Page 15 of Angel of Light (Lords of The Commission: New York #5)

“I could throw those words right back at you. Whatever opportunity you saw in the deals struck with the Alcaráz cartel isn’t there anymore, is she ?

” Vincenzo’s jaw tightened as soon as my words hit his ears.

That was the slip I was waiting for to confirm my suspicions.

He was right where I wanted him. I only needed a last low blow to tip him over the edge.

“What is it? Does she not like the stick?”

Fearlessness.

Vincenzo’s hand flew off his cane, pulling on the adorning skull. The sharp blade attached to it was now pressed against my jugular, drawing blood right upon impact.

His movement was restrained, though. Made to scare, not to kill.

“ She,” he hissed in a whisper right to my face, “is none of your goddamn business.”

My lips quirked into a grin. It might not have been a confession, but it was enough to point me in the right direction. My eyes grew wide and wild, my nose flaring in a rage that didn’t fit my fragile position under the bite of steel sinking deeper into my skin.

“Mi Vida.” My life , I whispered her nickname to him in Spanish, and that was enough for him to lose that last grip on his sanity.

Confirmation that Vincenzo was gambling with Alison in an all-in of life or death had me losing my grip and taste for my beating heart. My survival was a commodity. One I’d too easily give up on when hers was at stake.

Alison was a trading item for him. But now I knew where to dig for his hidden treasure.

Check, motherfucker.

“MASSIMO!” Matt roared, drawing his Glock and firmly pressing it against Vincenzo’s skull. I had two barrels digging so deep into my kidneys they could feel stones if I had any. I heard Jimmy draw his gun behind me, too, pointing at the double F’s, if I had to guess.

“Put. The blade. Down.” Matt ordered, punctuating his words for effect.

Vincenzo’s glower was deeply buried in mine, too lost in anger to register anything else besides the likes of me. I, on the other hand, was glowing in victory, my wrath daring him to finish what he started.

“Do it. We both know you want to.”

Time stopped as we faced this impasse. A breath wrongly drawn was enough to turn this dull hallway into a masterpiece of splattered red.

“Massimo! I said, put the fucking blade down.” A nudge of Matt’s weapon against Vincenzo’s skull snapped him out of his wrathful comatose, standing down with the bitter taste of defeat on his tongue.

Sometimes, stupidity did pay off.

“A Battaglia, after all,” Vincenzo spat, his tone drenched in venom and spite.

Slaughter would have to wait for now. It seemed like today wasn’t a good day to die.

Matt held his breath until Vincenzo and his two-man entourage were gone. He had his controlled demeanor firmly in place, complete with a puffed chest and signature dark glower. Cold, weary, and calculating, as opposed to whatever defined the dire place I had just crossed over to.

As fucked up as it was, I couldn’t hold back the sardonic snicker as my finger swiped across the trail of blood running down my neck. Not amusement in the slightest. Disbelief, maybe. Poetic fucking irony.

It appeared that we now had a matching pair of scars.

“Make sure they leave the building,” Matt said to Jimmy, waiting for him to be gone before he glared back at me and spoke again. “What the fuck, Max?”

As much as the bulging vein on Matt’s forehead had me standing straighter in the past, it did nothing to silence the scornful laugh I was possessed with.

I had momentarily turned into a psychopath who laughed in the face of death.

That reaper, though? He seemed a little too friendly to earn my fear.

Vincenzo didn’t have the balls to carry his threat through. He’d be too far gone for any chance at redemption. Knowing your days are numbered could have you itching to make peace with your demons in a desperate greed for white wings and a damn halo.

Fuck that. White never suited men like us. His days were numbered. Probably all of ours were, too, as soon as our Omertá was sworn.

“I’m not even going to pretend I understood half of what just happened, but it’s the last fucking time you go all Joker at my sister’s door, or I’ll finish what Vincenzo started. Got it?”

I reined in my deranged attitude, quieting down into a silence way worse than any blast as I nodded in agreement. That fucker was gambling with Alison’s life. I wasn’t one to do the same.

“Now… tell me what happened in there .” Matt pointed towards Alison’s shut door, his eyebrow still raised in annoyance. “ Before I arrived.”

“Nothing. Why?”

Matt exhaled deeply, holding the bridge of his nose between his thumb and index. Clearly my reply was doing a poor job of convincing him. Still, he could pull that Glock on me before I confessed to the unholy things Alison and I had been doing before they ruined a perfect fucking night.

“She still doesn’t remember?” He wisely chose ignorance, knowing fairly well he wouldn’t want to hear the details of a truthful answer to his first question. Knowing I was shoved so far down his sister’s throat that I had permanently rearranged her tonsils surely wasn’t in his top cravings.

“Nope.” I wasn’t about to expose Alison’s little lie, either. I was oblivious to her reasoning, but it was more than clear to me where my loyalty stood now. “Not that she would tell me before you. I reckon the fucking deal still stands?” I asked, referring to the damn marriage.

“It does.”

“I won’t be there when you break the news to her for the second time.”

“It’s not a moment I’m looking forward to, either,” Matt confessed with a heavy semblance.

“Then fuck honor. Vincenzo hasn’t been playing it clean. Why should you?”

“All I hear is a shitload of words, Max! The same finger pointed vengefully at the person who will soon have what you crave. Find me the fucking proof, and I’ll carve the bullet and load it into your gun for you. Before that, I’m bound by–“

“Honor and blood,” I interrupted, hating the feeling of those words on my tongue. They were getting real old real fast.

“My word,” He corrected me. “And hers. Alison chose this. She said yes.” I might have tipped her into doing it. Was this karma? Bitter fucker.

“Would she have ever denied you the love of your life?” It wasn’t a question.

It was a guilt trap and I couldn’t bring myself to feel ashamed for it.

It was to give reason to all Matt had put Francesca through that Alison accepted this marriage.

It was because of her that they got their happy ever after.

She would have walked under acid rain if that meant happiness for the ones she loved. The proposal wasn’t fair to begin with.

“Is that what you are to her?” Matt asked, catching me off guard.

I held his gaze for longer than I should, hope slashing its way through my thick skin before reality kicked me in the gut. It hurt a lot more than the cut bleeding onto my collar. “It doesn’t matter, does it?”

I’d take whatever time I had with her, but I couldn’t let myself fall down that hope slope. I couldn’t fool myself into thinking she would be mine forever.

But the truth was slipping off my tongue before I could hold it back, “Either way, I do know it’s what she is to me, and I’ll do whatever it takes to see that she’s safe. Vincenzo is far from it.”

“Give me proof, Max,” he repeated. “Give me the gateway, and I’ll cross him over myself. Until then, your dick stays in your pants, or I’ll be forced to cut you loose.”

Those words were as good as gone with the fucking wind. I was feeling every bit like the Joker tonight, and Alison was my Harley.

The only crimson running in the aftermath of that face-to-face was mine. That definitely wouldn’t cut it for me tonight. I was bloodlusting too hard to simmer. Yet it seemed that blood wasn’t on the menu tonight.

No. Fucking. Problem.

I’ll gladly settle for cum.