Page 22 of Runaway in the Mafia (The shadows of Cosa Nostra Chronicles #3)

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

VITALE

“ V ai affanculo.”

“Cugino,” Sergio’s voice grated through the phone and scraped at my budding headache. “I would if I could. Have you seen my dick?”

My cousin fucking himself was an image I didn’t need.

I kicked my car door shut and leaned against it.

Antonio’s house lay ahead of me. Inside it, a discussion I wanted to avoid, a contract I wasn’t keen to sign.

My fingers pinched my forehead. It felt like I had an ever-present headache.

It started with a scent, picked up with a brown sight, and had a name that started with an A.

“You might be of better use like that than finding information I asked for. Sei un idiota.”

“Now, now. Did zia Ada bring you up to name call your cousins?”

“Well, if you aren’t an idiot, prove it to me. Did you even find anything?”

“Nope.”

Suspicion narrowed my eyes even if he couldn’t see me. “Did you even look?”

“Of course I did.”

He didn’t.

“You are fucking fired.”

He laughed, and I winced. “Who will you make your underboss then?”

My mind ran wild with the options and came up with zero. Batista, no. Romeo, fuck no. Angelo, no no. Jesus! Why did I only have good-looking cousins who had a thing for Ahana? Bastardi .

“You are all fucking bastards.” I disconnected the line.

A whiff in the air distracted me as I pushed off the car. A glance to the right found what I knew would be there. For fuck’s sake. Couldn’t a man get a break?

Armando gave me a frown when I didn’t acknowledge him as he opened the door for me. Instead, I stormed past him, through the halls, and burst into Antonio’s office. “Why the fuck do you have a Plumeria tree in your garden?”

He looked up from his computer, a frown on his forehead.

Armando came up behind me. “ Mi scusi, signor Capizzi, Signor Di Matteo didn’t give me the chance to tell you he’s here.”

“Fuck’s sake.” I brushed him off and walked to the armchair in the corner of the room. “We are not in fucking America now.”

“It’s okay, Armando.”

He walked out, closing the door behind him.

I lit a cigar and puffed like a madman. “Well?”

He leaned back in his chair, his gaze thoughtful. “You’re all wound up, even for you.” He rubbed his jaw. Cool. Calm. Unbothered. “The last time you were like this was about a year ago, I think.” His gaze was heavy, and it spelled out the words I didn’t want to read. I know.

Of course he must have known. He wasn’t an idiot.

So what? I’d walked into a shady apartment of Carlo’s and found him with his new favourite whore riding him.

That wasn’t the issue because, well… nothing new in that.

But it hadn’t stopped me from putting a gun to his forehead and blowing his head off.

Or paying said whore to shut the hell up.

If she had listened to me, that would have been the end of it.

One death on my hands. One I would have repeated.

Again and again. But she had to go to the Albanians and snitch.

Not like I was left with an option other than to burn the fucking place down with her and the Albanian right hand in it. Vero?

But I didn’t tell him that under the beam of his laser eyes. I didn’t tell him that Carlo had planned to divorce Mamma so he could marry the next whore he found his dick buried in.

Maybe it hadn’t been the only option. Maybe I should have confided in my consigliere . You know, the actual fucking diplomat in the Cosa Nostra who was a genius at coming up with compromises. I should have allowed myself to cool off and let him do his magic. Show off his negotiation talents.

But he loved Carlo. He had looked up to him.

He probably thought he owed him for making him his consigliere at the young age of thirty.

And he hated his mamma. He wouldn’t have understood.

Wouldn’t have understood the degree of embarrassment Mamma would have had to go through if I had kept Carlo alive.

And I couldn’t. I wouldn’t stand by and watch that woman fall apart.

I didn’t care if she painted me in the same charcoal black as her husband.

I didn’t care that she looked at me with apprehension crisscrossed across her face.

I’d seen the image of her potential shame, and before I knew it, I’d burst through that door and put a bullet in his head.

“What’s your interest in the tree?”

“What’s your fucking point?”

His look was pensive. It weighed heavily.

He rocked back on his chair, no doubt passing judgement on my actions.

You’d think I’d be filled with shame. Who the fuck killed their own father?

That was a line we rarely crossed, even in the Cosa Nostra when we handled drugs and money like pasta and vino .

But that’s the only crimson I liked painted on my hands.

Well, that and another fucker that would hopefully paint them soon enough.

I’d told her. The secret I’d been carrying around that no one else knew. Because I had wanted her to trust me like I trusted her. It made me feel better that she knew it. Like she knew the real Vitale behind the facade. It felt like a balm soothing the burn in my heart.

“What?” I didn’t catch his words.

“Something’s bothering you.”

“Not really.” Fucking Plumeria . “Can we get back to my question?”

“What’s the tree called?”

“Plumeria.” And I found my mistake.

“Since when were you into nomenclature?”

Since I found it wrapped in a tiny towel.

“Forget it.” I leaned back, spread my legs, and puffed madly.

Across from me, his stare told me I hadn’t convinced him with my nonchalance. “Divya loves it. You know, I think Ahana—”

I shot up. “Where’s your whiskey?”

“I was talking.”

“And I’m thirsty.”

He nodded to the trolley next to the door. I ignored the smirk lining his fucking lips. The chrome and smoked glass encasement sparkled like a rescue point.

“Midday whisky, huh?”

I had to put in an unhuman effort not to shatter the crystal in my hand. It was too risky. I abandoned it and kept a calm face as I turned back and nodded at the clear glass with his favourite drink in it. Amaro. “The pot calling the kettle black?”

He cradled it like a lover and took a sip from it. “Nothing new for me. But you...” I turned back to pick up the decanter. “Drinking midday. Agitated enough to annoy the fuck out of anyone. I did those too.”

“Weren’t you born like that?”

He didn’t pay heed to the nonsense coming out of my mouth. “Didn’t smoke though. That’s your thing. But you’ve been chain smoking these days.”

“Is there a point to all this rambling? Fuck, is old age getting to you?”

He ignored my taunt. Rightly so. He was only four years older than me. I popped the cork off.

“I had an obsession.” His laugh was wicked. “I still do, but then I couldn’t get hold of it.”

Fuck. My focus was on the glass and getting the liquid in there.

“It was caramel brown.”

Fuck.

“But I think yours is darker.” The whiskey spilled. Fucking next to the glass. I slammed the decanter angrily on the trolley, and the Christel jiggled with the thump.

“Vero?”

No. No. No.

She was not my fucking obsession. She was nothing. I didn’t want her. What I wanted was not to want her. Not to disappoint Mamma. Not to become fucking Carlo.

Silence was all that hummed in his walnut-clad office. That and my uneven breathing. I grasped the bars of the trolley and rasped a breath through my nostrils. Calm the fuck down.

“Nothing stops you from having her.” His voice was light. Laced with approval.

A shiver rolled up my back. A silver lining within the dark, stormy clouds. Could I? My breath shallowed. “I’m the fucking don.”

“So?”

“So, I am not marrying a fucking brown girl. That’s not accepted, and you know it.”

“Marriage, huh?”

“Goddammit! That’s not what I meant.”

“If you say so.”

But he was right. Was I already thinking of marrying this girl, or what? No, I wasn’t. She. Was. Nothing. I’d prove it.

I gripped the whiskey decanter in my hand and spun around. His smirk was too wide for my comfort.

“I’ll sign the contract.”

“Yeah?”

I nodded. “The moment I get home.” My relief was short-lived.

“There’s no need.” He pulled his drawer open and took out an envelope. “I have the copy, right here.”

Goddammit.

One brow hiked up. “Unless, of course, you don’t want to sign it.”

Fuck this man. I hated my family. I wanted all the idiots to find their fucking way out except for that lone speck of brown. Fuck, he was right. I was into this girl. Even when she disobeyed me. Especially then. This. Could. Not. Happen.

Before I knew it, I’d taken a gulp straight off the decanter and crossed over to his desk. “Give me the damn pen.”

He held it away from me. “What’s her name again?”

“Ahana.”

His grin blew up on his face and I realised he meant my future wife. Fuck. I didn’t know. Carla? Bianca?

Ahana. Ahana. Ahana.

“No,” I growled and lurched for the pen.

My signature was so hard it almost scratched through the paper.

I stared at it like it was a death sentence.

I should have been relieved. No more sleepless nights.

No more heady scents that followed me everywhere.

No more jerking off to the memory of a stolen kiss.

Nothing. I was back in control. Right? Something cracked inside me.

“Make sure Andrea gets this, pronto, ” My tone was all gravel.

“If you’re sure about it.”

“Sì, no more discussions about this.” I should be relieved. I stepped back and rubbed my forehead.

His sympathetic gaze met mine. “Need a Tachipirina?”

I sighed. “Yeah.”

“Divya’s in the kitchen. She’ll have something.”

I dropped the decanter on the way out. “Oh,” Antonio threw behind my back. “She’s having an Indian themed day today.”

I frowned. And that’s my problem, how?