Page 35 of Dirty Mafia Torment

Cling without knowing it is hollow.

Cling without knowing what I’m holding is a cruel lie.

CHAPTER FIVE

RENZO

Present

She’s gotevery reason to hate me.

I lie here on the floor in my father’s office, eyes pinned to the ceiling like the cracks above might spell out the meaning of my fucked-up existence. Instead, all I see is her face. Her beautiful stricken expression. The fire still burning in her eyes. Her disappointment. The loathing. She looked at me like I was something deranged, something already damned.

And I am.

The truth? In a weak and impulsive moment, I caved. Chasing that high like it was oxygen. I let it crawl under my skin and hollow me out, because it’s easier to feed the craving than to face myself.

They say the first step to solving a problem is acknowledging you have one. Like my efforts to escape my destiny are the issue, when it’s the Life I dread.

Except the path I swore I wanted is stale and rotten. As withmost things, I’ve grown bored with living a life of excess. Waking up in strange beds, getting off on the thrill of a punch, flashing a middle finger at the mafiosi around me—my father, my brother—believing the world I occupy is superior to their tightly rigid one.

I don’t see life through rose-colored glasses. I see it through shot glasses.

And I’ve become exactly who they said I was.

Broken. Messy. Weak.

I’ve dragged everyone down with me—especially Elia Seraphina … Accardo.

My hand balls into a fist. Why the fuck didn’t she run? Why didn’t she take the out and disappear? She was halfway there; I’d made sure of it. But instead she put her faith in a bullshit promise from a man who’d just buried himself inside the tightest, sweetest pussy he’d ever had, then thought he owned her because of it.

Christ. I told her months ago I wasn’t her savior. Thought she was smart enough to save herself.

But I was wrong.

I failed her.

And I deserve every ounce of her hatred.

“Renzo?” my father’s new wife calls out, dragging me back from the darkness. Her soft footsteps approach, then I feel her hovering over me. “What are you doing on the floor? Are you okay?” The concern in her tone is a knife between my ribs.

Growing worried by my silence, Alessia nudges me with her foot.

I grab her ankle, just like I did when we first met. “Your panties red, angel?”

She wiggles free, then sinks to the floor, her wedding dress billowing as she rolls onto her back beside me. “My panties aren’t your concern.”

“But we were almost married.”

Yeah, that’s the really fucked-up part about what I’ve done. I pitched the idea of marrying Alessia to my father after I’d already promised Fina we’d marry. Like I could juggle two lives, play saviortwice, and come out clean. My mind bent on this crazy-ass plan—marry one to free her, marry the other to save her.

In the end, I fucked them both over.

I just hope Fina never learns the truth. She deserves more than the pain I’ve caused her.

I turn to Alessia. “Don’t you have wedding guests to greet?”

“Family is more important.”