Page 26

I wanted that peaceful nothingness to come back the moment pain filtered into my system.

It was the first thing that came flooding in with my awareness, making that border of darkness slowly lift as my eyes adjusted to the space around me.

Everything was foggy at first, but as I blinked through that haze, a sense of dread surrounded me.

The room was fairly dim yet bright enough for me to see the red crushed velvet sofa beneath me, along with the others that formed a U-shape in the middle of the room. Deep purple curtains were up in various places, and the heavy smell of cigarette smoke, along with strong perfume and cologne filled the space.

Upon taking it all in, the first thing that came to my mind was some sort of club or lounge. One that few knew about, or at least had some aura of exclusivity to it.

I had no idea where I was, or what I was waiting for while my arms were behind my back and bound with cuffs. The faint pain in my head only made my fear and panic worse while I pulled in somewhat ragged breaths.

Every time I swallowed, my throat ached, causing me to silently question what happened.

I was at a loss, feeling awful and afraid. I just wanted to know what was going on, where I was, and where Damien was.

For half a heartbeat, I hoped it was some kind of misunderstanding and I was being held in some sort of Levov hideout. But the longer that thought lingered in my mind, the more ridiculous it sounded.

I would never be handcuffed in that case. I wouldn’t be hidden away somewhere like I was nothing more than a hostage. If they ever tried, Damien would never let them hear the end of it.

Movement in the corner of my eye caught my attention, and a flicker of fear rushed through me the second I saw him.

Raf.

Seeing his face brought it all back at once: finding him in the parking garage, him admitting to being the spy, and him choking me until I passed out.

It was fortunate I was still alive at all. But I couldn’t be so sure about my baby…and that was enough to send a stabbing ache right through my heart. My stomach dropped at the thought.

Watching while Raf entered the room from behind a section of thick curtain, sitting down on the couch across from me, I felt a mass of difficult emotions crawling through me.

I was furious at him for what he did…and afraid of the fact that he overpowered me and apparently took me somewhere else while I was out. But above all else, I believed he was a coworker…and one I could lean on at that. At the very least, we seemed to get along, and I assumed he was genuine.

He never gave me a reason to doubt him. But I should’ve known. Somehow, I should’ve been able to predict what he would do to me.

Unsure of my voice at first, I murmured, “I trusted you…”

Raf only chuckled and shook his head at that. “No…you trusted the man you thought I was. But welcome back.”

Gritting my teeth, I hated how cold and smug his tone sounded. I had gotten so used to the facade he put on that hearing and seeing him act differently just felt wrong.

I still couldn’t believe he managed to con us all. That he was able to play his game long enough to find himself an ideal position to strike from. Even thinking about it made my blood boil.

“How did you do it?”

He lifted a brow at me curiously. “What, trick everyone?”

“Yes.”

A satisfied grin settled on his lips as he sat back on the sofa, eyes not leaving mine. “The Pesci family needed someone to hide in plain sight, and luckily for me, I used to do quite a bit of acting when I was young…lying always came easy to me, so it really wasn’t that difficult. Truthfully, the hard part was maintaining that far-too-happy demeanor…Christ alive, I wasn’t sure how many more fake smiles I’d be able to pull.”

I narrowed my eyes at him slightly, aggravated by the way he talked about it so casually…so callously. “You had credentials, you submitted work…how?”

He chuckled again. “Easy. I was given a false identity, everything was forged for me, and I outsourced some help with the tedious parts, like coming up with those bullshit articles. Everything about it was fake, and you and Gemma ate it right up.”

Even if it all made sense, I couldn’t wrap my head around it. How far he went just to get information.

“You went through all that trouble…just to get confidential secrets for your boss?”

Raf nodded simply. “I did…of course, not for cheap. I had to pause my entire life, after all. I even stopped responding to my real name in my downtime. But thankfully, the boss made it well worth my time.”

Glowering at him, I shook my head. To go as far as he did and to commit for so long seemed barbaric. Insane, even.

I knew the world of organized crime often took things to the extreme, but it still seemed like so much effort just to get the upper hand. To get back at a family who wronged yours so many years ago…

I didn’t think I’d ever understand how those families operated, but I didn’t have much time to dwell on it. I was still trapped, and I had no idea what was going to happen to me.

Forcing out a breath, I held his gaze. “Where did you take me?”

With a nonchalant air about him, Raf draped his arms across the back of the couch. “Just a Pesci club…one of my favorites, actually. We’re waiting here until the boss arrives, then we’ll have a nice little chat with him. How does that sound?”

I hated even the thought of knowing I’d be in the same room as the kingpin. As the person who set Raf up to trick us, and the one making all the plans to break the Levovs and Novikovs.

Being near him was the last thing I wanted to do.

Then, the curtains drawn across the doorway pulled back, and a man stepped inside the room. Immediately, his light brown eyes flickered between the two of us before they settled on me, and he ran a hand through his sandy-blonde hair.

“Well, well…you did deliver, didn’t you, Raf?” he said, grinning while he entered the space, stopping to stand just before the arrangement of couches.

Raf nodded simply, crossing his arms over his chest. “That I did…told you I had something worth paying more for.”

The kingpin’s gaze slipped back to Raf, narrowing only slightly as if contemplating putting him in his place for the comment. But he scoffed, then looked back at me. “We’ll see about that. First, I need to know that this one even matters.”

“She does,” he interjected, surely defending his actions and commitment to the job. “She’s carrying a Novikov heir, after all. That idiot Damien has been all over her since the moment he took up shop in the office.”

A brief flicker of anger moved through me at how he talked about Damien…the father of our child…but I bit my tongue and bided my time.

A satisfied smirk crawled across his lips at that, and he took a few steps closer to analyze me further. “Is that so? Then I suppose I can’t discredit her too soon…”

Despite how badly I wanted to slink away and hide from his gaze, hating how it made my skin crawl, I held his eye contact as bravely as I could. For Damien. For our baby.

I wasn’t going to let them think I was completely weak, even if I was out of my depth.

“What’s your name then, hm?” the kingpin asked with a smooth tone while his eyes seemed to map out every inch of my face.

Clenching my jaw, I mumbled, “Sky…”

“Sky…” he echoed quietly, tinged with amusement. “I see…I’m Esidor Pesci. My father, Enrico, had quite the problem with some associates of your baby daddy, it seems. Because of it, my sister Aria and I suffered more than we ever should’ve.”

Furrowing my brows, I never pulled my gaze away from him. “What does that have to do with me?”

He chuckled. “Of course what happened between my family and the Levovs doesn’t have anything to do with you, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still be useful to me in some way.”

Hating the implications of his words, I swallowed back the worry it brought over me. “How?”

“If I must spell it out, then I guess I will,” Esidor sighed before sitting down on the couch beside mine, knee close enough to brush against mine, making me pull back slightly. “You’re carrying Damien Novikov’s baby, which in any crime family, children are an integral piece of the puzzle. Legacy, passing on the family business, having someone to fill your shoes when you’re gone…those things can only happen when you have heirs. So, it only makes sense that Damien would do anything in his power to get you back. It helps how close you and Gemma are, and her close associations with the Levovs. It’s the perfect equation for me to use you as a wager to get what I want.”

While it didn’t come as a surprise to hear the basis of his plan, it didn’t make it any easier to accept.

I was being used just because I mattered to Damien and the others, and that was exactly what he didn’t want to happen to me.

Yet, I somehow managed to get myself in that position, and it was agonizing to even consider.

“What do you want?”

Esidor grinned as he leaned forward, edging a bit closer to me with his voice low. “I want to make the Levovs pay for the way they disgraced my father and our family…how they ruined what could’ve been a legacy worth remembering. And as a fortunate byproduct of both families working together, I’ll take the Novikovs down while I’m at it. For the first time in what seems like forever, I’ll bring the most notorious family in New York to their knees, and the Pesci family will gladly take their place.”

Taking in his intentions made my heart clench, aware of how many people would be affected by it if they were to succeed.

I didn’t know that much about their business, but I did know the Levovs were notorious for a reason. They were feared and respected for a reason.

Surely, some ostracized family wouldn’t be able to make waves big enough to bring them down.

Despite the concern that flowed through me, I narrowed my eyes at him. “It’ll never work…”

He snickered. “Planting Raf in the office and funneling whatever information he could get his hands on to me worked so far…along with tricking Damien and getting you here. It was a long-haul plan, but you’ll see eventually, sweetheart. It’ll all be worth it.”

My skin crawled all over again at his smug, seemingly all-knowing tone. He was far too confident about it all, and it made goosebumps rise on my arms.

“Thanks to you and that baby inside you, I’ll have all the money and influence I could ever want soon enough,” he hummed, reaching forward to take my chin between his fingers. He inspected me closely, tipping my head from side to side, and he gave a half-impressed, half-bored hum. “Not bad…but I think my sister has you beat. It’s a shame none of those Levovs gave her a second glance.”

More anger moved through me then as I grit my teeth and tried to pull out of his grasp.

But he only chuckled and tightened his grip, focusing solely on my face. “Now, now, Sky…you don’t want me doing anything drastic to keep you in line, do you?”

Even if he could’ve been all bark and no bite, the dark, almost sadistic gleam in his eyes told me I didn’t want to find out what he meant by that.

Another spike of fear moved through me, and in that moment, I could only silently pray that Damien would find me before it was too late…before Esidor’s patience ran out.