Chapter 17
CHAPTER 17
STEFANO
Val had fucked up big time, and I did not appreciate being played. Whatever her game, it wasn’t the time for it.
I let go of her and pushed her against the counter with my body, flattening my hands on the granite on either side of her to cage her inside my arms, so she couldn’t turn away from me.
A goddamn erection pushed at my slacks.
Not the time for that either.
I knew what Val wanted.
Having power meant there would always be someone trying to take it away from me.
Seemed even Val wanted it.
Nothing attracted people to a man like me more than the desire to feel the strength of his power. Not even money. I had to be on guard all the time, in every situation, including with those I wanted to trust.
Trust had never come easily to me because I knew very well about the dangers of losing it.
My father and my brother had been way too trusting. And in the end, that oversight and their arrogance got them killed.
I wouldn’t allow myself to be destroyed by that same shit. If my reactions sometimes bordered on paranoia, so be it.
“Tell me how you know about the families,” I repeated.
I didn’t want to hurt Val, but maybe scaring her enough to show her how serious I was about getting answers would get her to open up to me.
She shoved at my chest.
“Because I know who you are, Stefano, and I told you I wanted nothing to do with the way you live your life. But I wasn’t stupid enough to believe you wouldn’t ever come looking for me and find my son, so I’ve watched your world. To be prepared.”
“To be prepared? What the fuck does that even mean?”
“Do you know how many journalists out there walk the streets of New York, searching for the next breaking mafia story? And of course there’s social media. You can literally find information about the families on the internet.
“Oh, and what about the low-rent mob bosses constantly brag about their low-level shit on public sites? You should look into that.”
I nodded. I would absolutely have that investigated.
“So you researched me? And Benedict Capaldo as well?”
I paused, inhaling her distracting scent while giving her a minute to consider how she wanted to continue responding to my questions.
Christ, why hadn’t I ever completed that background check on her? I’d started the process, but something inside me just couldn’t do it. I was blind to what I thought was her innocence.
She pushed at me again, gently this time, and nodded.
“Yes, I guess you could call it that. I keep my eyes open. For Enzo’s sake, how could I not? There are thousands of blogs written about New York’s mafia dons and countless articles published about the city’s wealthiest families.
“God, Stefano, Benedetta Capaldo walked right in and introduced herself to a stranger using her very recognizable name. I can’t even tell you how many articles I’ve seen about her father. It makes sense for someone like you to marry a woman like her.”
“Well now I'm not marrying her,” I said, staring at Val.
Val’s explanation might have made sense, might have been logical, but it didn’t feel right in my gut.
Sure, I could successfully threaten the editor of The New York Times . But I couldn't shut down the social media giants. I couldn’t take down every blogger writing about their mob conspiracy theories. Most of them were full of shit anyway and had zero evidence to support their claims.
Now and then, when one of their claims hit a little too close to home, my lawyers handled those.
Most of those websites didn’t report the full truth about mafia life, and Val certainly didn't seem like the type to waste her time with conspiracy theories.
If she had been so worried about me finding out about my son, why didn’t she leave the city instead of staying in the same fucking place?
I scoffed at the thought of it all and then narrowed my eyes.
Something still didn't add up.
“Social media, blogs, that’s it?”
“That’s it,” she hissed.
Then, after glancing down at the bulge in my slacks, she tore away from me with a new fire lit in her eyes.
“Are you happy now, Stefano? Did you squeeze all the information you needed out of me? Yes, okay? I spent more time than I should have scanning those ridiculous websites for stories by amateur journalists because I’m afraid. I wanted to know how to keep you from corrupting my son.”
“Our son,” I corrected.
She pushed out a heavy sigh.
“Are we done now?”
My paranoia had subsided. To be fair, she’d been right about our son, but now it was too late for that.
We still had some unfinished business.
“Not quite yet, Valerie.”
She put her hands on her hips and gave me a fake smile.
“Oh, don't worry. As soon as you eliminate this threat against my child, we’ll be out of your way, and you can get back to your plans for world domination. You can build your empire as vast and as brutally as you like… just leave me and my son out of it.”
Not an option. She had to know that by now. She had to know I would no longer let them go. Didn’t matter what I had to do or say to make it so.
She belonged to me. And she would only be safe with me.
No world existed in which I would not be in our son's life.
No reality remained in which she didn't spend all her nights in my bed.
That time had passed.
Val went back to cleaning the kitchen, wiping down the island countertop as I watched and considered spelling out her new reality for her in terms she wouldn’t misunderstand.
No, too soon.
She would fight me. She might even do something stupid.
Like try to run.
To get Val to stay with me where she belonged, I had to show her a few things. Enzo would never again truly be safe anywhere but here under my roof. And she couldn’t be happy anywhere but here with me. I had to show her what I could provide for her and our son.
In the event she refused to see those things, refused to do the right thing, then I would cross that bridge if we came to it.
The front entrance door slammed shut, something that always pissed me off.
A few seconds later, Tony came into the kitchen carrying a dark red envelope, and immediately I recognized the raised gold lettering on the front.
Fuck. The day just kept getting better.
Without saying a word, I took the envelope from him but didn't bother opening it right there. Everyone in New York knew what this envelope contained.
I’d just received an invitation.
The kind of invitation I couldn’t ignore, not yet… but soon.
“We’ll finish this later,” I said. “I want the names, Valerie. All of them. Make a list while I’m gone.”
She rolled her eyes as she offered Tony a plate of cookies that he greedily accepted.
“If you say so,” she said.
Her bratty dismissal of me in my own kitchen made me want to bend her over my knee and show her what happened to insolent little girls.
The time would come when she found her place by my side in public, on her knees in private, and in my bed every night.
Soon. The time would come.
I gnashed my teeth as I headed for the staircase, needing to get away from her, needing to clear my head before dealing with what waited for me inside the red envelope.
Upstairs in my office, it seemed lonelier than usual. The energy seemed different. So much had happened in the room over the last twenty-four hours.
After sitting down at my desk, in my father’s heavy leather chair, I glanced over at the box holding Val’s necklace. It still belonged to her, and one day she would wear it.
I shook my head, pushed my hand back through my hair.
The empty feeling inside would fade away as soon as I got down to business. It always did.
Gripping the envelope, I sliced the fucking thing open.
Edgardo Lordi.
The man who’d had my father killed. And my brother.
Lordi was many things. A brilliant strategist. An ambitious, successful man. A man whose ambition had led him to break with Cosa Nostra code by taking out another boss without having the Commission’s permission.
A power-hungry, neurotic fuck yet to be punished for it.
This man viewed the pomp and circumstance of clandestine meetings arranged by secret envelopes as a show of strength.
I saw it as cowardice.
Don Lordi surrounded himself with bodyguards and enforcers and shrouded himself in the mystery of a ceremony because he didn’t truly have what it took to protect his empire.
From someone like me.
The invitation served as his demand for my immediate presence. He wanted to talk.
I didn't think it had anything to do with Enzo. That wasn't Lordi’s style. He had more wisdom than to hire someone as sloppy as the Con Amore shooter. And if he wanted to take out my son, he wouldn’t tell me about it.
Granted, killing the boy in front of me would have been cruel. But showing me that I had a son just to take him away would have made this whole thing very personal.
Lordi always separated business from personal.
Even when removing my father and brother from the equation, it wasn’t personal to him. The man’s motives had been straightforward. Take my father’s power and ensure my brother would never come after Lordi seeking revenge.
What was I to this man?
He had let me live as a show of good will, because I didn’t pose a threat to him. More than that, the Commission had left me in place to pick up the pieces of my family. They hadn’t allowed Lordi to absorb my men or undermine my authority as next in line to inherit my father’s empire.
It all worked out for Lordi. He’d eliminated his competition for the open seat and made me look weak, making my father’s connections believe the Vignali organization had become too inconsequential for anyone to worry about.
The last part of his plan didn’t work for long.
Lordi was aware of that now. He’d underestimated me.
I dropped the invitation on my desk and texted Tony to let him know we were leaving and to have him tell my driver to pull the car around. Then I went to the armoire to put on one of my black three-piece suits and a dark red shirt.
Once my father’s style, now mine.
No one could deny I was my father’s son.
Lordi would notice the strong resemblance, and I wanted him to see it. I wanted him to remark on it. I wanted to force him to face the product of his betrayal.
Me.
I doubted it would shake him up, but I wanted him to know he hadn’t completely defeated my family.
His men would search me upon arrival. Only a fool would allow a man with a vendetta to enter his establishment and his presence with a weapon.
Didn’t matter. I wouldn’t go unarmed.
I put a forty-five in my crossover holster, fitted a pistol at the small of my back, and put another in my ankle holster. All uncomfortable and not as practical as the movies made it seem. I hated that misconception.
Then I added two knives, one custom made to slide through my belt loops behind the belt and another in the sole of my shoe. Again, not comfortable. But being within spitting distance of that fucking rat, I would enjoy my discomfort.
Back downstairs, I found Val on her way out of the kitchen. I grabbed her and kissed her hard, showing her one of those things she needed to see, that she was mine.
“I need to go for a sit down,” I said, close to her lips.
She blinked up at me, her cheeks pink, little puffs of breath coming from her pretty mouth.
I had to step back to pull myself away.
“Before I leave, Val, I want to make a few things clear.”
“Okay,” she whispered.
“Our conversation isn't over. We’ll pick it up again tonight, in my room. I’m not going to marry Benedetta. And you are certainly no one's whore.”
Then I kissed her again, not allowing her to respond.
This time she tried to fight me, but only for a second, then her beautiful, soft body melted against mine. She kissed me back, pushing her hands into my hair, claiming me just as fiercely as I claimed her.
Val might not have fully accepted it yet, but her heart and her body knew she belonged to me.
It took about fifty minutes in the city traffic to reach the restaurant where Don Lordi waited for me.
As Jimmy pulled up in front of the building, I noted the red brick construction, no streetside windows, a striped awning leading up to the entrance, and potted Italian cypress trees framing the door.
I’d never been inside. It sat too far out of my territory.
“Could this guy be any more of a cliché?” Tony asked.
I double checked the mags in my pistols. Force of habit. They would take my weapons before I got beyond the vestibule.
“There’ll be cannoli on the table by his revolver,” I said.
We got out of the car, and I headed for the door with Tony covering my back two steps behind and two to the right. He understood the assignment.
As soon as we entered the first set of doors, two of Lordi’s men approached with blank expressions. They patted me down first, taking my phone and just one of my guns.
The lazy fucks.
I'd punish my men for that kind of mistake.
Either they were half asleep, or they had grossly underestimated my ability to threaten their boss.
A grave mistake for Lordi, underestimating me.
Tony received a more thorough pat down, getting stripped of his phone and all weapons other than his ankle piece.
Unlike my own men, Lordi’s guys apparently received no instruction to check below the knee.
Stupidly satisfied, the two of them led us through a dining room full of red chairs and white linen tablecloths to Lordi’s area in the back.
The restaurant echoed with emptiness, of course.
I’d expected a little more class once we reached the back, but it turned out to be just as fucking tacky. Old wood paneling on the walls, seats upholstered in either red faux leather or red velvet, tablecloths draped over three tables. Taper candles shoved into old Chianti bottles.
I never understood bosses like Don Lordi, those who got lost in mafia mystique, making it seem as if they belonged on the set of The Godfather .
Why play at being a mafioso when you were one? Why imitate a stereotype when you knew there was more to it?
Then again, maybe stripping away the ambience, the props, and the bad acting might reveal how Edgardo Lordi wasn't all that impressive.
At least the room smelled of good quality tomato sauce.
Well, surprise, surprise. Lordi sat with two others from the Commission, drinking wine and dining on prosciutto.
I approached the table without acknowledging the extras. They weren't important right now. Instead, I stared at Lordi's fat pock-marked face and jerked my chin up at him.
“What the fuck do you want?” I asked.
“Stefano Vignali, my boy, take a seat.”
He motioned to the empty chair at the table, a seat lower than the others. A little game to make me feel smaller than him and his companions. Only men who knew their power remained vulnerable stooped to using such cheap tricks.
“I'll stand,” I said flatly. “This won’t be a long conversation. And I’m not your boy. Now tell me why I’m here.”
His lip curled in some deformed version of a sneer. Then he addressed his companions.
“He not only looks like his father, but he behaves like him too, doesn't he, boys? Same arrogance in his walk. Same cocksure attitude.”
The other men chuckled. I ignored them.
My focus centered only on the threat in front of me.
“You should be careful, boy. That arrogance is what got your father killed,” Lordi added.
“I disagree. It was his inability to identify a rat,” I said.
Although I presented them with an outwardly calm demeanor, my patience crumbled second by second. Before Lordi could respond, I went on.
“He trusted you. But you should know that I do not make the mistakes my father made. So what’s this about?”
Lordi put down his glass, sat back in his chair, and moved his gaze up and down, inspecting me from head to toe before speaking again.
“You know, boy, I've known you for your entire life. I've got to admit, I never thought much of you. Neither did your father if you want to know the truth. He always said you would have made a better girl. Because you were too weak to lead, on your own or at your brother's side.”
I forced out a dry fucking laugh.
“Funny, he always said you were a loyal friend. My father was a poor judge of character, and we all know that now. I’m still waiting for you to make your point.”
“My point is, yes, you proved him wrong. Your father and I both underestimated you. From the moment he bled out in the street, you started showing the families you were stronger than we thought. Certainly stronger than I imagined. I respect that.
“You pulled it together and kept your family's legacy intact with no outside guidance. I admired that in you, boy, for a time. But now your strength and intelligence have drawn more than admiration. It’s drawing attention and making waves.
“One might even say you’ve become a threat to us all, and I think it's time the Commission deals with you.”