Page 40 of The Crowned Garza

“A union with the Morettis,” he says predictably. “Don Carlo is interested in your marriage to his daughter.”

“Don Carlo’s daughter just turned seventeen.”

“And in a year’s time she will be eighteen. What is the issue?”

The Moretti Family were top dog when I first came back. They were on a ludicrous mission to forcibly absorb the other families and become one outfit. By the time Papa was better, I had us on an even playing field. Now we’re well above them. Makes no sense why he would want to ally with them.Theyhave more to gain from us.

Done entertaining him, I straighten up from the armchair. “Rest well,Don Luciani.”

He’s a dying man trying to hold on to what little power he has left. As his flesh and blood, it should pain me to see him in this state, but I feel nothing for this man. And he’s to blame.

After he got back from his recovery and saw all that was accomplished in a short amount of time, suddenly I was his “son.” Begged me to stay, but I declined and made him believe I went back home.

A few months ago, the cancer returned with a vengeance, with no chance of a fight. He demanded I come back and start preparing to take over. That’s when I revealed I never went back toItaliaand have been overseeing the operations the entire time. The fact he even believed I would have left my hard work in his destructive hands is bizarre. Our partnerships and connections were established purely because I’m half Rossetti. No one wants to work with him because he has created a reputation for being dishonest, untrustworthy, and needlessly violent. I had convinced him I’d be working remotely fromItaliato oversee and maintain our partnerships. His head is so far up his own ass that he actually believed that was viable.

“If it was Adamo who arranged your marriage, you wouldn’t question it. You worship him. But me?” He coughs and thumps his chest. “You will never respect me as yourpadre or your don, will you?”

“Do you think youdeservemy respect?”

Dismissively, he turns his head away from me and mutters, “Sei il figlio di tua madre.”

That, I am.

I’m proudly my mother’s son.

~

I LEAVE THELuciani estate undetected and park along the next street over in wait.

An alert chimes from my phone, but I don’t need to check it. That particular chime is assigned to alert me whenever the pretty little thunderstorm, Tillie Garza, has left her house. It’s almost one in the morning, but it’s not unusual for her to go out at odd hours. She has a restless and famished soul. Her curiosity is insatiable. Trouble runs from her and she chases it. She flirts with darkness like it’s her favorite taste.

She’s…her.

From my pocket, I pull out the soft, black material that’s now my talisman. Though it’s not visible, I know it’s there, stained into the cotton.Her virgin blood.

I lift it to my nose and inhale. No idea why I keep doing this because all it does is make me irrationally angry.

The passenger door opens and Iseppa gets in.

“What’s that?” she asks when I crush the handkerchief in my fist before stuffing it back into my pocket.

“Something that should have been mine.”

She smirks at me. “Did you steal it, then? Because you clearly have it.”

I scrape my knuckles against my jaw. “If only it were that simple.”

Six years older than me, Iseppa Luciani is one of the most ruthless women I’ve ever known. In this life where women aren’t given the same respect as men, she made it her life’s mission to earn that respect. When she was nineteen, Papa married her off to the Sasso Family. Months later her husband went missing. Two years after, he married her off to the Ganzo Family. Less than a year later, her new, young, and healthy husband died of a heart attack.

No one suspected her, but I know her. Papa apparently did, too, because he backed off after that. Took him far too long to realize his daughter was no ordinary woman. She wouldn’t be tamed or controlled. Quietly and undetectably offing her husbands was her way of getting it across to him.

When I came in and made her underboss, many weren’t pleased. But she made quick work of proving why she deserved her position. When Papa returned, however, he wasn’t on board with it and removed her.

But she’s one of the few people who knew I never went back home, since I kept her in charge of several projects without Papa’s knowledge.

“How did he look?” she asks.

“Like a dying man.”