Page 9 of Ravage God

“Come on,” he said softly. “Let’s get out of here.”

“Okay,” I said, following behind him and straight to his black Mercedes, a more inconspicuous car than the actual love of his life, the cherry-red Corvette that I knew he only drove when I wasn’t around.

That car made him stand out. I wished he wouldn’t drive it at all, but there was no reasoning with Valentino.

I watched the side mirror as Valentino drove away, leaving the huge mansion behind, and letting it get smaller and smaller until he turned, and it disappeared entirely from sight. Sometimes, I wished that would be true for good and that I would never have to see that house again. Never have to live in it. Sometimes, I wished I were brave enough to tell Valentino everything so that I could just ask him to let me live with him.

But that was nothing more than a fantasy I imagined in my head at night in my room when no one was around.

I leaned back against the seat and closed my eyes, trying to shut out my reality.

We arrived at Valentino’s apartment quickly. I opened the door but looked back at my brother questioningly when he didn’t turn off the car engine.

“I have somewhere to be, Isa. But you can stay for as long as you want, okay?”

I didn’t say anything. I didn't know what to say. I had thought…

I didn't know what I thought. I spent so much of my time by myself, but I thought I would at least have Valentino as company. It wasn’t like I would have talked much to him, but company was company.

But I knew he had a job to do.

And I was a little jealous that he had a job to go to while I…

I shot him a small smile.

“Okay. Thanks for driving me here.”

He opened his mouth and looked like he wanted to say something, but I got out of the car and closed the door before he could. He didn’t drive away until I was actually inside the building. I headed toward the elevators.

Valentino lived in a more… expensive part of the city. Most of his neighbors were socialites, businessmen with high positions in society, or made men with high-ranking positions in the De Luca Famiglia.

Valentino owned the entire building.

I could have asked for an apartment of my own here, but we ran in a small circle. It would only invite talk. It wasn’t common for unmarried daughters to move out of their family homes.

All it would take was a bored mob wife to say something along the lines of seeing a man coming and going from the apartment or home of an unmarried woman for it to spread like wildfire. It wouldn’t matter if that was true or not.

And I didn’t want Valentino to have to deal with something like that.

The elevator doors opened to the penthouse suite. It was big and spacious and expertly designed, but that wasn’t the best part about Valentino’s apartment.

No, the best part was the kick-ass view. That, and the fact that it was like a fortress. It was the safest place in the world for me to be.

I bypassed everything and went over to the floor-to-ceiling window that showcased the breathtaking view of the Las Vegas desert. I took a deep breath, feeling more at peace now than I had since last night when I heard Dad come home drunk.

I knew living with my father wasn’t a long-term solution either. It was just hard to leave. Valentino’s words might hold more weight, but there was one thing my father had fought hard for: to keep me at home.

While Massimo didn’t exactly run the De Luca empire the same way his father, Amadeo De Luca, did by shredding away a lot of the old traditions, my father and a group of six other men were a part of the traditionalists, who had been in the game since the first day Amadeo took the helm. That was more than twenty-five years ago. They had earned a lot of respect from all the made men, which meant some traditions, no matter how archaic, were still being observed. And there was nothing Massimo could do to eradicate it, no matter how powerful he was. I imagined they would be around until the last of the seven men died, taking those traditions to the grave with them.

Being the daughter of Joseph Gambino meant I was being watched more carefully than others, which was why the subject of my marriage was such a sore topic for Dad.

I sat down on the floor by the window, pulled out my sketchbook from my backpack, and sketched the scene. I had drawn this landscape so many times that I could probably draw it from memory alone, but there was just something calming about sitting here and drawing it.

I didn’t draw people very often.

People didn’t interest me. They could be too much at times, and I preferred drawing landscapes.

I relaxed further against the wall and took in the scenery, trying to ignore just how loud the silence really was.