Anthony picked up his drink, taking a generous swallow before slamming his glass back down. “Kid, when you decide to take your old man out, I’ll tell you. Until then, it doesn’t matter. It’s not like you can help.”
Anthony was right; he couldn’t. Dominic had his hands full just keeping his brothers and sister breathing under Lucifer’s merciless rule.
“I won’t be a kid forever.” He wasn’t exactly promising to help, if the day ever came that he could, but the silent meaning was clear. Dom owed Anthony more than the man would ever know. Lucifer thought that Anthony was just a stupid bag of muscle, while Dominic saw the only person who actually gave a fuck about him. Anthony treated him like he didn’t exist around Lucifer, but when he wasn’t around, Anthony treated him like the son he never had.
“No, you won’t. Just hope I live long enough to see that day.”
Dom’s concern grew at seeing the weariness become more apparent. “Are you sick?”
Anthony gave a sarcastic laugh. “Sick and tired of dealing with Lucifer. Does that count?”
Ruefully, Dom nodded. “Yes. We’re both saddled with the same disease.”
Anthony nodded toward a gun that was laying on the table next to the liquor bottle. “There’s the vaccine. Both of us know that’s what it’s going to come down to. The question is”—Anthony refilled his glass—“which one of us will get the fucking pleasure.”
Dom didn’t have to think twice about his answer. “I will.”
“You sure about that? I could do it without a guilty conscious.”
“Me either.” He shrugged.
“You sure?”
Seeing the life drain from Lucifer’s dead body would be the highlight of his existence. “Oh, I’m sure.”
“Then I guess”—Anthony took another drink—“we wait.”
Dom nodded. “For now.”
Going for the door, Dominic buttoned his thin jacket.
“Kid, you need a thicker jacket. It’s cold out there.”
He managed to scrounge around enough money to get Angel a winter coat. He still needed to get Matthias one. Winter would be over before he had enough to get one for himself.
Dominic shrugged, not wanting to admit the truth to Anthony. “Don’t need one. The cold doesn’t bother me.”
“Take mine.” Anthony wasn’t buying that load of shit. “I’ll get myself another one.”
Dominic looked at the distinctive coat that was hanging by the door. “No, thanks.”
“Take it,” the gruff enforcer barked out at him in a tone that had Blue Park quaking in fear when they saw him. Then the man, who was as close to a true father that he would be granted, got out his chair to take his coat off the hook and shove it at him.
Dominic pushed it back. “What do you think Lucifer would do if he saw me wearing your coat? He wears a fucking wool coat. He knows it’s freezing outside. He’s trying to teach me a lesson. If I wear your leather, it’ll just piss him off.”
“What fucking lesson could you learn from freezing your ass off?”
Dominic’s hazel eyes glowered. “That until he’s ready, I’ll only have what he wants me to have.”
“Thanks, kid.”
Confused, Dom stared at him as Anthony hung the coat back up. “What for?”
“For making me feel better about my shitty life.”
Ten
Where It Had All Begun
Dominic, Age 20
Getting out of the car, Dominic fixed the ugly, dark brown suit his father made him wear. You could practically smell the dust on it from where it had hung in the back of his father’s closet for all those years. Shoulder-wise, the old suit fit, but the rest of it hung like it was still on a coat hanger from where he was so lean.
“Did I really need to come?” Dominic asked his father quietly in the parking lot. Lucifer had requested his capos to attend and show respect, and Dom was still just a soldier in the family.
“You’re my son.” Giving him a side-eye, he just as quietly hissed out his next words, “Now, don’t ruin this fucking day for me.”
He had never seen his father this happy in his life, and to see it on a day like today made Dominic sick to his stomach.
“Then what about the ones you left at home?”
Lucifer stopped to look hard into his son’s eyes. “They’re not the ones who will be running the family one day, are they?”
His father’s question sounded like a threat, like he could change his mind who sat at the head of the family when he was dead and gone.
“No.” Dominic made it clear that the Luciano throne was his and his alone. “But one will sit underneath me.”
The underboss. It was all the twenty-year-old thought of obtaining. When he got the title, he would be one final step closer to the throne.
“Cassius,” his father said without a second thought before walking off.
“Cassius?” a stunned Dominic repeated. “But he’s only seven. How could you possibly make that decision no—”
“Because I did,” Lucifer announced firmly.
“Angel and Matthias are only fifteen; you don’t know what they’ll be capable of. They could be better than me, and you don’t even know it.” Dominic paused a moment before he bravely said his next words. “You won’t even give them a chance.”
“Let’s be clear.” His father spun around so his vicious tongue could slap him in the face. “The only real threat you have for taking your place in this family is Cassius, and you fucking know it.”
The heart that sat in his chest pounded at the thought of the youngest Luciano at the head of the family.
“What?” Lucifer gave him a twisted smile. “You’re not going to tell me how Cassius could be better than you one day too? Or do you only stand up for your brothers who never have the chance of taking the throne?”
He was one second away from opening his mouth until he thought better of it and walked past his father, toward the Catholic church. Lucifer would have beat the shit out of him right here in front of their enemies if he had. Sure, he could admit Matthias might not have a chance of sitting on the throne, thanks to their psychopathic father, but if Lucifer wasn’t scared of what Angel could become, then Dominic himself wouldn’t stand a chance.
Angel being born a twin was the exact thing that could have made him a greater man than Dominic, but it was ironically the very thing that held him back. Angel wasn’t gifted the opportunity like Dom to pretend that he’d never backstab his own father. It was clear in Angel’s gray eyes, ever since he was a child, that he’d kill Lucifer if he ever hurt Matthias beyond irrevocable damage—and Lucifer knew it. Hell, the only reason Lucifer still walked the earth was because of the thing he hated the most—Katarina. Like Dominic, Angel hadn’t blown his brains out already because of him. Protecting Matthias was the only reason Angel would never make it to the throne.
Dominic loved Cassius, but he was also afraid of his youngest sibling. And it wasn’t out of fear that Cassius could be greater than him, it was out of fear that he could be worse than Lucifer. Cassius might have looked like Dominic in every way, but on the inside, he was born as fucked-up as his father. Dominic did everything he could to keep Cassius busy and away from Lucifer, and the only thing that might save his soulless life was Katarina.
She could see the darkness that lurked beneath the surface and, even at ten years old, she was trying her best to keep that darkness away by showing Cassius the difference between good and evil. It might only work because, if Cassius was capable of love, then he felt it for his sister.
Walking into the Catholic church, he was surprised Lucifer didn’t burst into flames when he entered the sacred ground.
There were two people at the front greeting their guests, and having come in behind a small group, he and his father had to wait their turn.
Dominic knew the older man. Once a year, the two crime families of Kansas City met outside the city on equal ground to ensure the peace they created after the war. Tha
t war was where it had all begun, as it almost caused the Luciano name to cease to exist. If they hadn’t come to that agreement, he and his father wouldn’t be here today. Simultaneously, however, it was the reason his father treated his kids like soldiers, ruining any hopes of a normal childhood.
The man they were about to approach was Dante Caruso, his father’s biggest adversary. Dominic might have actually liked the man, if he wasn’t so full of himself. He had an arrogance about him, and Dominic was surprised he didn’t fucking choke on it. It was clear he thought he was God’s gift to the American mob, and it was only a matter of time for his day of reckoning. Dom felt genuinely bad that it had come in the form of burying his wife.
The man had thought he had it all, and the universe had humbled him. Life was funny that way. You’d think his reckoning would have come from a bullet. Instead, it took the thing Dante loved the most.
The Caruso boss had always stood tall, but today, he was a little shorter, and his piercing ice-blue gaze wasn’t as intimidating with the red ring around them from the tears he had most likely shed right before this. Just like the rest of the world, even the mafia needed balance.
However, it was the girl who stood in front of Dante who drew his attention. The second he saw her, his heart had stopped; he never knew beauty like that could exist in a world so ugly.
She had blonde hair that looked like it had been spun from gold, and her tanned skin somehow made it shine brighter. Her face was so symmetrically perfect that, since she was the only one wearing white against a sea of black, Dominic, honest to God thought he was seeing an angel. Thinking he had imagined her, he shook his head to see that she wasn’t the one who had tragically died too young.
His heart might have stopped, but now it beat faster with every man who greeted her. Every one of them either gave her a hug or a touch—from what they could play off as sympathy—but Dom knew they couldn’t care less about her mother laying in a casket at the end of the aisle. Their eyes lit up like fucking Christmas trees to see a young girl in a pretty dress. Dominic was always surrounded by older men, and they didn’t think of angels who had fallen from the sky but the ones from their dirty magazines.
If he heard another one of those grown men tell her how grown up she had gotten, he was going to shove their wagging tongues down their throats until they were shitting them out for the next week, like her father, Dante, should be doing. The Caruso boss was likely already deciding who his princess would marry out of his men, and he was probably sitting in this very room.
It was her height that gave the men the audacity to think it was okay to look at a young girl that way. Dominic didn’t know how old the girl was, but she had to be somewhere around Angel and Matthias’s age and was almost as tall as them too.
Strangely, Dominic felt something for the girl, as well, but it wasn’t in the way the rest of the men did. What he felt, when watching the gross men look at her, was similar to the thought of his father hurting Kat. He couldn’t place that feeling at first until he thought about how happy he was that Lucifer didn’t claim his sister as his own, and she would never be subjected to this. He realized his feelings for the girl were protective in nature.
“Dante,” Lucifer greeted him with a nod. “My son and I are sorry for your loss.”
Dominic only briefly nodded to the grieving boss before his eyes went to the girl. As if she wasn’t pretty enough from far away, she was more beautiful the closer he stood; her hair that looked as though it was spun from gold, complemented her emerald eyes that would give the real stone a run for its money.
“Thank you.” Dante clearly had to force the words out but somehow managed to fake it before he politely introduced his daughter. “This is my daughter, Maria.”
That name not only suited an angel, but it was fit for an Italian princess.
Now you want to keep her away from creepy old men? he shouted in his head, seeing the sudden death grip Dante had on his daughter’s shoulders. Dominic didn’t blame him from wanting to keep Lucifer away from her, but his father would rather drink acid than want a woman, or girl for that matter, who had the Caruso last name.
“It’s nice to meet you, Maria.” Lucifer kept up the charade.
Dom had to give her credit. Most kids, and even adults, cried at the sight of his father, but she managed to look the devil right in the eyes.
“This is my son, Dominic,” he continued, introducing one boss’s child to the other.
When her emerald eyes landed on him, he became transfixed at the sight. It was like they had their own light source behind them, reminding him of the stained glass windows around them as the sun shined through the painted green.
“Hello.”
“Hello.” Her voice came out just as angelic as her features.
Wanting to get to the others waiting to greet them, Dante moved them along. “Well, thank you for coming to pay your respects, Luciano.”
It wasn’t because they were in a church that Dante didn’t call Lucifer by his first name. Neither the Caruso boss, nor his men, called him by it, only ever calling the devil by his surname. No one knew why they refused to call him by his given name, but it certainly wasn’t done out of respect. Nevertheless, it was still Lucifer’s day, and nothing was going to ruin his mood as a slow, sinister smile touched his lips.
“Anytime.”
Dominic’s hazel depths lingered on her precious stone ones a little longer. There was something strange and oddly familiar about her, but before he could figure it out, his father pushed him down the aisle.
Walking down the long aisle, passing the occupied pews, every step away from the Caruso princess was harder than the last; it felt like he was trudging through mud. He didn’t know why he felt like that. Maybe he wanted to go back and somehow get her out of being forced to greet the men who came in? Whatever it was, every instinct in his body tried to lure him back to her. It wasn’t until they reached the end of the aisle did the instinct ease.
It was catholic tradition for the children to wear white to funerals, so evil didn’t touch them, but when he saw the crisp white casket that held the boss’s late wife, Melissa Caruso, there was another reason. Maria didn’t belong in black, just like her mother who looked peacefully asleep in a light pink dress.
Even in death, Melissa was beautiful, but it didn’t compare to the large portrait of her set off to the side. Dominic couldn’t help but think what a pity it was to rid the world of something so pretty when such ugliness existed.
He touched his forehead, finishing the sign of the cross over his chest, waiting for a smug Lucifer to respectfully do the same. Of course the devil refused the blessing. Dominic had to look away from his sick father, who was rejoicing this sad day.
Seeing the eighteen-year-old son of the deceased seated in the first pew alone, Dominic walked over and silently took a seat beside him. He had only met him two times, the same way he had met his father, Dante, at the once-a-year meeting. Dominic couldn’t believe it when the seventeen-year-old had shown up as a made man, but then he had remembered what the kid had done to become the youngest made in the two families. Like everyone else, even Dominic had to wait to be of age, but what the oldest Caruso son had done had classified him as an adult. Even the American judicial system would have tried him as an adult, locked him up, and thrown away the key.
The only good thing that would come out of hav
ing a psychopath as a father was that Dominic would know how to deal with his future enemy when it came time. Lucifer was his greatest weapon, and the Carusos didn’t even know it yet.
Both future Kansas City mob bosses sat next to each other in silence, and just like their fathers, the sons were destined for the same adversarial path.
It was strange to know your enemy before they’d become it. It was like staring into a crystal ball and seeing your future. He supposed he should feel blessed, as not many people could say that, but it felt ominous to have your whole life decided before you were even born.
/> Dante’s son didn’t have an air of arrogance like his father, but rather a cloud of darkness. Today, however, it was gone. He thought it might’ve been because he was forced to wear a suit that he didn’t want to wear, just like he felt, but Dominic was sure they hadn’t wanted to wear it for different reasons. Not only was Dominic’s a size too big, but he had asked Lucifer if it was appropriate to wear brown to a funeral, even if it was dark.
Dom would have killed to wear the suit his adversary was wearing. It had been tailored to him perfectly, but it was the fact that it was all black that had him envious. Unlike the Lucianos, the Carusos always dressed in expensive Italian suits that varied in colors of black, gray, and white. The Lucianos wore clothes that looked worn, their fabrics less lux. They hardly ever wore full suits like the other family did. They’d either not have the tie, suit, or pants to complete the ensemble.
The young Caruso who sat beside him was like the Lucianos in that regard—he hated to wear suits. The only thing Dominic had seen him in was dark jeans and black T-shirts, even to their official meetings. But the suit wasn’t why the dark cloud had evaporated. The air around him was replaced with … sorrow?
Dominic furrowed his brows, thinking he couldn’t possibly possess feelings, even for his mother. He had always thought him to be like Lucifer—incapable of loving another. Dom felt bad for the deceased and for those she left behind, but he hadn’t felt an ounce of care for the eighteen-year-old … until now.
Looking back to the beautiful woman in the casket, he spoke softly and low to the future Caruso boss for the first time. “I’m sorry about your mother, Lucca.”
At first Lucca seemed shocked when he turned his head toward him, clearly not having heard someone say those words to him yet. Then the look disappeared as his blue-green eyes bore into him, forcing Dom to look into his haunting depths. “Don’t act like you’re sorry, Dominic.”
Dominic (Made Men Book 8) Page 8