Page 67 of Broken Mafia Prince (His to Break #1)

RAFFAELE

T he light breeze whips lightly at my hair, pushing it into my face. I drag a hand through the dark strands, pushing it back. It’s cold, but I can barely feel it. All of me feels numb and disconnected from reality.

For so long, I’ve battled with making a decision, terrified that each one is the wrong one.

It feels relieving to finally make up my mind, and I wonder why it took me so long.

What the fuck was I thinking debating between the woman I loved, my happy future with her, and a life of blood, death, and terror?

The me that had any lingering loyalty left for my family is dead and buried, and I hope it never fucking resurfaces.

Where was this goddamn family when my mother was ridiculed in her own home? When she died and nobody mourned her? What about the burial that only the house staff and I attended?

No.

I’ve given all I can, and I won’t give another inch for this family. If I stay here, my father will turn me into my worst nightmare: him. And I can’t let that happen.

I pull the Gagliardi family ring off my finger and hold it up to the fading light of the day, inspecting the engraved family seal. Once upon a time, I was so proud to get my own ring, so eager to wear it and feel like a man. I scoff.

A second later, the ring flies out of my fingers, somersaulting in the air once, twice, then dropping down into the inky depths of the lake. I don’t watch it disappear, my focus on the group of men laughing at their own jokes while offloading crates from a truck.

A part of me will miss this life: the bustle and the danger, the strategizing, the money, the thrill. Anyone who’s lived long enough in it will miss it.

My fingers clench into fists at my side, and I turn away. I freeze when I see the figure standing several feet away from me, leaning up against a wall and looking like he doesn’t have a care in the world. Sticking my hands in my pockets, I march toward him.

“How did you know I’d be here?” I ask as soon as I’m close.

Matteo raises a brow, his lips quirking into a smirk. “It wasn’t difficult to guess. You’re becoming predictable these days. I could probably set a clock by your routine.”

“Will you ever stop stalking me, Matteo?”

“Only when you stop making it so easy,” he says with a shrug.

I scoff. “What do you want?”

“Just here to make sure you don’t suddenly decide that jumping off is the better option.”

“I wasn’t going to.”

There’s a pause and then: “What are you going to do? You know you have to make a choice, right?”

First Tommaso, and now him. “So I keep hearing.”

“Well?” he prompts.

“I’ve sacrificed too much for this family,” I tell him. “I’m done with that.”

My best friend watches me for a long moment. I don’t know what expression he’s searching for, but he must find it because moments later, he lets out a throaty chuckle.

“I had a feeling it’d come to this.” He shakes his head, a smile playing on his mouth. “You know this isn’t going to be easy, right? Your father won’t sit back and let you destroy all his plans. He’s waited his whole life for this moment.”

“I think a part of me has waited my whole life to finally give him the middle finger,” I admit.

I try to read Matteo’s expression, but whatever he’s thinking is carefully hidden behind an impenetrable wall.

He’s always had my back, always quick to jump in when I needed help over the years.

Matteo is a good man, a loyal friend, but I won’t hold it against him if he doesn’t join me in going up against my father.

I can’t ask him to join me in what may just turn out to be a suicide mission.

Edoardo might be a bastard of epic proportions, but he’s also shrewd.

Not to mention that he has Emilio and the entire Gagliardi family at his side.

The only thing I have on my side is the love I feel for Giulia and my desire to keep her safe.

“You don’t have to be a part of this,” I tell him. “This is my fight and?—”

“Your fight is my fight,” he cuts in, glaring at me. “Don’t bloody tell me I don’t have to be a part of this. I’m already a part of this, Raff. I became part of it the moment I stepped foot in Chicago.”

“This is dangerous, Matteo. The risks are?—”

He takes a step forward, jaw clenched. “You think I don’t know the risks? I do. I’m not a kid, Raff. I know exactly what I’m getting into, and I’m not backing out. So stop giving me a way out. I don’t want one.”

Matteo holds out his hand to me, eyes determined. “Are we doing this or not?”

A smile curves my mouth, and I clasp his hand. “We’re doing this.”

“Now for fuck’s sake, tell me you have a plan, and we aren’t just running headfirst into Edoardo’s trap,” he grouses. “While I’ve been itching to do something as crazy as that, I also plan on living to thirty.”

I throw my head back and let out a loud bark. “You crazy bastard.”

Hours later, I pull up at a run-down strip club. From the sideview mirror, I see Matteo’s head poke out from his truck, looking questioning. I didn’t tell him much more than we’re meeting some important people outside of town.

I step down from the car and crack my neck, waiting for the other man to reach my side.

“Does Giulia know this is where you get your stress relief?” he teases as we make our way into the building.

Ignoring him, I nod at the bouncer at the door, who looks rather uninterested in our arrival.

The inside of the building is just as gloomy as the outside.

A few drugged-out women twirl around the poles in the center of the room while rough-looking men leer at them, occasionally tossing a few crumpled dollar bills at their feet.

The club and the watered-down drinks they’re serving aren’t my business, though.

I continue to the back of the club where a thin curtain separates the private room from the rest of the club. A round, rusted metal table sits in the center of the room, with six men already seated around it.

“About time you got here,” one of the men says, puffing on his cigar.

“I hope I haven’t kept you waiting for long.” I pull out a chair and drop down into it.

All the men seated at the table have been carefully selected by me in this rebellion against my father.

I’ve chosen them for a number of reasons—manpower, their possession of arms, and their ability to keep their mouths shut.

It was almost impossible to find people willing to go up against my father, and I don’t blame them for not wanting to.

Edoardo is infamous for brutally crushing his enemies until nothing remains of them.

“No point wasting time—we all know why we’re here.” I lean forward. “My father is planning his final hit on the Montanaris. Bigger. Bloodier. Three days from now. He wants to finish what he started—wipe them out, take their territory, and make Enrico kneel.”

A hostile takeover, the kind that leaves bodies in the streets and sends a message no one can ignore.

At my side, I feel Matteo tense. Surprised murmurs ripple across the room, and I sit back, waiting for it to die down.

“No way,” someone scoffs. “Didn’t he just try to hit their shipment at the docks? Fine, they barely made it through, but both sides lost a lot of men in that shootout.”

“I can’t even believe it,” another follows. “There’s no way he’s able to regroup in such a short amount of time. We all saw the damage. Edoardo might have a lot of soldiers, but they’re not infinite.”

“You don’t know how desperate he is for Montanari blood,” I say. “He’s bringing in the Russians and the Vitellis. He thinks that attacking now that their defenses are weak. That they won’t see him coming.”

“Edoardo hates the Russians,” Matteo points out.

I slant him a look. “Exactly.”

The fact that my father has put aside his hatred for them for this war with the Montanaris just shows how deep he’s gotten.

There’s no stepping back from this anymore for him.

This will either be the biggest loss of his life or his greatest victory.

I’m going to do my damn best to make sure it’s the former.

“He’s a desperate motherfucker,” one of the men laughs.

“How are we doing this?” Matteo asks.

Silence falls over the room, the men looking at me with eyes full of expectation and trust. Every man here is depending on me to lead them through this, because they’ve all seen the effects of this war, and they know that no good can come out of more fighting.

They know that if we don’t try to put an end to this, my father is going to bury us all.

“We have to stop my father and his soldiers before they get to the Montanaris,” I tell them. “You’re probably asking yourselves how the hell we’re going to do that.”

I wait for the slow, reluctant nods from the men. “Garbage trucks will block off the roads. Timing is our best friend here. We need to lock my father’s men in one street and end this once and for all.”

“A street fight will attract every law enforcement agent in the vicinity,” one of the men points out, dragging a thoughtful hand through his bushy beard. “What are we going to do about the cops? Because there’s no way we can get every last one of them to turn a blind eye.”

“I have it on good authority that this entire street will be under construction for two days starting tomorrow,” I explain. “We need to herd Edoardo’s men into the blocked-off street, and we’re going to do that using a car chase.”

“It sounds easy in theory, but we can’t completely predict that they’ll fall for it,” Matteo says. “What do we do then?”

“Then we do it the old-fashioned way.” I smirk, moving my gaze around the table to meet each man’s eyes. “Bombs.”

Someone wolf whistles. “I hope you know what you’re doing, Raffaele. If not, you’re going to bring down the foundations of this world, and it’ll drop right on our heads.”

I shrug. “Either way, the foundations are going down. The only thing you should be worried about is which side you want to be on when it does. Inside the house or outside the fence, looking in. Your choice.”

The silence in the room is fraught with tension, each man considering their position and making their final decision.

With me or against me.

At my side, Matteo finally breaks the silence, reaching for an empty glass on the table and pouring a finger of whiskey into it. He takes a single sip, makes a pleased sound, and holds the glass up in the air.

“Let’s put an end to this.” His voice rings out, deep and clear, “To the end.”

“To the end.” I raise my glass.

One by one, the men raise their glasses until we’re all toasting to putting this messy family rivalry where it belongs: in the grave.

Gratitude pulses in my chest when Matteo turns and nods at me.

I’m doing this for all of our futures, but their choosing to stand by me and trust me is the best gift I could have ever gotten.

I swear to myself in that moment that I won’t fail them.

And no matter the consequences of this final battle, I’ll make sure that they all get out of this alive.

Later, it’s just Matteo and me sitting in the room, drinking quietly. He looks completely too relaxed for someone who’s just pledged to be on a new side of history. I’m the opposite of relaxed. My body pulses with anxious energy, fear, and excitement.

“Do me a favor,” I say quietly, eyes locking on his. “One more favor.”

“Anything.”

I tilt my head back and stare up at the ceiling, trying to breathe evenly.

The only thing I’ve been able to think about is Giulia getting hurt in the middle of this.

I can’t let that happen. I can’t let anything happen to her.

She’s the reason for all of this in the first place, and if she doesn’t make it out alive, this would all be for nothing.

I’d have failed.

I can’t fail in this.

“If I don’t make it out alive, I want you to make sure Giulia gets away.”

“Don’t jinx this, you asshole,” he bites out.

I ignore him. “Promise me.”

“I’m not going to let you?—”

I sigh and face him. “Matteo, please. Promise me.”

An emotion I can’t place flits through his eyes. “I promise. But you’d better think twice about dying, Raff. Don’t think I’ll hesitate to put a ring on your sassy brunette and help her forget all about you.”

I laugh. “I’d love to see you try.”