Page 20 of One Savage Union (Crimson Bonds #1)

ROCCO

“ L isten, you little Romano shit—if my daughter isn’t released in the next twenty-four hours, I’ll gut you like a pig and blow your entire fucking family into particles so small the vultures will choke on the dust.”

Matteo Ricci’s fury is all heat and hollow threats.

I spin in my leather chair, slow and lazy, letting my twenty-four-karat gold fidget spinner whir between my fingers. To him, I look like a man half-listening. In truth, I stopped hearing him completely about ten seconds ago.

Because in my head?

Lucia is playing La donna è mobile .

That goddamn aria—the one she drifted into on the piano after I’d bent her over my dining table and fucked her senseless.

I asked her to play a song for me.

She snatched my goddamn soul.

She sat there, ass still red from my hand, fingers trembling as she coaxed that melody into the air like she was conjuring magic instead of notes.

I’ve been haunted by it ever since.

Every sensual flick of her wrist. Every swell of emotion in her face as she played Verdi like she meant it. Like she was translating everything I made her feel into music. Lust, defiance, surrender—woven into sound.

And now, while Ricci threatens war, all I can think about is how she looked—barefoot, wrecked, radiant—making music like it was her weapon and her offering all at once.

I should be buried between her thighs right now. I should be dragging her through a hike up the Path of the Gods, feeding her fresh figs and fucking her in a shepherd’s cabin I had cleared out for the sole purpose of wrecking her soul.

Instead, I’m in Rome, babysitting a bastard who abandoned his daughter for twenty-four years and now has the nerve to pretend he's coming to save her.

He’s too late.

Lucia belongs to me now.

She doesn’t know where I am. I didn’t leave a note. Didn’t say goodbye.

She thinks I disappeared to clear my head.

What she doesn’t know is I came here to remind her father—and the rest of the goddamn world—that she’s no longer his to lose.

“She’s not yours to take,” I say flatly, finally cutting him off. “And she sure as fuck isn’t yours to rescue.”

Matteo lunges forward, slamming his fists on the desk between us. I don’t flinch.

Four of his soldiers, packing concealed but heavy artillery, are at his back.

I have the same protection. His soldiers are bigger, but mine are more vicious.

I could cut the tension in the room with the Sebenza 25 blade strapped to my ankle.

I know that one wrong move from any side will incite a bloodbath, so I must handle Matteo’s anger and bruised ego with care.

After all, we’re family now.

I exhale as he calls me one type of motherfucker after another. I regret that my current environment is a far cry from the comfort and peace of my coastal home.

That’s why I don’t have time for this shit. Matteo Ricci’s rant has lasted five minutes too long, and I’m tired of the old man. He’s so amped up that I haven’t said a word, even though my patience wears thin.

Ricci is ruffled because he has no control over his situation, not because he’s worried about Lucia.

He’s a man known for his unwavering control, calm commands, and cool demeanor. Matteo Ricci orders a kill with the nod of his head.

His enemies often receive bullets with their names on them twenty-four hours before he kills them.

He’s a monster who sat and enjoyed an entire Christmas meal, drinks included, with eight men he knew betrayed him without blinking an eye.

When Matteo gave the last toast: Alla salute , which literally means to health, he immediately began to methodically kill every single man at the table with his infamous platinum handled AK-47, named giustizia or justice.

As the story goes, he cackled after the bloodshed, poured himself a drink, and muttered to my continued health.

His emotions rarely, if ever, come to the surface, and the most common way people describe him is that he is ice cold.

Tonight, I need to get him in line. We’re in the office of my Rome penthouse in the center of Prati.

It was built at the start of the 19th century, and it’s one of the most affluent places in Rome.

It’s beautiful and the streets house some of my favorite luxuries, such as Brugnoli shoes.

I may bring Lucia here one day if she’s a good girl, but the truth is I’m rarely here.

The home is more than just an essential real estate investment. It’s perfect for a meeting like this.

The bastard hasn’t taken one step towards Lucia in her entire life. Before the kidnapping of his daughter, he could pretend she wasn’t valuable.

I knew better.

Men like Ricci and my uncle only care about two things: money and family.

When Enzo discovered he had been placing money in her account since the day she was born, I knew I had Ricci by the balls.

He always intended to collect on his investment.

Beautiful women from our bloodlines can be bought for a hefty price and an invaluable alliance.

Now that he knows she could be in real danger, he’s prepared to move heaven and earth.

Or kill me…

That’s right where I want him.

If he kills me, he will have no way of getting to his daughter.

Lucia and I’ve been in Amalfi for a little over a week, but I’ve scrambled every cell phone signal, and I’ve concealed my location from most maps.

The only people who know my whereabouts are my pilot, my uncle, Enzo, and Mario.

Ricci is up shit’s creek, and he knows it.

That’s why I don’t mind waiting a few moments longer while he accepts the inevitability of his situation.

He slams a fist on my antique mahogany desk. I flick my eyes up to meet the fire in Matteo’s, and my guards inch closer. I raise my hand to stop their encroachment and look my enemy in the eye.

“Well, don’t you have anything to say to me, Romano?”

Finally!

“Yes. I want to begin by stating that my uncle and cousin are Romanos, and I serve as the former’s consigliere. My father was Alberto Fieri, and I wear his name proudly.

A name that your daughter now shares as my wife, so you should learn to use it.”

Silence and an unreadable mask fall over Ricci. He takes a moment to speak. Before he does, he slips into the seat in front of my desk. I nod to Mario, and he pours Matteo a glass of Macallan. He knocks the drink back in seconds and clears his throat.

“I never trusted your uncle, but I respected him. There’s a code men live by.

We don’t fuck with each other’s children.

I hope he knows what he’s done by taking my child and forcing her into his family, because there’s no way in hell Luciawent willingly.

She knows nothing about this life, and he will pay for dragging her into it.

You will die a slow and painful death if any harm comes to her. ”

“Hmmm. Who says I want any harm to come to her? She’s my wife and a beautiful woman. There are many more creative things I can do with her than kill her. Unlike the Riccis, we’re not in the habit of destroying beautiful things or killing innocent women.”

The last words were a low blow, but I don’t care. I know he ordered the murder of my mother and father, and according to the code, I should have killed him already.

I’ve wanted to so many times. Sometimes, at night, I find myself parked down the street from his home. I even snuck into his bedroom once,to watch him. The fucker sleeps like the dead.

His security is shit. Given enough time, Enzo can hack any system.

When he looked at Matteo Ricci’s system, he laughed and asked if I wanted the murder done in the next five minutes.

The only reason he is alive is that I promised my uncle no more bloodshed.

We’ve had peace for the past nineteen years, and I won’t jeopardize the health of the family over my vendetta.

It’s taken a considerable amount of self-awareness to refrain from projecting my hate of Matteo Ricci onto his daughter.

She doesn’t deserve it. Earlier, she tapped into my darker side by asking me to play for her.

She has no idea that her father’s machinations are why I stopped playing. I may be stern with her, but

I’ll never intentionally hurt her. There’s no need.

However, I can fuck with her father’s head. I’m sure he’s imagining all the many ways I’m debauching his only daughter.

“What does Romano want? More territory? Money? Weapons. What’s his price?” He hisses.

I laugh and drop my spinner on the desk in front of me.

“Old man, you think you have all the answers, but you know nothing. My uncle has no malicious intent, and anything you can offer, he already has. Didn’t you wonder why he would marry your daughter off to me and not his son? Wasn’t that odd to you?”

“Nothing about you bloodsuckers surprises me. Cut the shit Fieri. Either prepare to die where you sit or give me my daughter back. I don’t have time for riddles.”

I scoff.

“Give her back? When did you ever have her? She’s never even met you. In twenty-four years, not so much as a phone call from you. You’re not exactly daddy dearest in her eyes. She hates you.”

Ok, that’s a stretch, but he doesn’t know that.

“Fuck you.”

He yells as he stands and pulls his gun. His mask has slipped again, but he quickly regains his composure. He continues with asofter tone that is tinged with regret, but he doesn’t lower his weapon. He also doesn’t flinch at the four now directly pointed at him.

“Don’t you dare tell me anything about my relationship with my daughter.

It wasn’t my choice to stay out of her life; it was her mother’s.

She thought she would be safer that way.

I thought so too, at first, but I quickly realized that was a mistake.

I sent a letter every year on her birthday, asking to see her.

But her mother never showed her any of them. ”

I contemplate his words quietly... and never take my eyes off the barrel of his gun.

He won’t kill me. There’s no advantage to that.