“Where the hell do you think you're going at this time of night?” he asked, sipping on a tumbler of Scotch and keeping his eyes focused on his book.
“My friend, Millie, is breaking up with her boyfriend,” I lied, looking him straight in the face when he finally deigned to turn his gaze to mine. “She emailed me earlier and she's not in a good place.” I paused when Vincent said nothing. “Is there a problem with me going to see her?”
“This has nothing to do with Renata lying naked and alone in the woods, does it?” he said, as if he were asking me if I liked today's weather. There was no emotion there, nothing. That was the thing about Vinny—he flipped from caring to cold in a second.
“Vincent,” I said, tucking my coat over my arm and sighing loudly. “Have you ever had a girlfriend in crisis? I don't have time for games. I have time for cosmopolitans and gossip. Don't I deserve a little normalcy?”
“Oh, Lazy,” he said, closing his book and shaking his head. “You know, we're not as dumb as we look, me and your old man. I know you're upset, tesoro. And after the day you've had? First you tell me you're gonna run things around here and the next you act like you got more bimbo in you than brains.”
He cast me a look and a wink, standing up from the chair with a groan, like maybe his age was finally getting to him.
“You can go visit your friend, but we'll be watching.”
“And that's different from any other day, how?” I asked with a tired sigh. Vincent ignored me, but he did call a car, and he did check my purse. I couldn't help remembering the revolver he'd dropped inside the night of the shooting at the winery.
Had he known what was coming? Had Carlo arranged it? And was Vinny a part of it all?
Carlo had said he was looking for a mischief of rats.
I felt like I'd just stumbled right into their den.
Now I had to pray they didn't eat me alive.
The driver took me to Millie's house, a good three hours away from the Costello Manor.
It felt good to put that much distance between my father and me, between my mother's ghost and me.
He killed her, I repeated in my head over and over and over again. I knew that a single note, hell, a single line on a single note didn't really mean anything, but that was to someone lucky enough not to be a part of this world. In this world, it meant everything.
I thought of Vera, wearing my mother's nightgowns, cleaning up the magazines and the water glass, of my father parading her around in front of me. I wondered if he got some sort of sick pleasure out of it all?
“Shall I get your door, Miss Costello?” the driver asked, but I was already pushing it open and heading for the golden glow of Millie's front door. Juliano was with me again—he must be one of my dad's new favorites—and he stood outside, next to the garage door like I was a prisoner.
Not good.
I wasn't on my game, clearly. Vinny and Carlo were fucking onto the fact that something wasn't right with me. And I'd given it up so easily. What the hell was I thinking?
I knocked and a few seconds later, Millie opened the door looking ridiculously confused at my presence on her doorstep. To be fair, it was ten o'clock at night, she had no boyfriend, and I'd barely responded to any of her texts or messages in the last week.
“Give me a hug,” I said, screwing up my face, hoping she took the faux sadness of my expression to mean I was thinking about Edlyn and Bo. Really, we were simply putting on a show for my cousin/prison guard.
“Oh, babe,” she replied, putting an arm around me and holding her drink in the opposite hand. After a good squeeze, she pulled me inside and shut the door. “Where have you been? Edlyn's in a panic about this whole thing and God, I could just cut Bo's balls off with a pumpkin carving knife.”
I paused and looked down at the sad little pumpkin in the middle of Millie's coffee table. I'd interrupted her in the middle of an intense carving session, etching out a very intricate spider design into the orange flesh.
“I see you're in the festive mood,” I told her as I lifted my gaze up and found a row of twinkling green, blue, and purple bat lights hanging above the TV. A black and white movie was playing quietly in the background.
“Sort of,” she said, her blonde hair falling forward and slightly obscuring the lines of her face. “I guess I was just a little lonely? Nothing else to do out here all by myself,” she said, lifting her brows up and gesturing with her drink. “Can I get you an adult beverage? I figure if you're here this late without calling, something must be wrong. Booze helps, you know.”
I smiled, but I didn't have time to sit and have a drink—much as I might want to.
“Actually, I was hoping you'd do me a little favor,” I said and prayed like hell that I wasn't going to get Millie into trouble tonight. If one of my friends got hurt because of me, I'd never forgive myself.
Two hours later, I was slipping out the back window of Millie's bedroom and heading off through suburban yards bathed in shadows and moonlight. Juliano wasn't looking for me back here because nobody in the family thought I was stupid enough to try sneaking off—that was the whole point of his presence in the front yard.
You're being watched, it said, but he was never actually intended to physically keep me there. I made my way toward the edge of the neighborhood, to one of the quieter cul-de-sacs, and then I called myself a cab with the phone I'd fished from the new box of condoms I'd purchased earlier.
An hour or so later, I was standing next to the woods about ten miles down from the Bellincioni house, far enough away that I wouldn't get shot, but close enough for Caj to get to me quickly.
“You're making a big assumption, trusting me,” he whispered, coming out of the darkness behind me and grabbing me around the throat with a leather gloved hand. The other slid around my waist, locking me in place. If he wanted to kill me right then, it wouldn't take a whole lot of effort.
“If you think I trust you,” I told him, using a maneuver that Vincent had taught me many years ago to twist out of his grip, “then you're the one that's naïve.”
Caj just laughed, a vision in dark clothes, his red hair under a black cap like a thief in an old movie. His eyes watched me like a fox.
“You were tipped off about Renata?” I asked him, because I hadn't had a chance to discuss any of this in private with the men. After I saw that footage, I'd needed to be alone.
“Mm,” he replied, more sound than actual word. “You said your father wanted the traitor—I delivered it for you, like a cat bringing home a kill. Just a plump little mouse on your doorstep.”
“Please don't be creepy,” I told him, putting my hands on my hips and listening to the quiet night sounds of the New York countryside. When most of the world thought of New York, they thought of the densely packed blocks of the city, the hustle and bustle, the traffic and the crowds. But out here, it was dead silent. I could hear an owl in the distance, its hoots a soft melancholy lullaby. “You can be normal when you try; I've seen it.”
“You mean the night we fucked?” he asked, taking a small step back from me.
“I'd hardly call that normal,” I said, remembering shredded clothing, lips and tongues and teeth. God. I doubted most teenagers went at it quite like we did our first time.
“Who tipped you off about Renata?” I asked and Caj paused for a long moment.
“You think it was a setup?” he asked, making the large jump from my question to the obvious conclusion. Carlo had told somebody about Renata who'd spread the word to one of Caj's contacts and then up to Mr. Bellincioni himself. That was my working theory anyway. “I see. Interesting. So why call me? Why not Lucky?” He snapped the name off his tongue like it was a rubber band.
“I need someone with your skill set,” I told him, knowing that very likely any of the three men could help me out here tonight. But Caj was strange and unpredictable and he liked playing games. No, I didn't trust him, but I felt like I could get him to do this without paying too high of a price. “We need to find R
enata.”
“She'll have cameras and a guard on her,” he said, but I already knew that. My father would want to see her starve—live and on camera. And of course he wouldn't just leave her out there alone. No, he'd want to make sure she was dead. Somebody would probably saw off her head and bring it to Carlo as a trophy.
“Doesn't matter. We need to find her and talk to her.” I licked my lower lip. I didn't know who else Carlo was going to pin as a supposed traitor, but based on those photos and his words—a mischief of rats—there were probably several more people on his radar. “I wouldn't be surprised if my father sent her on those errands himself.”
“Why would Carlo Costello waste time framing his housekeeper?” Caj asked, folding his muscular arms over the front of his dark knit sweater. He looked so fucking handsome in it, it was an effort not to throw myself in his arms, let him fuck away my worries.
Maybe later.
“I have no idea,” I said, my head spinning with possibilities. “But I found something tonight … I think he killed my mother.”
I looked up and found that Caj's eerie half-smile had turned into a frown.
“Everyone knows he killed your mother, Adelasia,” he told me, his eyes more brown than green in the strange half-light of night.
“For what reason?” I asked, feeling my breathing slow and my heart come to an almost complete stop.
“For fucking another man,” he continued, and I felt this … sense of rage wash over me, hot and violent. I wanted to fucking wring Carlo Costello's neck. “Don't know who,” he continued, moving around me, like an animal surveying its prey. “But I'm guessing whoever it was is now six feet under.” Closing my eyes, I cut off my view of the trees, the silent road, the flicker of stars in a navy sky. I didn't know how to process what he was telling me, but I also didn't have time to figure it out. I'd have to worry about later—if there was a later for me.
“I don't think Carlo really wants any of the things he says he wants,” I said aloud, opening my eyes and finding myself face to face with Caj. “Why place a traitor in the game if there never really was one?”
“To cover his own ass?” Caj asked, sensing the direction I was going; I felt my skin prickle with goose bumps. “Or hell, I don't really know. But I suppose we might find out if we grab this housekeeper of yours. Such a shame I even bothered to give her to him in the first place.”
“You think you can do it?” I asked Caj and watched as he reached into the holster at his hip and presented me with a gun—one outfitted with a suppressor and most likely, subsonic ammo as well. Quiet as they came.
“I know I can,” he told me, and then gestured for me to follow him to the motorcycle he'd pulled up on.
How cliché.
But I liked it.
Caj surprised me by taking me back to his house, whizzing right through the gates on his motorcycle and letting me keep the gun he'd given me. Very ballsy of him to drag me into the Bellincioni Manor and not bother to do a weapons check.
Like me, Caj was staying in his family's house. Considering the fact that he was unmarried, it really wasn't all that unusual; it was a cultural thing. Besides, each family's house served as a sort of hub outside the city for the crime syndicate's activities. In NYC, there'd be a more central location, the real heart of the mafia. But out here, the manors worked just as well.
“Let's see if I can find out where we might stumble upon Renata Coppolina,” Caj said, stalking off and snapping his fingers as he went. “Somebody get my guest a cup of coffee.”
Caj stalked off like a panther, dressed all in black and moving like he was literally made of muscle and nothing else. It was a pleasant sight, if I was being honest with myself. The thought of my mother and her murder popped up in my mind, but I pushed it back again. I really didn't have the leisure to sit here and stew on it, not tonight.
A few minutes later, a woman appeared and put a cup of black coffee in my hand, offering up a small tray with cream and sugar on it. I waved her away and sipped it straight, hoping the rush of caffeine would give a boost to my adrenaline.
Standing there, in the middle of the black and gold foyer of the Bellincioni family, I felt like I was holding back a rush of emotions, a thin wall against a tsunami of feelings I wouldn't let myself feel. Eventually, I'd need an outlet.
Wandering into the living room area, I sat on the edge of a bench and sipped the hot coffee, letting it scald my tongue and throat.
It didn't take Caj long to come back, stalking into the room on long legs and confidence. He didn't look like a man that'd ever felt a lick of fear in his life.
“Think I might have a lead,” he told me, but his eyes were glimmering with the soft kiss of violence. Someone would die tonight at Caj's hands, I was sure of it.
We left on the motorcycle and headed northeast, toward the Independence River Wild Forest area, taking several obscure side roads that I was almost certain were not intended for public use. My body was plastered against the hot hardness of Caj's, my arms wrapped around his waist. I was wearing a leather motorcycle jacket that he'd given me and wondering why he had to smell so damn good.
For someone who could very well be a psychopath, he had a lot of attractive qualities about him. Or at least, my body certainly thought so. My breasts were pressed into his back, my nipples pebbled to hard points, and between my thighs, a heat rose that was almost overwhelming.
Mm.
Fucking away my troubles seemed like a good option right about then—especially when I had hours on the back of that bike to think about it.
By the time we came to a stop, the sun was just starting to crest above the horizon and I could only imagine the state Renata was in, having lain naked, cold, hungry and thirsty for nearly twenty-four hours.
If I needed any help squashing my lust, I'd just gotten it.
Caj didn't say a word, pulling his helmet off and taking mine, tossing them next to the motorcycle and starting off into the woods with me following along behind.
“You don't need to stay quiet yet,” he told me after a few moments, glancing over, the morning sunshine making his jade eyes even brighter. Our feet were loud against the dry leaves, an orange, gold, and red cacophony on the forest floor, like a painting or a symphony drawn from nature's hand. I'd have appreciated it more if I didn't feel like my life was on the verge of collapse.
“Why didn't you ever come back for more?” he asked casually after several long moments of silence. I'd expected a nighttime brawl, blood splattered in the shadows of the forest. Instead, we'd be doing this under the brightness of the sun. Somehow, it made the whole scenario just that much more macabre.
“More?” I asked, but I wasn't stupid. I already knew what Caj was referring to; I just didn't want to have this particular conversation at that moment. Or ever, really. “More what?”
“Oh, please,” he said, looking down at me like he was still trying to come up with a really interesting nickname. At this point I was starting to wonder if it might behoove me to fucking pick one myself. “You know I'm talking about sex—you're not shy, Adelasia.”
“Not shy, no, but why on earth would you think bringing up our sloppy first time would do either of us any good?”
“Sloppy?” Caj asked, his voice like the edge of a knife; it was sharp enough to cut. “Oh, I thought you were anything but sloppy,” he purred, making my skin feel tight. “I've been trying to find a woman who could live up to that night ever since. Please don't try and tell me that Bo did it for you.”
“It wasn't about sex with Bo,” I said and Caj threw his head back in a burst of raucous laughter.
“It wasn't about sex?” he asked incredulously, glancing down at me and looking uncomfortably handsome with his all-American good looks. Sure, I could see the hint of Italian in him still, but Caj was a New Yorker now, born and bred. “That's something people only say when they're decidedly not satisfied with the sex. Besides, if it wasn't about sex, then what was it with that man? Clearly, he wasn't exact
ly loyal.”
“He was a crutch,” I told Caj, looking away from him and focusing on the forest instead. There were pines, spruces, Douglas firs, and hemlocks. Some of the trees were evergreen, clinging stubbornly to a color that was far too similar to Caj's eyes. The rest danced with the seasons, blending into a kaleidoscope of color. “An anchor to normalcy.”
“A bland, boring man like that? Who cheats and can't fuck for shit? What an awful thing to punish yourself with.”
“Punish myself?!” I asked, stopping and forcing Caj to stop with me. We weren't out for a morning stroll in the woods. No, for all I knew we were in some brand-new fucking Costello family territory and liable to get shot at any moment. Disbarring that unfortunate outcome, we still had to find Renata, pray she was alive, and kill my father's men—probably cousins of mine—before we could even talk to her and find out what she knew. After that, I had no idea what would happen to her. Where would she go? If my father knew she was still alive, there'd always be a target on her back.
“I wasn't punishing myself,” I said, forcing my voice into a low whisper. “I was trying to walk away from all of this.” Gritting my teeth, I threw a hand out to indicate … all of it, every last horrible detail that I couldn't scrub from my mind.
The dead men at the winery.
The thought of a traitor.
Renata naked and bound.
My mother's murder and a note she'd taken such care to hide.
“Bo might've been boring, and he might've been a cheating snake, but at least when I was out there in the real world, I didn't have to worry about things like this.” I hissed this last part and then closed my eyes, drawing in a deep breath.
“Real world?” Caj asked, a hint of humor in his voice, like I'd somehow said or done something that'd pleased him. Well, fuck that asshole. I wasn't out to please anybody at the moment. Hell, I'd just be happy to live until tomorrow. “This,” he repeated, mimicking the harshness of my voice, “is the real world, Adelasia. This darkness and this blood and this hate. It's simmering underneath the surface of the world, lurking in shadows and waiting to strike.”
Lavish: A Reverse Harem Miniseries (Mafia Queen Book 2) Page 6