Page 55

Chapter Thirty-Six

Vinny

M y blood pumps with adrenaline. Fuck, I can’t wait to deal with this scumbag. It’s been years in the making, and finally, fucking finally, I have the perfect excuse to rid the world of the pathetic lowlife that is Robert Kennedy.

Massio slides open the warehouse door, and my eyes find Rocco sitting on a crate cleaning his nails with the damn knife he never lets out of his sight. My son has a thing for blood play, and after witnessing the cuts on his wife, I’d have a guess that it spills over into his bedroom too.

“Nice of you to join us.” Rafael raises a critical eyebrow in my direction, and if I wasn’t in my fifties, I would flip him the bird.

“Papa takes longer to get out of bed in the morning, isn’t that right, Papa?” Rocco taunts while speaking obnoxiously loudly .

Massio chuckles, and the moment my gaze slices to his, he slams his mouth shut.

“He’s just coming ’round.” Tommy gives Robert a swift kick that has him howling like a bitch.

The man looks barely able to hold his head, and I smile at the way my boys have worked him over.

Blood oozes from his nose, his lip is split, and his shirt is bloody and sliced up, telling me Rocco has already started on his torture.

The chain he clings onto is stretching his arms to capacity, and I have to hand it to my boys, they know what they’re doing.

“Did Daddy get his milk and cookies before leaving this morning?” Rocco’s eyebrows dance with jest, and this time I slap the back of his head.

“Shut the fuck up, that’s your future stepmother you’re talking about.”

“Fucking great. You’re barely here most of the time already,” Rafael chastises, and I sneer in his direction. I’ve dedicated enough of my fucking life to the Mafia. If I want to slow down, then I fucking will, especially now that I have a reason to.

Rafael steps forward. “You need to take a look at what we discovered when we located him.” He holds out his phone to me, and I take it.

Slowly, I take in what I’m seeing. A dark room with a mattress on the floor with one thin sheet and a crib beside it. “It’s the basement. Seems like he kept her there.”

Anger.

Fury.

Utter rage burns beneath my skin .

A deep hue of violent red surges inside me, blocking the light from my eyes.

He kept them in a fucking basement.

What the actual fuck?

“Keep going.” He gestures toward the phone, and my thumb shakes as I swipe onto the next image showing a door with a padlock.

My legs threaten to buckle. I don’t know what’s more shocking, seeing these images or my reaction to them.

I’ve seen some serious fucked-up shit before now, but nothing, and I mean nothing, has drawn this reaction from me.

“He locked the basement door. They were practically prisoners,” Rafael continues, and all I can think about is how I’m going to destroy him bit by fucking bit.

Prisoners?

My beautiful girls were treated so cruelly.

A voracious anger takes over me, and my nostrils flare as every muscle in my body coils at what Rafael is telling me. I swipe along to the next one, a lock on the refrigerator. He locked the fucking refrigerator? No wonder she ate so little when she first came to me.

My blood boils and the fury inside me feels like no other. The only time I have ever felt like this is when one of the bitches I married tried to harm Rocco.

All of her vulnerability that bleeds from her makes sense now—the lack of clothes, the being grateful for the smallest of items.

She had next to nothing. Hell, she didn’t even have a bed.

“There’s no records of her going to school either, or healthcare,” Rafael adds, and I snap my focus to him.

Her struggle to work through the contract dances at the forefront of my mind, her struggle at the restaurant.

Can my beautiful girl not read? I rub at the pain in my chest. Worse than any of this, she didn’t tell me.

Concern mars his features. “She had nothing, Papa.” His tone is full of sympathy, not something Rafael is accustomed to.

Pure unadulterated anger bleeds from my every pore, and I lunge toward Robert with savage intent. Rafael is quick to pull me back, but I attempt to shrug off my son, conscious not to harm him.

“We’ll make the fucker pay,” Tommy seethes, tugging the fucker’s head back by his hair, and my muscles slowly unfurl.

“Damn fucking straight we will.” Rocco springs up from the crate, his eyes alight with retribution.

A callous laugh causes the hairs on the back of my neck to rise, and Tommy releases Robert’s head, allowing him to stare back at me. The malice and cruelty are evident on his face, and not a trace of his daughter’s attributions are there. Has he always looked so deranged?

He swallows. “I almost had you. Almost.” He shakes his head. “I set this up a long time ago.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Rocco bellows.

“The Halloween party,” Rafael states, ten steps ahead of our thoughts. Yet more proof my son is the perfect man for the position of don.

“Right.” He sniffles, and that move tells me he’s withdrawing again.

“The family Halloween party. Party of the fucking century,” he sneers, like a green-eyed monster.

“I sent her in there. The little fucking princess desperate for acceptance, a desperate little whore. I could have gotten good money for her, you know?” My fists pump beside me, and my sons glance toward me with concern, but I stare ahead at the piece of shit who dared to treat her with such disrespect.

“I told her she needed to fuck you, and she did it.” I jolt at his words, and pain slices through me, cutting so deep it’s almost impossible to remain standing.

Yet, somehow, I do. I can only put it down to my training.

His words feel like the ultimate betrayal.

Would she have ever slept with me if it wasn’t for following his command?

“What are you talking about? Why the fuck would you want her to fuck him?” Tommy asks as his eyes bounce over his face searching for a lie.

He won’t find one, I can feel it in my heart as a piece of it crumbles.

She fucked me as a plan, and while I know her actions after were not part of her plan because I simply gave her no choice, I can’t help but feel the betrayal deep in my soul.

She lied.

My heart squeezes, and a sound similar to a whimper leaves me.

All this time, she lied.

“I needed leverage.” He spits out some blood on the concrete floor.

“Leverage?” Tommy queries as my gut twists. “What kind of fucking leverage?”

“Her compliance.” He grins manically.

My phone rings, and I pull it from my pocket to silence it, but seeing Hazel’s name on the screen has something akin to panic settling in my stomach. “Hazel?” I snap.

“She’s gone, Vincent.”

My world spins, and I struggle to register what she’s saying. “What?”

“Gracie, she went to the restroom, but now she’s gone.” She sniffles, and I want to tell her to stop with the dramatics, but I need answers, and quick. “Bonnie too.” She ran. I feel it deep in my gut, and it cuts deep. She ran, she fucking left me.

My lungs feel like they’re collapsing as I try but fail to remain calm.

My head spins, and I feel like I’m floating into the unknown. What the fuck is happening to me?

Warm hands turn my face toward his, and Rocco’s eyes come into view through a hazy blur. “Papa, concentrate.” He nods toward my phone, forcing me out of my head. “Calm down and concentrate.” His eyes drill into mine, and I give my son a swift nod.

“I’ll be there soon.” I end the call and face my sons, then clear my throat to wipe away the emotion. “Gracie and Bonnie are missing.”

A laugh erupts from the piece of shit. “Well, look at that, she did it after all.” He grins.

“Did what, motherfucker?” Rocco surges toward him, his eyes alight with brutality.

“She’s starting over.” He smiles sadistically, exposing his bloodied teeth.

A phone ringing cuts through the air, and Rafael’s spine straightens as he presses on his phone. My body stills, something inside me telling me to remain on the spot.

“Ellie, now’s not a good ti—”

“Rafael, you need to get out of the warehouse. Right fucking now! You’re about to be raided.” Ellie’s shriek is loud and hysterical and clear as fucking day, even without the speaker on.

“What?”

“Darryl Davis messaged me. He says you’re all about to be raided, please just leave.”

“Darryl fucking Davis?” Even I can hear the jealousy slithering through him.

“Don’t ask me to explain now, just do it,” she urges.

Tommy is already lowering Robert, and the fucker thrashes about, attempting to get free.

Rafael springs into action, barking orders for the drugs and weapons to be concealed.

Rocco is rushing Robert out the back door, and Tommy is pushing the bags of guns into the metal trap door.

Massio helps lock down the warehouse, and the chaos of everyone around me has me frozen to the spot.

For the first time in my life, I don’t want to put our Mafia life first.

I want to choose her.

“Papa?” I snap my gaze up to meet Rafael’s stern expression. “Go find her.” He stares at me with concern shining in his eyes.

I swallow the knot in my throat and admit what I don’t want to admit. “That’s not how this life works, son.”

“Says who? You’re the Mafia don, write your own fucking rules.” His eyes implore mine. “I know I will.” His lip curls into a smile, and he flicks his head toward the door. “Go.”

Pride takes over me. The son I’ve raised, the man I trained to one day become leader, is exactly who I wish I could be.

I give Rafael a firm nod, and the tension slips from his face, then he spins and continues barking orders at his brothers.

“Massio, let’s go!” Without giving it another thought, I rush toward the door knowing damn well things are about to change forever.