My simple job had cost Marissa’s life and created this life of watching Ava from the shadows.
I walked up to David, lifted my leg, and pushed my heavy steel-toe boot between his legs. He cried out as I pushed the chair backwards and stopped on the edge with nothing to stop me from pushing him right over.
Dante and Gio took their place at my side.
I aimed the guns at David and snarled. “Talk. You have one minute.”
“Please don’t kill me,” he begged.
“Wrong answer.” Since he was most likely a pawn too in whatever game we were playing, I thought I’d show some compassion and not shoot off any body parts. If he didn’t piss me off the wrong way and I ended up allowing him to live, people would have questions if I blew off an arm or two.
That was my rage.
I fired a shot at his crotch in the space between where my foot stopped.
He screamed.
Out the corner of my eye, I noticed Dante flinch.
“Let’s try this again. Talk. Who are you working for?”
“Please,” he begged.
“I’ll shoot your fucking dick off, then push you over the edge. I mean it. You don’t screw with mobsters, and you sure as shit don’t screw with me. So, talk… Who sent you? Why do you really need the shipping company?”
Jesus, the fact that this guy was still not talking told me whoever he was working for must have been scarier than me. Scarier than being in this situation.
“Please. They’ll kill my wife and my child.” Tears rolled down his cheeks.
I eased back and looked from Dante to Gio.
Wife and child.
Everything was a reminder of what I once had. A painful reminder.
“Who is they? Don’t mess with me. Answer the fucking question.”
“I can’t.”
“Do you want to die? Do I look like the understanding type to you?” I got up in his face and stared at him long and hard. That, however, still didn’t seem to faze him.
In rage, I flipped the chair around and shoved it hard, so now he was hovering dangerously close to the edge, and he could see his destruction. The fate that awaited him.
“You have a wife and child? How dare you put them in such danger. Nothing is worth that. Answer the question, David, or I’ll drop you right the hell now.” I actually wouldn’t do that.
I’d never done that even though I’d threatened it many times, but that was mindless killing. Killing out of spite. I doubt though that if Ava saw me like this, she’d understand. Right now, I looked like a damn monster. Like something straight from the chasm of hell.
“Joe Manello,” David said quickly. “Joe Manello.”
So, Joe really was back.
I pulled him back and flipped the chair back to face me. Against the moonlight and the soft haze of lights on the rooftop, David’s face was a sickly green color.
“Why does Joe Manello want the shipping company?”
“He needed transport. The shipping company has passage to England and clearance.”
“I’m aware what my fucking company has. What does he need transport for?”
“I don’t know. He came and approached me with an offer I couldn’t refuse. A billion dollars to get you to sell me the shipping company. It would be easier to—”
A single gunshot pierced through the night, and I actually felt the bullet whiz past me. It whizzed past me and lodged straight smack between David’s eyes.
Dante and Gio jumped into action, so did I, looking around frantically in the direction the bullet had come from.
Fucking hell. This was it. War had started. Whoever shot him didn’t want him to talk.
And again, they knew we were on the roof.
Alex and Jude…
Was it them?
Dante and Gio dispersed to search. I stayed where I was.
I didn’t know what affected me more. The knowledge of what was going on or my fears about what would happen next.
* * *
Ava
* * *
I straightened on the bed the minute Claudius walked into the room.
He looked awful and… there was blood on his face.
Blood, more blood, just like at the restaurant.
He didn’t say anything to me. He just looked at me, then walked into the ensuite bathroom.
I slid off the bed and made my way to him.
I’d worried myself sick the whole night. Worried about what he was doing, worried that something could happen to him, worried about what I was getting myself into.
Now he was back, with blood on his face.
“Claudius,” I spoke in a soft, hushed voice.
He’d taken off his jacket and shirt and stood shirtless in front of the mirror. He turned on the tap and splashed water on his face, splashing it so hard it went all over the floor.
I moved closer seeing his distress and pressed my hand to his back. He turned to face me, and through the water I could see one single tear run from his brown eye, down his cheek, staining the inky black of the cross.
“What happened?”
He shook his head.
“Did you kill someone?” I was afraid of the answer.
“No. Not yet.”
I pressed down hard on my lip.
“I need you to go to Luc’s tomorrow and stay there. I know you have plans Friday and it’s a busy week for you, but I need to make sure you’re safe.”
“I want to stay with you.” Earlier, I’d been a mess. I’d been so shaken up by what happened at the restaurant. But I wanted to stay with him. The same way he protected me, I wanted to make sure he didn’t go out and get himself killed.
“You can’t. Not at all.”
It was the way he said it and what he said that stung my heart.
“What does that mean, Claudius? Not at all?”
“Ten years ago, Luc and I were walking down the street near Delizioso. He wanted Mexican for lunch, and I wanted Italian. I wanted to go back to Delizioso. The place we’d discovered a few weeks back and kept going back to dinner, and I wanted to try the lunch special. Luc tossed a coin. Heads, we go to the Mexican place, tails, we go to Delizioso. Landed on tails, and in we went to Delizioso. I must have just picked up the menu when I saw you and decided you had to be mine.”
A tear ran down my cheek. That was a day I’d never forget because of the magic and the chemistry we shared. I’d wanted him to be mine too.
“Claudius…” I hated the helpless feeling that coursed through me. That helpless feeling that reminded me that there was nothing I could do. Nothing to fix the situation, nothing to make things the way they should have been. And… love wasn’t enough.
He cupped my face. “There are some things in this world that are so precious they should be left alone. I should have gone to the Mexican place. I should have left you alone.”
He placed a kiss on my forehead and walked away.
All I could do was stare as my heart broke again, and my soul wept.
Chapter 24
Claudius
* * *
Yesterday brought with it an answer clear as glass. It was the answer I didn’t want, but it truly was the answer to what my heart feared the most.
I needed to let her go.
Let Ava go. It was the same answer I’d had in the very beginning. The same fucking answer that tore me apart.
Letting her go this time would be harder, because she knew the truth. She knew how much I loved her, but love wasn’t close to enough for us to be together.
I needed to let her go and live a normal life. Go be happy with a man like that dweeb John. Crispy clean in his suit and that I-think-I’m-hot-shit attitude. She could go be happy with someone like that in her restaurant.
She could meet a normal guy, have a family, and live the rest of her life happy and safe. A life that didn’t include me.
A life where she wasn’t tainted by my world.
I wasn’t like Luc. Luc was the guy who had hi
s shit together. The significant thing about it was, whether he was in the business or not, he had his fucking head screwed on and knew how to handle a situation.
Me, I just lost my mind, and when it called for it, couldn’t think past running into the street on a blood hunt for the fuckers who messed with me and mine.
Too much had happened in just this week alone. All disasters like signs or massive warning billboards telling me to get this woman out of my life if I didn’t want to ruin her any more than I had.
So, that was it. It wouldn’t matter what I wanted. It was the right thing to do. The right thing—my old friend returning, rearing its ugly head in my face,
telling me that all the choices I made would never include my own happiness.
Fuck.
I didn’t matter. That didn’t matter. Right now, I had to switch into serious mode and get to the bottom of this.
Instead of sleeping, I went to my office and called in every resource I knew before the sun came up.
That also included contact to the hacker we’d used three years ago when Amelia got taken by Victor, and Taglioni Donachie.
The hacker’s name was Cora.
Getting her details meant talking to Amelia’s friend, Brad Sinclaire. A damn cop based in L.A. I hated cops more than anything, but he was a guy who actually grew on me even though I gave him a hard time.
I needed Cora now because I didn’t know how much time we had available to us.
Last night, whoever was watching us killed David. That and the incident at the restaurant all spoke of what trouble was on the way. So, I needed eyes everywhere.
Pa and I were already waiting for The Four when they came in.
I noticed the tension rippling off Dante and Gio. Tension toward Alex and Jude.
Pa glanced at me when the door closed.
I had everything prepped in my mind, but for the first time, I didn’t know how to start.
There was too much shit. Mostly, I wanted to torture the rat amongst us and kill him.
“You know what?” Dante declared. He would never have spoken first if Raphael were still boss. Hell, he probably wouldn’t do it if Luc were standing before him now and not me.
They’d become too comfortable with me, but I got it. The guy looked as pissed as me, as did Gio, who moved his hand to his piece in his side pocket.
Maybe it was stupid, but I kind of knew in that moment that the rat amongst us was neither of them.
“What would you like to say, Dante?” I asked.
“Where the fuck were you two last night?” Dante spat, directing the anger he exuded to Alex and Jude.
“I told you we were tied up,” Alex answered. “I messaged back last night. Couldn’t answer the phone. We went to the Glass House and saw Joe Manello and one of his whores. We followed him to a house on Rocherfield. I thought it was more important to tail him.”
I stared at Alex. He was the first to speak to David Shipel. He gave the man got a foot in the door. And Jude?
Asshole had that damn unreadable expression on his face. The same expression that made others underestimate him.
Was I doing that now?
“Fucking convenient. No one can check that out,” Dante argued.
Alex stood at the same time as Dante.
“What you trying to say, Dante?” Alex challenged.
Dante answered with a fist. One punch straight to Alex’s cheek that sent him to the floor.
Jude jumped up and aimed his gun at Dante before he could hit Alex again, but Gio stood at the same time, aiming two guns at Alex and Jude.
“I’ll use them. You know I will,” Gio warned, showing clear that while Jude might have Alex’s back because they were brothers, Gio had Dante’s back.
To my surprise, Pa started laughing. “This is what happens when mobsters go soft. They start fighting amongst themselves.”
Pa knew my concerns and had completely spoken his mind earlier when he said it was one of those two.
Jude or Alex.
I knew it was true, but I didn’t want to accept it.
“Put the fucking guns away,” I ordered, and all guns moved back to where they’d been previously stationed. “Jude and Alex, go back to tailing Joe. Report back at five.”
Alex looked me over. A bruise had already started to form over his eye.
“You’re sending us away?” Alex glared at me and shook his head.
“I’m sending you on a task. Do it.”
I was fucking sending them away, alright. What had happened so far had given the rat the intel he needed to tell whomever he was working for.
Now that we had an idea of what we were up against, I didn’t want to share any more information.
“Come on, Alex. Boss’ orders.” Jude stood up and tapped Alex’s shoulder.
Someone knocked on the door. That would either be my secretary or Cora. I knew Cora would be on her way but figured it could be too early for her to get here.
Since I’d offered her fifty grand for her help, I suppose that could have gotten her here quicker than I imagined.
“Come in,” I called out.
The door opened, and she popped her head inside. Three years older looked better on her. None of those bright colors in her hair shit that I’d seen last time.
Instead, her hair was a light brown, but the ends where it curled up were a soft shade of lilac.
It made her look more professional, although she still had some color.
“Morning,” she smiled, looking around the room. “I hope I’m not interrupting anything. You guys look a little tense.”
“We always look like this. Come in and sit down.” I pointed to the chairs where Alex and Jude had previously sat.
She bit the corner of her lip and made her way inside. As she passed Alex, I didn’t miss the look she gave him. It was the look he gave her, however, that caught my attention more. It made me wonder if anything had happened between them last time we were all together. The slight blush in Cora’s cheeks told me that maybe I was right.
It was all shit to me though. Business was business.
“Guys, you remember Cora.”
Dante and Gio nodded. Cora gave them a sheepish smile back. Still wary of us.
“Cora, I know you just got here, but do you think we could get down to business?”
“I’m ready.” She nodded.
* * *
“I took the liberty of checking out a few things on my way here. Sinclaire said the main goal was to see what was currently hot in Chicago. Anything worth stealing. I found five things and a possible sixth.” Cora brought up a file on her laptop, and her fingers fired across the keyboard as she opened one of the files.
“What made these things so special?” I asked. The obvious answer was money, but as I knew all too well, there were some things worth more than just money.
“You’ll see.” She clicked on the folder in the file, and an image of a jade stone popped up. “This was found in a dig in Indonesia. The current market value is not listed because of the possible significance. Sold on the black market, you could make an easy million. As with these.” She opened an image of a Japanese art collection. It looked of the priceless variety too. “These are here for an exhibition.”
“It can’t be any of those,” Dante said. “David Shipel wouldn’t offer up all that money to make an easy million, especially when he was being offered a billion dollars.”
“I agree.” I pulled my chair closer. “Cora, these guys wanted to use my shipping company to smuggle something valuable. The thing would have gone as far as England undetected because of the arrangements we have and leniency on shipping permissions. Whatever it is, is that valuable.”
She pulled in a breath. “Well, let me jump to number six. Maybe we should start with the worst-case scenario and work our way down.” She pulled up an image of three cylinder-shaped objects. They were silver but reminded me of Fabergé eggs due to their glossiness.
“What the hell are those?” Gio
asked.
“Nukes,” Pa stated.
Cora nodded. “They’re nukes currently being stored at the military base in Illinois.”
“What made you think it was these?” I had to know.
“When I was told about Barabbas Antonella. His name popped up a lot for illegal weapons trafficking. But he’s not a thief of sorts. He’s the orchestrator. Joe Manello’s name never came up, but I saw the type of wealth he has. I’m willing to bet he’s the investor. I think you’re looking at a crew setup here. Not just one of two people. There’s someone big missing from the picture. Someone you haven’t seen yet maybe.”
I looked at Cora as she spoke, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up. There was one person I could think of, but I knew my heart wanted it to be him.
Goliath…
This was the sort of thing that was up his alley.
“How are we going to know? The nukes are just speculation. It might not be them.” That was me trying to be objective.
“There’re these two things.” She clicked the files below. One brought up a research paper from some doctor on cold fusion, and the other a tech-looking chip. “The chip allows you to hack into any system. It’s actually a decrypter devised for Homeland Security as an antiterrorist measure. It could be that too.”
It could be, but I didn’t think it was.
“I think it’s the nukes,” I said, glancing at the guys. “It feels more fitting with the shipping company. I’m pretty certain if it was a chip, then they wouldn’t need to get gone by sea. Let’s say it is the nukes, and they want to steal that, what would they do? Just grab the things and go? Taking something like that is bound to cause a big fuss. Don’t you think?”
Cora smiled. “Definitely. If I wanted to steal something like this, I’d have friends on the inside. You can’t get your hands on something like this in any simple way. If our theory is right and this is the thing they’re after, then they have some seriously big plans going on in the background. What we’re seeing is just the tip of the iceberg.”
Dirty Hearts: A Bad Bod Mafia Romance Page 19