Page 19 of The Mastermind (Mafia Rivals #1)

CESARE

‘For someone facing imminent dismemberment, you’re entirely too zen for my liking.’

To my eternal regret, he’d adopted several unpalatable traits from that show.

Sighing as we lifted off from the private terminal in Teterboro Airport in New York, I turned to Rafaelle.

His eyes narrowed. ‘Come to think of it, you’ve been pretty chill considering you came second in the race yesterday. What gives?’

Silently, I handed over my phone. He scrolled quickly through the neon-green message thread and glanced sharply at me.

‘Fuck. That’s why you were texting with those questions last night?’

‘Yeah.’

He read through the messages again. ‘You think there’s some teeth to this?’

I shrugged. ‘No fucking idea. But I’m going to use it to buy myself some time for you, Bibi and me to dig into it, ideally before we turn up at the next race,’ I said as I took my phone back and read through the messages.

For some reason, most likely the hacker fucking with me, they no longer disappeared immediately. Sometimes they stayed for half an hour. Sometimes two hours. This latest thread had remained on my screen all the way across the Atlantic.

It started last night just as I was rethinking the lunacy of leaving a blissed-out Maddelena to her dreams when I could have been balls-deep in her tight cunt.

And in a way, the messages had set my big head straight as my little head had promised the worst case of blue balls in the history of mankind.

I’d stormed out with Fist guarding my back, my fingers flying over the screen.

For reasons still beyond me, my mysterious hacker had seemed in a mood to answer questions. Starting with one I’d asked before.

Who the fuck are you?

Nightowl.

A duh eye roll wasn’t even worth the effort.

Why are you helping me and how do I know you’re not feeding me bullshit?

That had pissed him off and he’d disappeared for half an hour, returning when I was back in my hotel room, mourning my disappeared wood and wondering if I could get it back in time to rub one out to the memory of Maddelena’s incredible taste and scent.

His next message, when it came, smothered enough thoughts of sex to redirect my brain power north instead of south.

TRY SEARCHING THROUGH THE WILLOW

‘The fuck?’ I’d muttered, my feet frozen in the middle of the hotel room.

What the hell is this? I don’t have time for a motherfucking easter egg hunt!

Tossing my phone on the bed after that because I’d suspected this ‘Nightowl’s’ cat and mouse game would mean silence for another few hours, I’d been surprised when the ping had arrived as my phone was bouncing on the bed.

I’d snatched it up.

W.I.L.L.O.W.

Growling my frustration, I’d paced for ten minutes before throwing in the towel and texting the siblings group chat.

The name Willow mean anything to anyone?

The chorus of no’s hadn’t lifted my mood. Nor had the ribbing about karma and the consequences of forgetting the names of chicks I’d banged coming back to haunt me.

The temptation to tell Nightowl to shit or get off the pot had been strong, but I’d managed to control myself.

In a last-ditch attempt, I’d sent one last text to the trio of MIT students we supplied free molly and a cool ten grand a month retainer to be at our beck and call to dig info for us.

Their response just after midnight had been eye-opening to say the least. And kinda obvious when spelled out. The fucking Russians.

My first instinct had been to call in every favour owed and start fresh tabs if necessary to get to the bottom of this as soon as possible. But common sense and the need for caution had stayed my hand.

If the cause of my woes really had ties to who I believed to be Willow, then we were dealing with a whole new level of threat.

And if Maddelena was somehow tied up in it too…

The rush of alarm and tension coiling through my middle at that thought had dried my mouth.

Considering she was a very bad liar and we both knew it and yet she persisted in stating her innocence, had she been forced to deny any wrongdoing out of fear or genuine ignorance?

And which other Mancinelli knew, if at all?

The possible new players were cunning enough to have slipped a mole right under her nose.

The notion that I was searching for excuses for her didn’t escape me. But curiously it didn’t bewilder me as much as I thought it would. Which in itself was… nuts.

But in the hours before morning, what had puzzled the fuck out of me was the hope that she truly wasn’t in with the fucking Russians. Because if she was… what Rafa had said in the car on the way back from the meeting with Yalcin about me needing to slit her beautiful throat?

Unfortunately, that was a possibility that had grown exponentially real. And potentially out of my hands.

Even if it was the last thing I wanted.

The Salvatore Estate in Fallbrook in the Lower Hudson Valley came into view from the left side of the chopper windows, and my breath hitched.

Originally set in sixty-seven acres of prime real estate, Orazio had spent decades buying up the surrounding mansions and countryside until we now owned over five thousand two hundred acres.

At the last valuation, it’d been estimated to be worth over three billion dollars.

Just another reason the various government agencies were creaming themselves to find a reason to snatch it from under us. And the reason Orazio had made sure he had past, present and future generations of politicians and law enforcement officials firmly in his pocket.

It had everything from four swimming pools, a bowling alley, stables, shooting range and full golf course, to underground bunkers the size of three football fields – in case of the nuclear attack Orazio predicted was imminent – and a miniature cathedral where we were all required to attend mass on religious holidays and family occasions.

Beside me, Rafaelle tensed as we swooped over the mausoleum where several loved ones were eternally resting. Including Isabella Salvatore. Mama.

Security was stationed at seven different points around the compound, and soldiers and attack dogs patrolled with military precision, armed to the teeth with the latest in armament of the mostly illegal kind.

The air was brisk and fresh when we alighted and I chose not to vocalise that I would’ve preferred the fumes of New York City that still managed to rise up to my fifty-fifth luxury duplex in Lower Manhattan.

Or any fuel-laced air pumped from hybrid engines in any pit lane in the world for that matter.

Bibi, the twins and a handful of soldiers landed two minutes after we did on an adjacent helipad.

Another of Orazio’s paranoia-fuelled orders was that no more than two of his grandchildren were ever to travel in the same vehicle at any time in case of an assassination attempt.

Since the twins refused to be separated and Bibi grumbled about travelling on her own, she’d called ‘fuck it’ and jumped on the jet and chopper with the twins.

It was a toss-up as to whether Orazio would lose his shit over that, but I was hoping she didn’t catch any heat since he would be directing his rage at me.

We all had a tough dinner to get through tonight and she’d been through enough.

I felt for her as I watched her wearily trudge the short distance from the helipad to her wing of the sprawling mansion.

The twins peeled off to the hunting lodge they’d unofficially commandeered on their twenty-fifth birthdays, even though for Orazio’s sake they spent enough time in the main house to fool him into believing they still lived under his roof.

The moment we stepped into the grand foyer, Rafaelle slapped me on the shoulder and headed down the right hallway. To the kitchen. His favourite place in the house.

Because it had been our mother’s favourite place.

It was a ritual he never broke whenever we returned to Fallbrook, no matter what. I suspected Rafa would storm through fire or a category-five tornado, risk life and limb to rescue Matri’s beloved pots and pans if it ever came to it.

I hoped it never did because I sure as fuck wouldn’t let him.

No matter how badly her terrible death had shattered all of us, but especially him, life was worth infinitely more than a handful of crockery.

And yes, I got that there was a certain irony in my thinking when I willingly risked my own life every time I slid behind the wheel of a Furia Racing car.

His footsteps trailed off and I exhaled, letting the very rare silence wash over me. Lifting my head, I stared up at the rotunda and the fancy mosaic Orazio had had some Sicilian painter etch into the domed ceiling.

Somewhere up there, all our names were inscribed onto scrolls and saints’ robes and arrows carried by fat little winged cherubs in a celebration of family, Catholic benevolence and love.

A ludicrous lie.

The Salvatores hadn’t known peace since a woman named Valentina Baglioni had met her mysterious end in a dirty alley in Palermo on Valentine’s Day some six decades ago.

Her name too was up there, notably closer to Orazio’s than even my grandmother’s.

I dragged my gaze from the ceiling as footsteps approached.

Fabiana, the housekeeper, and as close to a surrogate mother as I was allowed without Orazio deeming it mollycoddling, smiled. ‘Cesare, welcome home.’

‘ Grazii .’

‘Your papa and Nonno are on the golf course with Bagio and Pietro. They will be back in an hour. Dinner is at the usual time.’

I allowed her enveloping hug and a kiss on both cheeks before, predictably, her eyes moved past me, searching.

I smiled ruefully. ‘He’s in the kitchen. You should get in there before he rearranges everything.’

‘ Diu miu .’ She shot off with a yelp and a swift sign of the cross, and I turned towards the stairs.

If I was lucky, I would be left alone for an hour.

Just about enough time to solidify my defence before the Sword of Damocles swinging over my head fell.