Page 3 of Capone (Sinful Warriors MC #6)

Chapter Two

GIOVANNA

S ix days. That’s how long it's been since my already broken life had shattered into a million pieces. They took her. They took my baby!

After I was tased, I passed out and was stuffed into my trunk. My attacker went and grabbed my baby from her car seat and got back inside their vehicle, taking my baby with them.

I hadn’t slept. I’d barely eaten. I hadn’t even left Gabi’s room other than to shower and use the bathroom.

I felt like a walking zombie. Derek’s brother, Danny, who was also an agent with STF, had been working day and night trying to locate Gabrielle.

He hadn’t found a single clue as to who took her and why.

My mother got on a plane and came as soon as I called her crying, telling her what had happened. I wasn’t surprised when she showed up alone. I hadn’t spoken to my father in years. He was a traditional Italian man. He didn’t like it when I refused to allow him to make decisions regarding my life.

Growing up, I had the perfect childhood.

I was spoiled and got any and everything I wanted.

I never knew what my father did to afford us the lifestyle we lived until I turned twenty-one.

He came to me with a marriage arrangement to the son of a business partner of his. When I refused, he became enraged.

It was then that I found out that my father had been living a dangerous life. He was the top weapons distributor on the West Coast. Illegally, I might add. I was in shock, but not as shocked that he had set me up to marry the son of a Mafia Don who would soon be taking over.

I was livid with him, but all he cared about was solidifying his position with the Mafia.

All he could talk about was the money it would bring in and how we would be untouchable.

He didn’t care that I was still a virgin, and in no way did I want to give something so precious away to a complete stranger.

At one point, he told me I didn’t have a choice because he funded my life. And that he did. My car and my apartment were paid for by him. I couldn’t believe he was throwing that in my face. My mother tried reasoning with my father, but he wouldn’t hear it.

I heard the cries of my younger siblings from the hall as they listened to us scream at one another. In the end, my father gave me an ultimatum. Either I marry the future Mafia Don, or I could be disowned.

I was hurt.

I loved my father so much. I had never seen this coming. Growing up, he was the perfect father. He loved and doted on me every chance he got. To see him switch to the careless monster he was today killed me.

My father got the surprise of his life when I chose to be disowned. He informed me not to bother going back to the apartment because he would have the locks changed by the time I got there. He took my car keys and told me to leave his home and not to come back until I was ready to do as I was told.

That day never came.

My best friend, Kelly, offered me her couch until I could get back on my feet. My mother was conflicted. She wanted to leave, but she had four children and a twenty-five-year marriage on the line. She and my father argued constantly. She was stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Part of me was angry with her for staying, but my father was all that she knew. She didn’t care what he felt. She didn’t turn her back on me. She offered me money a few times, but I always declined. I didn’t want anything else from him.

I ended up getting a job at a diner. I saved and saved until I was able to afford a small one-bedroom apartment. I enrolled at a local community college. My life had finally gotten back on track.

And then I met Derek.

He came into the diner one night and instantly began to pursue me. I tried resisting him at first. I was nowhere near in the headspace to be in a relationship. I was still figuring out my life, but in the end, he convinced me to go on a date. From there, I fell hard and fast for that man.

Six months into our relationship, I gave him my virginity. I was pregnant three months later. When I told my mother, she cried tears of joy. She was so excited to become a grandparent. My father, not so much.

When he actually said I was muddying my blood by reproducing with a Black man, I had enough.

I told my father to forget I ever existed.

I didn’t want anyone who thought of my baby that way to have anything to do with her.

From that day on, we never spoke to each other.

Gabi had never met him. She didn’t even know what he looked like.

When Derek proposed, I accepted. My father made sure to let me know I was making the biggest mistake of my life, and he couldn’t wait to laugh in my face.

I’m sure he would have had something done to Derek if he didn’t work for the government.

My father didn’t need the STF sniffing around his illegal business.

Once Gabrielle was born, I had settled into a housewife role, setting my dreams of opening my own bakery aside. I hadn’t worked since I found out I was pregnant. Derek didn’t like the idea of my working while pregnant. He pressed the issue until I finally gave in.

We married when Gabi was six months old, and I was happy.

Then, our one-year anniversary came. Things began to change.

All of a sudden, Derek was taking more business trips than normal.

He spent more time away from home than in it.

When I voiced feeling neglected, Derek sweet-talked me until I let it go.

He would always say he wanted to give his girls the world. I just wanted to scream I didn’t want the world. Just him. But instead, I kept my mouth shut and prayed things would get better.

I loved Derek with my whole heart. His working too much didn’t warrant me leaving him. I would look like a fool to leave a good man who loved and provided for his family. Around the time he was killed, we had begun arguing more.

It had been almost a year of the same thing.

I was fed up. I didn’t feel loved, and I had slowly started giving up.

No matter what I said, he wouldn’t budge with his work.

I started to feel like there had to be someone else.

Danny didn’t travel as much as he did. He was always home with his girlfriend, Nicole.

Hell, even Nicole was an agent. So, I really couldn’t understand how they were always home, and he wasn’t.

When I brought that up to him, it was the first time he had raised his voice at me.

He told me to stop comparing what we had to others.

He left the house that night and didn’t come back until morning.

I cried myself to sleep that night. A week after that fight, Derek was killed.

Despite the problems we were having, I was devastated.

A knock on Gabi’s bedroom door stirred me from my thoughts. I lifted my head from the unicorn stuffy I had been cuddling in Gabrielle’s bed just as my mom opened the door.

“Giovanna, you have to eat something, sweetheart.”

She had a plate of her famous lasagna in her hand. My stomach rumbled from the smell. I hadn’t eaten anything since yesterday morning. Most of the time I couldn’t hold anything down.

All I wanted was Gabrielle back.

“I’m not hungry,” I mumbled.

My mother watched me with sad eyes. Just as she opened her mouth to say something, the doorbell rang. I jumped out the bed and ran to the front door. I swung the door open in a rush. Danny and his boss, Mercury, were standing there with blank expressions.

Immediately, I broke down. “What happened?” I cried. I started to fall to the ground, but Danny caught me.

“Nothing, Giovanna. We’re just here to talk to you.”

He guided me into the living room. I took a seat on the couch, staring up at them through my tears. After Mercury took his seat, he cleared his throat.

“We haven’t been able to get a lead on Gabrielle’s whereabouts.”

I shook my head frantically as a cry ripped through me. “Not again!” I sobbed as my mother took a seat next to me and wrapped me up in her arms.

“We have a plan, Giovanna,” Mercury reassured me.

My cries turned into whimpers as I gave them my full attention. “What is it?”

“I’m going to ask two former agents to help us on the case. They were by far the best agents the STF has ever had. If anyone can find Gabrielle, I know Cara and Sara can.”

Their names sounded so familiar. Then it clicked. “Isn’t Cara your ex?” I asked Danny.

He nodded solemnly. “Yes, but like Mercury said, she and her sister are the best. Mercury, Nicole, and I are flying out first thing in the morning to ask them for their help.”

I stood, wiping my face with the back of my hand. “I’m coming too.”

“Giovanna, you can’t?—”

“I wasn’t asking Danny. I’m losing my mind in this house. I’m going,” I repeated with finality.

Mercury and Danny sighed in frustration. “Look, we’ll take you, but you can’t interfere, Giovanna,” Mercury said sternly.

“I won’t. I just want to be in the loop. I need my baby girl back, Mercury,” I said as fresh tears slid down my cheeks.

Danny wrapped me in his arms. “We’ll be back at seven in the morning to get you.”

“I’ll be ready.”

After they left, my mother got me to eat a little of the lasagna she prepared before I went and packed a suitcase. She was going to head back home since I wasn’t going to be here. She made sure to let me know to keep her filled in.

After my suitcase was packed, I went and lay in Gabrielle’s bed like I had been doing since she was taken. As I lay there, I sent a silent prayer that Mercury and Danny were right about Sara and Cara because without them, I didn’t know what that meant for Gabrielle.