Page 66 of Brutal Devil

I think back on the day I met them all at Club Venere, how convinced I was that the Andrianis were using leverage against my father to force me into marrying Priest.

“That’s news to me.”

“You mean Priest never told you?”

“We haven’t exactly had a lot of heart-to-hearts,” I point out.

Because we’ve been too busy either being at each other’s throats or, most recently, fucking like animals. Not one of my finer moments. I’m still furious with myself for what happened in the casino’s observation room.

“We found out about Amedeo’s plan to clip your father and Squeaky and become don. The bloodshed between the families had finally started to calm down in the last few years after…”

Saint’s words trail away, and I realize he’s talking about Leo’s murder.

The rush of tears pricks my eyes. I suspect it always will whenever I’m forced to think about my beloved brother being gunned down in a dark alley and left to bleed in the street.

“Sorry,” Saint says gruffly. “I didn’t mean to bring it up.”

“It’s still hard for me to think about him.” I blink hard and a tear escapes, rolling down my cheek.

“Fuck.” He gets up and stalks off, coming back with a tissue box he holds out for me. “Here.”

For a second, I debate pretending I’m not crying and that this show of weakness isn’t happening. But then another tear breaks free, so I swallow my pride and grab a tissue. “Thanks.”

“So, like I was saying. There’s not been much love lost between families,” Saint continues. “Your father was an asshole, but he knew the rules and, for the most part, he didn’t break them. The Animal is a different fucking story. He’s unpredictable. A crazy fucker.”

I nod. I had forgotten about Amedeo’s nickname. He earned it by chewing off a guy’s ear before shooting him in the face. It’s a heartwarming tale I didn’t learn until I was a teenager, old enough to be curious about the whispers I’d heard and to ask questions. Questions I quickly discovered I didn’t want the answers to.

“Amedeo is volatile,” I agree, understanding why the Andrianis wouldn’t want to face someone like him as don of the Revellos.

“The Animal has a crew who’s loyal to him, but most of the Revello family doesn’t want to see him become boss. One of them came to us with the plot against your father and Squeaky.”

The animosity and tension of the meeting at Club Venere makes sense. Priest was reluctantly helping a rival he hated, but only because doing so would ultimately put the Andriani family in a better position.

“It was hardly altruistic of Priest to go to my father with Amedeo’s plot,” I point out. “He was trying to protect the Andrianis.”

“That’s his job as don.”

“True. But he didn’t need to force me into marrying him to protect the Andrianis.”

“Yes, he did, Luna.”

I wad up the tissue in my fist, my tears dried up by anger for now. “Explain, then.”

“When Priest went to Tomasso with the plot, your father proposed a marriage between the Revellos and the Andrianis to reunite the warring families. He knew at least half the capos in the family would side with him against Amedeo and that the family would unite stronger with blood ties. Bringing the Revello faction back into the Andriani family would neutralize Amedeo with the least amount of bloodshed and restore peace. It would also ensure that Amedeo the Animal would never become don.”

It’s a lot to take in. Priest has shared some of this with me, but not all of it, and I wonder why he didn’t tell me this whole arranged marriage was my father’s idea. True, Priest agreed to it. But I’ve spent all this time thinking it was the Andrianis who forced my father’s hand. Who made him lie to me and lure me across the country for their own selfish gain.

The truth is, my father is the one who orchestrated this entire, fucked-up situation.

“So my father wasn’t forced to sell me off,” I say, allowing it to sink in.

Some part of me had been clinging to the hope that my father hadn’t had any other recourse. That there had been no choice for him to go back on his word and marry me off to Priest. That little part shrivels up and dies inside me, like a plant in a drought.

“In a way, he was, and in a way, he wasn’t. The circumstances didn’t leave him with many options. He didn’t want the Animal to become don, not after finding out that he was plotting to murder him. There was only one way to keep that from happening.”

“He wanted vengeance so badly that he chose it over me.” As I say the words, a kind of icy tranquility overtakes me.

My father was dying, and even then, he put the family first. I wonder if he cared for me at all or if I was only ever a bargaining chip.