by Bella Rose
JULIET HAD NEVER been more surprised or more glad to see anyone before in her life. When Antonin came strolling into the living room, she thought she might actually burst into tears. He looked so calm and so certain. How could he seem so sure that this was all going to work out? His confidence gave her courage. She could do this. Even though Giovanni had completely lost his mind, that didn’t matter.
“Hello, Giovanni,” Antonin drawled in heavily accented English. The Russian accent coating his words was the only acknowledgement he seemed to give that he recognized the tension in the room.
“You bastard!” Giovanni swung around to face the wide entryway leading from the living room to the foyer. The muzzle of his gun dipped wildly as though he were in danger of accidentally firing the thing. “What are you doing here?”
Antonin gestured to Juliet. “You’re holding the mother of my unborn child hostage. Where else would you suggest I be?”
“Unborn child?” Father Barelli already looked as if he were in danger of fainting. This new knowledge of sin practically pushed the man over the edge. “My dear girl, are you pregnant?”
“Yes.” Juliet gave an emphatic nod. “And just as soon as everyone stops trying to kill me or marry me against my will, I’d really like to marry the father of my baby.”
“Oh my.” Father Barelli stared with wide eyes at the giant of a man who was scarred from head to toe. “This is the father?” He looked doubtful.
“Yes, sir,” Antonin returned politely.
“Hello?” Giovanni was now waving his weapon in the air. “Could everyone please pay attention to the guy with the gun?”
“Would you just put the gun down?” Juliet suggested. “I’m not saying yes. Antonin is probably going to rip your arms out of your socket. And I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to shoot Father Barelli just because he told you that he cannot perform a wedding ceremony at gunpoint.”
“The Vatican really does frown upon such things,” Father Barelli wheezed. It was obvious that the old man was struggling to keep it together.
Antonin ignored Giovanni altogether and walked to Juliet. He placed himself between her and Giovanni and gently drew her into his embrace. She snuggled close and inhaled the familiar scent of him. For the first time since this craziness began she believed that it might turn out all right.
Then Giovanni stared right at Antonin and started laughing. “Finally. I thought you were never going to take the bait.”
Juliet’s heart leaped into her throat. “Bait?”
“So you’re the one working with Josef,” Antonin said quietly. “I should have figured. He needed a patsy, and here you are.”
“I’m not a patsy!” Giovanni snapped. “He and I had mutual interests.”
“Really.” Antonin chuffed out a laugh. “And he told you that?”
“No. I determined that we had mutual interests. When he contacted me about your whereabouts.” Giovanni looked confused. “Or rather Carlos contacted Josef about you. I suppose Josef was Carlos’s informant.”
“Josef is nobody’s informant,” Antonin retorted. “You’ve already got your wires crossed. I hope you realize that whatever deal you made with him is null and void as soon as he doesn’t need you anymore.”
Juliet clutched Antonin’s arm. She had a bad feeling that things were about to get worse.
ANTONIN WAITED AND watched and was not disappointed when a few minutes later Josef’s narrow frame strolled through the house. He had obviously entered through the kitchen. Or he had been there the entire time, though it didn’t really matter. Things were about to get messy.
“About time you showed up!” Giovanni shouted.
There was something incredibly off about the man’s entire demeanor. Antonin had spent plenty of time listening and observing Giovanni Corleon, and he had not seemed at all prone to this erratic and desperate behavior. It was as if there was a piece of the puzzle that Antonin was missing altogether. Yes, the Corleons had been with the Cagliones from the very beginning, but why would Giovanni act as though his entire life was dependent upon this association? Especially when he had been the one to aid Josef in bringing down the entire network.
Josef’s mouth twisted into a parody of a grin. With his pointy goatee and narrow face, he looked like a classic Russian villain or Imperial spymaster. Antonin and Dimitri had made fun of the man’s looks once upon a time. Never again would Antonin so underestimate an opponent.
Josef sent a scathing look in Giovanni’s direction. “I am not at your beck and call. Have you not yet noticed that?”
“We had a deal!” Giovanni swung his gun around and pointed it at Josef.
That certainly would have been a convenient outcome, but Antonin wasn’t silly enough to believe that was going to happen. Then Dimitri emerged from the other side of the room, and Antonin felt the blood in his veins freeze. His friend was holding a weapon and pointing it at Juliet.
“Now,” Dimitri said with a strange sense of joviality. “You cannot marry the bitch if she’s dead. So I suggest you lower your weapon and back off like a good little boy.”
“What’s going on?” Juliet whispered to Antonin.
He grimaced and gave her a little squeeze where she was holding on around his waist. “I have no idea. But I will tell you it isn’t good.”
Dimitri glanced at Antonin and smirked. “I’m sure you’re confused. You’ve pretty well been a step behind since the beginning. Starting with the murder of Charlie Caglione.”
“What’s he talking about?” Juliet asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
Dimitri leaned around Antonin’s bulk and winked at Juliet. “Did your lover never tell you that he’s the one who murdered your father? And with his bare hands, I might add. Our Antonin is quite efficient when it comes to killing. We simply never expected him to run right back into the bar and find you. It did make things a bit more interesting though. The two of you had such chemistry!”
“Shut up, Dimitri,” Antonin snapped. “There’s no reason to make this any worse than it already is.”
“Oh, but it’s going to get a lot worse, Antonin,” Dimitri promised.
Chapter Twenty-One
JULIET COULD NOT wrap her mind around what this strange Russian man was telling her about Antonin. Yes, he was an efficient and ruthless killer. Yes, she already knew that the Bratva required their Brigadiers to kill the leader of a rival clan in order to gain their position within the organization. Those things she could understand. Perhaps it was the little bits and pieces she could not reconcile.
She turned to Giovanni. “You knew.” She pointed at him and wondered if she had ever hated anyone as much as she hated him at this moment. “You mentioned something about it. You kept trying to put that idea in my head, but that’s because you knew.”
“I suspected,” Giovanni said quickly. “That’s not the same thing!”
“That’s not the same thing!” Juliet shouted. “Yes it is!”
Unable to contain herself or her fury any longer, Juliet ducked out from behind Antonin and rushed Giovanni. She hit him like a ton of bricks and the two of them went flying. To his credit, he did attempt to take the brunt of their fall. He twisted sideways and the gun fell out of his hand. It struck the wood floor, and Juliet heard an ominous click. Then a shot rang out.
The sound was deafening in the close space of the living room. Juliet squeaked in shock, and even Giovanni gave a shout. But none of their noises could drown out the pained moaning coming from Father Barelli.
Juliet scrambled away from Giovanni, practically stepping on him in the process. Her foot struck the gun and sent it spinning across the room. It wound up beneath the couch, but she had no time to worry about that. She was too busy smacking Giovanni. The man had managed to gain his feet in all of the ruckus. The Russians kept going back and forth, staring at first her and then the priest.
Juliet started punching Giovanni with everything she had. “You shot the priest! You’re going to hell now! Just y
ou wait!”
“Actually,” said the man named Dimitri. He waved insolently at Juliet. “I believe you were the one that caused the priest to be shot.”
“How dare you?” Juliet rounded on Dimitri. “I would never shoot a priest! Giovanni was the one who dragged the poor man here to perform a wedding that was never going to happen.”
Juliet grabbed a blanket from a storage bench and ran to Father Barelli. Fortunately the man didn’t appear to be bleeding out on the floor. He was ashen faced and looked alternately angry and scared, but he was still alive.
“We’ll get you out of this, Father.” Juliet glanced up at the Russians. “Let me send him to the hospital, please?”
Dimitri and Josef glanced at each other, and then they both shrugged. Dimitri nodded toward Antonin. “He was the one we wanted. The rest of you are nothing.”
“Yeah?” Juliet curled her lip at Dimitri. “Well, as far as I’m concerned you can have the lying, father-murdering fiend.”
ANTONIN WOULD NEVER forget those words as long as he lived. If Juliet had truly given up on being with him, then he had nothing left to lose. It had all been a gamble anyway. Men like him were not meant to have families and regular lives. Although he was still curious as to how Dimitri and Josef intended to get rid of Mikhail. It was not as if Antonin’s father was old and decrepit. Perhaps a bit paranoid and easily misled by those he trusted, but not infirm by any means.
Antonin waited. He made no move toward or away from Dimitri. He wanted to see if Juliet was serious. When she began to help the priest gain his feet, Antonin realized that she had truly put thoughts of him behind her.
Juliet snarled at Giovanni. “Get your stupid ass over here and help me!”
Giovanni was warily watching Dimitri and Josef. When neither of them made any sort of move toward Giovanni or Juliet, Giovanni must have decided it was safe to comply with her demands. Antonin also suspected the man was using the priest as an excuse to get out of the house. To say the evening had not gone as planned was a massive understatement.
“I cannot believe you basically kidnapped our priest!” Juliet continued to rail at Giovanni. “What is wrong with you? It’s like you took a stupid pill the other day and just won’t stop. Get his other arm, and for shit’s sake, do not let him smack his head on the doorframe.”
The two of them supported the elderly priest as they exited the living room. Antonin said nothing. It was a knife in his heart when Juliet did not even look in his direction. He had known that the truth would eventually come out. He just hadn’t thought that it would happen in such spectacular fashion or at such a bad moment in time.
The front door slammed and a few moments later Antonin heard the priest’s car start. Good. At least Juliet was safe. She had already shown herself to be perfectly capable of handling Giovanni’s machinations. Perhaps she was better off without him in her life. Antonin turned his attention back to his former best friend and his known longtime enemy.
“Well?” Antonin clenched his hands into fists at his side. “What now?”
Dimitri glanced at Josef, but it seemed that Dimitri had become the spokesman for the two men. It was odd. Antonin would have never thought the two men would work together at anything. What could Josef have promised Dimitri to get him to cooperate?
***
“I HATE YOU,” Juliet told Giovanni for about the millionth time.
Father Barelli made a tsking noise in the backseat. “Juliet, it is not God’s will for us to hate anybody. It poisons us and permeates and blackens our lives. At this time in your life especially, you must try to focus on the good and the pure.”
“Thank you, Father,” Giovanni said with just a touch of superiority. Then he had the nerve to smile at Juliet. “Everything I’ve done has been for a reason.”
Father Barelli sniffed as though he smelled something particularly unpleasant in the car. “Don’t mistake my admonishment to Juliet to be for your benefit, Giovanni Corleon. It will be a cold day in hell before I forgive you. As if I would even guess that you would think of asking for forgiveness.”
“Hey!” Giovanni looked incensed. “You don’t know what my life has been like!”
Juliet couldn’t believe he was about to pull the pity card. “Oh, poor baby!” she crooned. “Tell me. What has been so awful in your life that you decide it can be cured by taking a priest hostage and trying to marry a woman against her will?”
“That house should be mine!”
The car swerved violently on the road as Giovanni turned to glare at Juliet. The sudden violence in his tone and body language was frightening. What on earth had happened to make him so bitter?
“You were Enzo’s best friend,” Juliet said quietly. “My family treated you like family. Even after my brother died, you were always welcome with us. You were part of our circle. I cannot understand why you would do something like this!”
“Because you don’t really know your father. You never did!” Giovanni insisted.
“Don’t.” The harsh word came from Father Barelli.
It occurred to Juliet that Father Barelli had been Charlie Caglione’s priest as well. Could he possibly know something about this that Juliet did not? She had been sitting beside the priest holding a blanket against the wound in his shoulder. Now she stared at him with new eyes. What was he not saying, and why not just spill it?
Giovanni gave a bitter laugh. “Why don’t you want me to say anything, old man? It’s not like there’s anyone left alive to be offended.”
“Are you certain?” Father Barelli said harshly. “Because this woman you profess to love would be shattered if you started spilling secrets that aren’t yours to tell.”
“Okay,” Juliet said angrily. “If the two of you know something, spill it. This cryptic bullshit is ridiculous!”
“Language!” Giovanni taunted. “Do you know how many Hail Marys you’ll get for using that word in front of a priest?”
“Shut up,” Father Barelli said wearily. “I’m so tired of you, boy, I’m tempted to shoot you myself.”
Juliet turned in surprise to stare at the priest. It was the first time she’d ever heard anything so cross from his lips. Then Giovanni grinned at her in the rearview mirror. It was almost like looking in a fun house mirror.
“Your father was my father,” he told her gleefully.
“What?” Her brain scrambled to keep up. Then it made the next leap. “Ew! Then why would you try to marry me?”
“Because your mother was a whore who got herself pregnant by one of her husband’s soldiers,” Giovanni informed her. “Enzo and I were your father’s heirs, but the man loved you so much that he didn’t want to shame you by disinheriting you.”
***
THE HOUSE WAS silent when Antonin walked in flanked by Josef and Dimitri. He could see a light on upstairs and knew that Mikhail would still be awake on a night like this when so many things had gone wrong. What remained to be seen was whether or not his father’s legendary luck would hold out against two men who had turned against him so thoroughly.
Dimitri poked Antonin in the side with the muzzle of his pistol. “Shall we?”
“And if I disagree?” Antonin asked quietly. “You’ve already arranged to have the men be unfit to help my father. Why do I need to be involved?”
“Why should Mikhail’s beloved son be here?” Dimitri mocked.
Josef snorted. “You and Mikhail sicken me. You both think that the other hates you. In truth I know that you respect your father. You would do anything for him. And Mikhail? He loves you. He is proud of you and your list of brutal accomplishments.” Josef huffed a huge sigh of annoyance. “It took a lot of convincing on my part to keep him worried that you were trying to usurp his position.”
“Why would you do that?” Antonin wanted to know. “You were my father’s right-hand man. You were the Brigadier he trusted most. What more could you want?”
“Silly boy,” Josef said with a laugh. “I want everything.”
&nbs
p; “And what is it that you’re going to give to Dimitri when you want everything?” Antonin wondered, but he also thought it might be worth a try to drive a wedge between them. “I’m sure Dimitri is not doing this for nothing.”
“Money.” Dimitri sounded almost cheerful. “Now get moving before I shoot you in the ass just to speed things up.”
Antonin lurched up the stairs. He wasn’t quiet about it. In fact he was trying to make as much noise as possible. He smashed against the railing, stomped his boots on the stairs, and cursed as he tripped his way up the steps.
When they reached the entrance to his father’s study, it appeared to be deserted. Antonin breathed a sigh of relief. Perhaps this would end with his death after all. His father would still be alive to end Josef’s worthless life and get revenge for Antonin’s death.
“Drop your weapons and step away from my son,” Mikhail’s voice said from behind them.
“You don’t want to do that,” Josef warned. “There are two of us. You cannot kill us both before we put a bullet in your brain.”
“No.” Mikhail chambered a bullet. “But I can take at least one of you down with me and save my son into the bargain.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
DIMITRI IMMEDIATELY DOVE for cover behind Antonin, but the bullets had already started flying around Mikhail’s office. From the corner of his eye, Antonin saw Josef coolly firing his weapon, presumably at Mikhail. Antonin couldn’t see his father, but for now he had to believe the wily old mobster could take care of himself.
“You bastard!” Mikhail shouted in Russian. “You made me believe my son was the traitor!”
Josef said nothing, ducking behind a set of bookshelves as if he intended to wait until Mikhail rushed inside the door. Antonin started toward Josef, but Dimitri was like an octopus holding him back. The man’s arms and legs seemed to be everywhere. Antonin struggled. Every time he felt his hand or foot come into contact with something solid, he punched or kicked. Dimitri grunted in pain but didn’t let go. He wrapped his body around Antonin’s and held him on the ground.