Page 38 of Vincenzo (The DiMaggio Crime Family #3)

AMALIA

I ’ve been fucking fooled.

My body heats with a boiling rage when I realize how oblivious I’ve been. This entire time I thought Armando was helping me, but it hasn’t been him at all? It’s been his fucking twin brother Diego?

“Surprised, prima ?” he says with a sinister chuckle that Pedro joins in on.

I tighten the pressure I have against the blade on his neck. “You sure you want to join in on my cousin’s stupidity, Pedro?”

“Please,” he scoffs out. “You’re just a little girl trying to play a big boy’s game.”

“I’ve been working on perfecting my fucking chivalrous brother for years now,” Diego says, “and I’ve finally been able to put it to good use. How would you rate my performance?”

His tone has changed. Armando’s usual charming and confident tone has been replaced with the slimy, douchebag voice of Diego.

“How long have you been pretending to be your brother?” I snap.

“Too long. You and that idiot brother of mine made it too fucking easy for us. All we had to do was switch our names and forward your calls in both of your phones, and you were putty in our hands.”

My heart beats erratically, making it nearly impossible to breathe. Everything was a setup. Everything. How the hell did I not catch onto this?

The anger coursing through my body finally becomes too much and I explode. “How could you do this, Diego?” I exclaim. “I always knew you were a little bitch who always wanted to follow in daddy’s footsteps, but how could you side with him and Pedro after what they did to your own mother?”

“ Don’t answer that, Diego,” Pedro says.

I tighten the hold I have around his neck and he lets out a hiss.

“Oh, did I nick you there?” I ask as if I don’t already know the answer.

“Speak again, and I’ll do a lot fucking more next time.

” I lower my lips to his ear so only he can hear me.

“And trust me when I say, killing you has been a dream of mine since I found out what you did to my parents. Don’t fucking tempt me with the one thing I’ve been dying to do, Pedro. ”

“It doesn’t matter,” Diego says. “The bitch won’t be an issue for long.”

Enzo tightens his hold on Diego, making him cry out in pain again. “You’re fucking confused if you think it’s appropriate to speak to her like that when I’m a split second away from breaking your arm and shooting you in the fucking head.”

Diego laughs, and the sound sends a shiver up my spine. “How fucking cute. You still think you have the upper hand here.”

My brows furrow and I snap my gaze to Enzo, whose glare is hard on the gun buried in Diego’s temple. He clenches his jaw, and just when I think he’s about to shoot him, something hits me in the back of my head, hard .

It happens so fast that all I hear is Enzo yelling my name while I let go of Pedro and fall to the ground, white lights flashing through my dark mind.

“Mierda,” I hiss out.

I bring my hand to the back of my head, and something wet coats my fingers. I wince.

“Now, now, now,” a deep, familiar voice says. I’m not sure if it’s coming from behind me or in front of me at this point. With my throbbing head and my vision a blur, I can’t tell my left from my right, but I do feel someone ripping the gun from the holster I have around my leg.

Enzo’s yelling, but it sounds muffled like it’s in the background, and I can’t make out his words.

When I’m yanked back up to a stand by the strands of my hair, I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from hissing out in pain, and my hands fly up to my attacker’s hands in hopes that I can alleviate some of the hold he has on me.

“Let her go, or I’ll blow this fucker’s brains out all over the place!” Enzo yells, his voice finally coming through.

Opening my eyes, my vision slowly clears until I see Enzo and Diego still in the same positions.

“No, you see, I don’t think you will, because if you do, then your pretty little girlfriend’s brains will join them.” Cool metal presses into the back of my head.

“Manuel?” I spit out, struggling against the grip he has in my hair.

“ Manuel? What, no tío anymore?”

“Fuck. You,” I say through gritted teeth.

He tightens his hold on me, and I struggle to not cry out in pain.

“Now, that’s no way to speak to the man who raised you.”

“All you did was raise me to be a naive murderer.”

“I raised you to have worth in this world,” he snaps out, his tone getting serious. “You think your parents would’ve made you into anything worthwhile? You’d just be sitting at home like a pretty little cartel princesa .”

“Amalia!” Enzo’s voice is frantic, and his penetrating gaze hits me hard.

“I’m okay,” I call out to him, but it doesn’t alleviate the concern in his eyes.

“How could you do this, Manuel?” I ask. “It’s one thing to have my parents killed over this sick sense of power you’re obsessed with, but how could you have your own wife killed because of it? Did she mean that little to you?”

A laugh vibrates through my uncle that sends a sickening chill through my body. “I only married Carmen for her name.”

My face blanches. “Her name?” I repeat. A sour taste at my uncle’s cold and calculated words dries out my mouth.

“Oh, come on, princesa . Don’t act so naive.

Carmen and your mother were the sole heirs to the Velasco Cartel, which meant the men they married would take over.

Unfortunately, your grandfather decided to put your dad in charge of the North American region, so I had to remove that obstacle from my path.

Then when Carmen decided to get vocal about certain aspects of the business I wanted to introduce, I knew she needed to be removed as well. ”

My eyes widen as I put the pieces together. “What aspects?” I ask, even though I’m certain I know the answer.

My uncle lets out an annoyed sigh as if explaining this to me is beneath him.

“She overheard a conversation between me and Pedro about my plans to integrate sex trafficking into our line of work, and she wasn’t too happy about it.

So, I decided to take her out before she could make it a bigger issue than it needed to be. ”

He says it as if her life was so meaningless. I grind my teeth. Hard. That’s why he murdered mi tía ? Because she had the balls to stick up to him about something that’s wrong ?

“You’re a piece of shit,” I say. My voice is low and deadly controlled.

My uncle presses the gun harder into my head. “You better watch that mouth of yours.”

“You do anything to her, and your kid’s done,” Enzo threatens.

“Just do it,” I call out to him. “It doesn’t matter what my uncle does to me. Kill the puta madre !”

My uncle yanks me back toward him and says, “Nuh, uhh, uhh. That’ll be the biggest mistake of your damn life.”

Enzo is silent, and he doesn’t make a move.

“You seem like an intelligent man, Vincenzo. Take a quick look around. If you haven’t already, that is.”

Enzo remains silent and keeps his glare on my uncle.

“That’s what I thought.” He chuckles, and the sound goes right down my spine, heightening my senses.

“I’m sure you’ve noticed you’re outnumbered, then.

I have five armed men who have their guns aimed at you, and I have my gun aimed at your girlfriend.

So that means it would be best if you did what I said and let my son go. ”

Enzo brings his gaze back to mine, and his eyes soften for a second.

Fuck. No. He’s going to let him go.

“Enzo—” I say, but I’m cut off.

“I let your son go and then what? You kill me and Amalia?”

My uncle lets out another deep, dark laugh. “Fine. Tell me your demands.”

“You’re going to come over here and let Amalia go. Once you do, I’ll let your little bitch of a son go.”

Enzo must tighten his hold on Diego because he grunts out in pain.

“Then you’re going to let us walk out of this place alive — without anyone following us —and you’ll never see us again.”

“Enzo—” I try again, but my uncle yanks my hair, forcing my head back. I bite my tongue to keep from crying out, and a copper taste infiltrates my mouth.

“Shhhh, the men are talking here,” he whispers in my ear, and it takes everything in me not to jab my elbow into him and take him out myself.

The only reason I don’t is because of the five other men who have their guns aimed at Enzo.

Is it possible we could take them out without being scathed?

Sure, but it’s not a guarantee, especially when I’m not even armed.

“You’ll leave Miami?” my uncle calls out to him.

“Immediately. I have a jet on standby,” he says.

“And you’ll never come back here or speak of this place or our family ever again?” my uncle asks.

A fucking gag order.

“Never again,” Enzo says.

I hate this. This is not how this was supposed to go down, and it’s all because I was fucking fooled.

I had him. The man who murdered my parents. I had him.

My heart is hammering in my chest, lighting my skin on fire.

He and my uncle were supposed to pay for what they did. We were going to make them pay. And now what? I’m just supposed to let them go free? Turn a blind eye and go about my life as if the two men who destroyed it aren’t walking this Earth living their best fucking lives ever?

My eyes shoot to Enzo’s, and he’s staring at me as if he’s trying to tell me something.

My face must show defeat, knowing the sacrifice we’d have to make to keep us alive, but Enzo’s tells me something completely different. His unwavering eyes and locked jaw tell me he’s not giving up.

When I perk up a bit from the painful position my uncle has me in, Enzo gives me the faintest nod that I question if I saw it. When his eyes light up for a brief moment, I know he’s just told me something.

This isn’t the end.

“Fine,” my uncle says, pushing me forward. “Walk.”

When we get to be about ten feet in front of Enzo, my uncle stops us and says, “Don’t forget whose guns are aimed at you both. Any funny business, and you’ll both be dead in a heartbeat. Now drop your gun and release my son.”

“The fuck not,” Enzo laughs out. “I’ll keep my gun strapped to my hand, thanks.”