Page 84 of Scandalous Kingpin

FRANK

Being born into the Syndicate didn’t come without responsibilities.

I was raised to believe in strength and power. The result of my parents’ strict expectations. My own father prepared to banish me for taking an Irish mafia princess for a mistress. Not because I cheated on my wife whose family had a pull with the mafia in Italy.

Oh, no.They all had plenty of mistresses lined up and were none so discreet.

Much of it stemmed from the Irish being unfairly considered an enemy of the Syndicate.

What my father didn’t know was that when I saw Aisling, I came alive. She made me feel something other than darkness. When she fell pregnant, she begged me to keep the baby. It wasn’t hard to convince me because life with her was the only thing I wanted. Christian was our miracle. I’d never felt prouder than I did the moment when I met my beautiful boy. A product of Aisling’s and my life. The boys and Aisling wereit.

But then my father and the Syndicate learned of the child. If it had been a girl, he would have dismissed the whole ordeal.

But it was a boy. A beautiful baby boy who looked like an angel.

We ran.

We got caught.

We were judged.

In the eyes of the Syndicate and the DiLustro family, it was a betrayal, and we were given two options: die together or live apart. My first wife’s family would ensure if we took the first option, the entire DiLustro line would be wiped out.

So neither Aisling nor I had a choice once Christian was born. In order to ensure his survival—and ours—she had to give him up.

Aisling got the short end of the stick. I had Dante and Christian, and the Syndicate. She was left with only this secret to keep from her family.

My boys and I were always close. Connected. They sought me out regardless of whether I was busy.

Then they stopped, seemingly overnight.

Just like that, the walls went up. I chalked that up to hormones, and while it stung, I left them to their own devices. Perhaps I was scared they’d closed themselves off to me like I’d done with my father.

I knew too well how strained relationships worked in our family. I didn’t want to repeat that with my sons.

But after everything, and hearing it all spill out onto the therapist’s office floor, I understood.

I recalled how both boys would shut down whenever Vittoria was around. She’d always fuss over me, distracting me from my sons’ discomfort.

My sons had been hiding their pain for decades. I never imagined my wife would ever torture them, abuse them.

Fuck, I should have seen it. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. Vittoria perfected that fucking motto on my boys. My. Boys.

Nothing could forgive the fact that I let my sons down. They needed their father, and I wasn’t there for them.

I expected Aisling’s resentment—hell, I almost welcomed it. She left Christian under my protection and I’d let her down. I’d let them all down.

Maybe I could fix everything. Starting with my sons. Maybe then, they’d forgive me and we could be a family.

A real family.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

PRIEST

The wound in my chest—invisible to outsiders—bled with each passing day, festering without my wife in my life.

I couldn’t come to terms that she left me. Refused to talk to me. Refused to see me.