“What makes you think it’s him?” My dad was a stubborn bastard. Once he decided on something, it was almost impossible to change his mind. But I had to sway him somehow. Because if he started looking in this direction, he might discover what I was desperate to keep hidden.
“I’ve had him watched since my suspicions were raised. He works under Tony, who says he’s above reproach, keen and bloodthirsty. He works, goes home to his parent’s place, and visits Anita. That’s it. But I smell a rat, and I’ve never been wrong before. I can trust you to take care of him, can’t I?”
My dad froze with a glare, cold with impatience. It still held the power to freeze me, like it did when I was a child. He didn’t tower over me as a vengeful giant anymore, but his shadow loomed on the wall behind him. He wouldn’t accept any answer except my assent. I dipped my head, making a promise I knew I wasn’t going to keep. The moment I looked into Anita’s eyes, really looked, and beheld the monster that lurked there. I’dfallen on my knees, my soul hers to take. I thought I’d loved the soft facade she mastered, but when I saw the raw rage that boiled her veins.
There was no choice.
My dad thought Paolo was The Gardener.
He’d made the same mistake I did, dismissing my brilliant wife. Now he wanted Paolo dead and The Gardener destroyed. But I would never let that happen.
I’d choose Anita. Every time. Now, I had to make sure she understood the danger we were in and convince her to work with me rather than against me. If she wanted her cousin to live. My dad pulled out a box of cigars and his beveled glass cigar ashtray. It had been a gift from my mom. The secret Anita had admitted sat heavy in the pit of my stomach. Lanton was dead, but his misdeeds slashed the tendons of my ankles from the grave. I was still stumbling, unable to process the implications.
“Good. It’s about time we got back to the way it should be. We need to show a united front. I don’t need rumors starting or those Donatos thinking they have a chance to regain their land. The Orazio empire will expand, and I need my son by my side.”
“Are they planning on pressing the borders?” The Donato family had a small slice of Greenich Bay. When my mom went missing, my father blamed them. He forced them to give up part of their territory. They still plead innocence all these years later.
“No.” My dad shifted in his leather seat. His eyes were bloodshot through the cloud of smoke he blew in my direction. “I want to continue Lanton’s plans to expand our trade. There are lucrative avenues that we should take advantage of. We run the port, the opportunities to grow are many.”
A chill went down my spine. His gaze had a greedy glint, one I hadn’t seen before. There was only one thing that would make us that kind of money.
Flesh trade.
“I didn’t think you were serious about that. It’s high risk and, frankly, messy.” My mind raced. Lanton was dead, but his reach was still tainted. Would I ever be free of him? We controlled the port, but trafficking bodies through it? His lip curled as he waved an impatient hand at me. Ash dropped from the cigar, missing the tray. He brushed it off onto the carpet with a grunt.
I remembered when Lanton had visited us once. I’d sat cross-legged in the room as my dad, and Lanton smoked, cradling glasses of amber spirits. Diane and my mom had brought in a tray of finger food, promising not to bother the men.
My chest had glowed from my forgotten place on the floor. I thought I was so grown up. Lanton had spilled his ash on the floor, and my mom let out a noise of dismay. My dad expected everything in the house to be kept pristine. But instead of reprimanding Lanton, he turned to my mom, making her apologize to Lanton.
I’ll never forget the look on her face. The way her expression froze, like cracked plastic. Fake and wrong. Lanton had enjoyed the soft, shamed whisper she’d made toward him. Spreading his legs wide as if the armchair was his throne.
A shiver ran down my spine.
“Times change. I didn’t ask for your opinion on the matter. Prove to me you’re worth listening to. Put a bullet in Paolo’s traitorous head, and we’ll talk. Don’t say a word about what I’ve tasked you.”
He frowned at the stack of papers, muttering as he dragged it in front of him.
Impotence swirled in my stomach as I rose, but I hoarded my arguments. I saw my dad through a new lens. It was dirty and cracked. I wondered when it had fallen into disrepair. Times changed.
“What did the Donatos do to Mom when they took her? I’ve heard the rumors.”
My dad dragged his fingers to the edge of the table, gripping until the wood creaked in protest. His head lifted in slow motion. I knew he was giving me a chance to repent, to turn tail. He couldn’t let go of her memory, but he wouldn’t let anyone speak of her, either. She was a ghost around his neck, a noose.
“You want to know what they did to your beautiful mom? They tore her to pieces until there was nothing left but her hair.” His voice cracked and shook like an earthquake. “They plaited the strands, tied them with a black velvet ribbon. If she’d kept quiet and stayed at home none of this would have happened.”
I couldn’t say anything in the face of his admission, my stomach burning through with acid. So, I turned my back on him, knowing it wouldn’t be the first time.
My heart choked my throat as I stormed through the compound. The blondes that Lanton had been tenuously connected to all turned up dead with black velvet ribbon tying their hands.
He trussed them up like presents. It was too close to dismiss, but why didn’t my dad see it?
My dilemma weighed on me as I found Paolo. He was working with Tony, stocktaking weapons. There were a few guys loitering in the stuffy warehouse, sorting through a shipment that arrived this morning. It would help to have witnesses for this. I grabbed Paolo around his neck and squeezed. Cutting off the noise of protest he made.
“You’re going to walk out of here with me. Don’t say a fucking word. You got it?” I waved off Tony when he strode toward me.
Paolo raised his eyebrows but left his belongings and ignored the probing call from the surrounding men. I nudged Paolo toward the driver’s seat of my car, pulled out my gun, and laid it across my lap.
“Can I speak now?” he asked quietly, and I shook my head. I wound down the window, needing to clear my clamoring mind. Ialso wanted anyone watching to hear the yelp of pain I was about to knock out of Paolo. The tension in the car was enough to make my bones snap.
