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Dante

My phone kept shootingoff in my pocket, but I ignored it. I chose to disregard the man on the other end . . . My father.

He was looking for me, he was looking for Ivy. He was waiting.

And no one kept my father waiting. But I had decided to make him second to this.

Ivy needed me, and I wasn't going to let her down. The woman had been tossed into my world by sheer coincidence. She was the end result of bad business, and now she was mine.

I couldn't give her back, no fucking way.

If I sent her back to live the life Remo had mapped out for her, I could never call myself a man again.

Because a real man wouldn't stand by knowing the abuse she would be put through, a real man wouldn't let that motherfucker break the only thing that had ever slipped through the cracks and made them whole.

I was a real man. And I wouldn't apologize for doing the right thing.

Pulling into the parking lot just outside of the city, my heart was stampeding with adrenaline and excitement. For the first time in my life I went against the orders I was given.

And it felt great.

The phone vibrated again for the tenth time and this time I couldn't ignore it. Thinking back on how screwed up it was how my family learned of what Sesto did, I couldn't stomach it. The fact he hadn't told us himself was worse to me than actually knowing that he ratted.

My father at least deserved some explanation from me. I wasn't going to leave him wondering, I owed him that if nothing else.

Slamming the door shut, I walked out into the parking lot, staring at the broken and faint lines painted into the cement. This place was desolate and far enough away from the yard that no one would get here before we were long gone.

Instead of driving to the yard, I drove an hour and half in the opposite direction. We'd have a three-hour head start and not one of my father's men would be able to touch us.

Flipping the phone open, I didn't even have the chance to spit out one word before I got a complete earful. “Where the fuck are you? You're already half an hour late. What the fuck didn't you understand about be at the yard in two hours? Fuck, Dante, I swear sometimes I feel like I'm talking to a fucking child with you.”

“Tell Remo I'm sorry—wait, no, tell him that he can go fuck himself. Make sure that last part is really drawn out. Even flip him off if you want to, that would be good too.”

“What the hell is wrong with you? You know what you need to do, stop screwing around and get here. We don't run on your time, you run on mine.”

“We? What, is he holding your hand right now?”

“Dante.”The harsh sound of his voice sent a spike into my skull. “This isn't a fucking joke. Get. Her. Here. Now.”

“No.”

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me. I'm not giving her back to him, he doesn't deserve her.”

A loud burst of air scratched through the speaker, the audible yells of Remo were distant, but there. “Dante, this is the last time I'm going to warn you, if you don't get here now, I'll have no choice.”

“That's where you're wrong, you decide the choice. But not this time, this time it's different. I'm sorry, Dad, but I'm out.”

“You're what?”His teeth ground down as the words trickled out like sand. “You're not out, you're never out unless I take you out. You don't get to call the shots, Dante, I do. Do you really want to lose your life because of that woman?”

“I'm not losing anything, I'm gaining everything.” Rubbing my chin, my hand shook slightly as I pressed the phone to my head. “You won't see me again, you won't have to deal with my fuck ups anymore. Isn't that what you wanted? You always held me to a higher standard, you always compared me to Sesto until he fucked you over. I was never good enough for you, you made that clear. Now I'm making it easy on you, I'll disappear, I'll evaporate into thin air, and you won't have to see me ever again.”

“That's not true.” His voice fell flat as the world he had created was crumbling around him. “You know that's not true, you're my son, that won't change.”

“But it changed with Sesto . . . Him going to the cops was enough for you to put out a hit on him, he was your son too. When does the line get drawn? When is blood thicker than water?”

My father had always dreamed that my brother and I would take over once he was gone. He had groomed my brother to take his place, fed me all the nutrients I needed to be the second hand. Bane Pisani had created our world, he made himself into an empire that he claimed was for us.