion, while she was still reeling from the revelation that Massimo loved her. She wished she hadn’t been so shocked and told him she loved him as well.