Page 128 of Die for You

“You know who. Let me make it up to you.”

“Really?” she says, her eyes bright.

“Yes.”

“How?”

“Whatever you want.”

She taps her lip in thought. “Whatever I want?”

“Yes, baby, anything.”

“I want what I’ve asked for…I want her dead. That’s all I ask. Allow me to avenge my father, and everything will be over.”

“Okay, you win. Untie me and I’ll do it.”

Bria looks for any signs of deceit. But eventually, she ambles over behind me. She places the box cutter at the rope around my wrists and slices through.

“I love you, Lennon…”

I feel a slash across my back.

“But you were never a good liar.” She laughs hysterically, seeing through my ruse.

Blood spills from the wound she made, and I know this is merely the beginning.

“Your men are now mine. Gianna’s men are now mine. I am unstoppable. This entire fucking town will submit to me.”

“Take it, it’s yours.”

“I don’t need your permission. I have it. Your name is ruined, Lenny.”

“Just kill me and be done with it.”

“Kill you?” Bria questions, licking her lips. “Why would I want to do that? Killing you would be easy. I’d rather you live a life with shame as the once all-powerful, almighty Mafia king. Shame will follow you wherever you go. That’s a punishment far worse than death. You’re ruined, and nothing but an embarrassment. Overthrown by your own wife.”

She’s right. I would rather death than live with a tarnished reputation because once you commit to this life, there’s no getting out.

The men who once followed me will see me as a coward. A man’s honor is everything, and Bria is taking it away.

“I killed all your confidants. I burned down my father’s store because I’m starting fresh. A new era approaches, and it’s one I built myself. Everyone will remember my name.”

She’s doing all this for notoriety and believes she has something to prove. But her father has the respect he does because he was honorable.

His daughter is anything but.

“This entire time, I thought Gianna was the bad guy, but it was you. You’re the one who kidnapped Lettie? You knew about her this whole time?” Valentina deduces.

“Yes. I came to Gianna with a proposition to use your bastard child as bait, knowing she’d take it because, look what she did to you. She was desperate and weak, and this was the only way to get what she wanted. Even until the very end, she believed she was going to win, that we were still in the sisterhood together.”

“Don’t youdarecall my daughter that,” Valentina snarls. “If anyone, you’re the home-wrecker, you fucking psycho!”

“Why do you get to have it all? Lenny’s love and his child. It was supposed to be me, not you! But I played all of you. I was under your noses this entire time, but I was underestimated. But never again. As Gianna says, to love is to be weak. And I don’t plan on being weak ever again. A woman scorned is a dangerous thing.”

She snaps her fingers, and Hugo jumps to command. He enters a moment later with a man I’ve never seen before. I assume he’s one of Gianna’s.

The other people they drag in, Idorecognize.