by Bethany-Kris
Kev had taken over the Calabrese faction after his father was killed. It was almost amusing how the man was quick to slither into his father’s seat like the man had never been sitting there to begin with. But what could one really expect with this bunch?
Closed mouths didn’t get fed.
Wasted time was gone forever.
It wasn’t as much the men that surprised Andino but the quiet woman sitting at the table next to where her brothers stood.
Siena.
It had been a long while since Andino had seen the woman. Ever since her brothers came to John’s house that night, and demanded she be returned. Andino had to take Siena in a second time just to make sure he was seeing the same woman because … here, like this … she didn’t seem like the same woman at all.
Downcast eyes.
Quiet.
Hunched shoulders.
Perfectly made up in her dress, hair, and makeup.
Oh, sure, the woman was beautiful. He was sure that was the very thing that his cousin had first noticed about Siena. But quiet, meek, and submissive? Andino didn’t think those sorts of things would interest John at all.
Since he knew Siena had been quiet since that night she was returned to her family, he was starting to wonder if that wasn’t by her choice.
Andino didn’t get the chance to think on it for long. Dante moved forward, and Andino went with his uncle silently. Kev was the first one to stick his hand out to reach for Dante’s, and shake. The boss always went first. Andino couldn’t help but pass the two bosses a look when they shook hands—he couldn’t hide the disgust that slammed through him at the simple action of two men shaking hands.
Why?
Simple.
Kev Calabrese was nowhere near the man Dante Marcello was, and he would never be. That was just fucking fact. There was no way a Calabrese man could have even a fraction of the honor in his pinky that a Marcello man radiated constantly. They were two entirely different breeds of men.
There was a long-standing, unspoken rule in Cosa Nostra that when two or more bosses were in the room, they became equals in a sense. That way, the rest of the men who were watching didn’t feel like they had a reason to cause trouble.
The problem with that for Andino was the fact no, he didn’t think a boss who was clearly above another and had been for years should lower his fucking standards for someone else. And he did not plan on being one of those bosses when his time did come.
“Andino,” Kev greeted him, letting go of Dante’s hand and looking like he might try to shake Andino’s. “The underboss position suits you, old friend.”
Friend.
Right.
Andino almost fucking scoffed.
He did manage to keep his hands firmly tucked inside his pockets which was enough of a hint for Kev to not try and shake his hand. Thankfully. Dante didn’t miss Andino’s sneaky move if the look his uncle passed him from the side was any indication, but he didn’t say anything as the meeting was moving forward, and he had more important things to deal with at the moment.
Small blessings.
The last thing Andino wanted was to sit down and make nice with these fucking fools. Hate was a strong word to use—he tried not to unless it was absolutely needed, but damn him if it didn’t fit for the Calabrese.
He hated them.
“Let’s get this started, yes?” Kev asked, gesturing at the table and the waiting chairs. “The sooner we get this finished, the sooner we can get back to the things we all want to be doing.”
“I agree,” Dante murmured.
Andino allowed his uncle to choose a seat at the table first, and then Andino took the one next to his uncle. It was only once he had sat down that Siena finally lifted her head. He didn’t miss the way her gaze drifted to him, but just as quickly, dropped to stare at her hands resting on the table.
“Let’s get right to the point, shall we?” Dante asked, leaning back in his chair and folding his arms over his chest. “The violence needs to stop between our respective organizations before it goes too far, and we both lose more than we can afford to.”
Kev arched a single brow as he stared hard at Dante. “A little late for that, isn’t it, Marcello? Your nephew took our boss—our father. I like to think that he was someone we couldn’t afford to lose, and yet, here we are.”
Andino didn’t miss the scowl that drifted over Siena’s mouth, but just as quickly, she hid it by glancing away from the table altogether.
Yeah, Matteo Calabrese was really a loss.
Fucking fools.
“Did we not offer to make peace somehow after that event?” Dante asked. “Did I not apologize for the misstep?”
Darren’s gaze blazed from where he sat next to his brother. “You call killing our father a misstep?”
Dante barely glanced at the man. “Are you willing to act as though neither of you had any hand in attempting to manipulate John and his mental state into a worse place for your own gain, then? I mean, if you’re going to play the saints, you should at least make sure you’re saintly, Darren.”
Silence covered the table, and the men stiffened a little more in their seats. They were now balancing on a very delicate line, Andino thought. One that could quickly turn from calm voices and a reasonable conversation to shouts and promises of more violence. Andino wouldn’t mind that as much, but it was not what Dante had come here to do.
“It seems to me,” Dante said quietly, “that we have both found ourselves in a … difficult situation. One of us wants to be in the right while the other one simply wants all this to stop. It’s not difficult for you to come over to the other side, Kev. As a man who has sat in my seat for far longer than you have been sitting in yours, take my advice when I tell you the thing you want to do is the right thing in stopping all of this by whatever means you can. Is going up against a family like the Marcellos really how you want to mark your tenure as the boss of your family?”
Kev blinked, and opened his mouth to speak.
Dante was quick to interject before he could with, “Is a war where we tear your organization apart, even if you do land a few shots on us, how you want to be remembered when I make sure your family buries you?”
Yes, talking.
Bosses had to talk.
But it was all in using the right words.
Kev’s jaw tightened as he stared at Dante for a good minute without saying anything. Siena stayed mostly unmoving at the end of the table while Darren, on the other hand, kept throwing glances at his brother like he was waiting for the man to stare back at him. Kev never once looked away from Dante.
“Well?” Dante asked.
“What is peace worth to you?” Kev’s question came quietly, and seemingly innocent. Andino knew it was anything but those things. “Your wife’s life, Dante? Your daughter’s? How about your brothers’, or their families’ lives? What is it worth?”
Dante had a weakness.
Only one.
Them.
The Marcellos.
“It is worth the time and effort it took me to come here today to have this meeting with you,” Dante replied calmly, “instead of blowing you to fucking bits when you walked out of your brownstone this morning, Kev. Shall we continue with a path that will end this feud between our families, or not?”
Finally, Kev looked away from Dante to glance at Darren. The two brothers shared a quiet look before Kev nodded, and went back to the conversation as though he hadn’t even left it to begin with.
“We have two issues to handle on our side of things, actually,” Kev said.
Dante waved a single hand. “By all means, tell me. I apparently have all the time in the world to listen.”
If Kev heard Dante’s low-grade insult, he didn’t behave like it.
“It is more than just our father that we have to deal with in some way,” Kev said, tipping his head to the left as if to direct attention to the quiet woman sitting there. “You see, we also have a woman who has been badly stained by the actions of a m
an in your family. She will never be seen as proper or respectable for a wife now—not after everything. What are we supposed to do with that?”
Andino scowled. “Let her have free will to do what she wants?”
That seemed obvious.
And normal.
Dante lifted a hand as if to silence Andino for a moment. “I can see where you might consider that to be a problem, but not how it becomes my problem, Kev.”
“I think,” Kev drawled slowly and with a cold smile, “that I could fix two of my issues by simply making peace with you, actually.”
“How?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” the man across the table asked.
“It is,” Dante returned, “but I don’t play word games, and if you’re willing to do what I think you want to do, then you can be man enough to say it, so that the woman you’re ready to trade can hear you say it, too. If you’re going to be that man, then be that man, Kev.”
Andino glanced at his uncle at the same time Siena’s head snapped up, and her eyes widened. Her mouth opened to speak, but Kev was quick to talk first.
“A marriage,” the man said, pointing a thick finger at Andino, and then down the table at his sister. “Between Andino, and Siena. It will make peace, and also, save my sister’s reputation. I think it’s a good d—”
“Absolutely not!”
The words all but exploded out of Siena’s mouth. That shocked expression she had worn just a few moments before was gone now, and in its place rested rage and disbelief. She stood fast from her seat, making the chair topple over backward behind her. All eyes at the table were now on her, but she wasn’t looking anywhere except at Kev.
“You won’t have a choice,” Kev murmured.
Siena didn’t even think before she picked up the glass up full of water on the table, and whipped it at her brother. It crashed over the side of Kev’s face, but to the man’s benefit, he didn’t even flinch.
“I will kill myself before I ever marry him, or any other man you put me in front of, Kev,” Siena hissed. “Mark my words, I will.”
Kev’s jaw tightened, but he stayed quiet. Lifting a hand, he gestured with a finger at his sister. One of his men who had been quietly sitting at another table stood fast, and crossed the floor. He took Siena by the arm, and was quick to remove her from the restaurant. Or at least, out of the main room. She didn’t even try to fight, or protest with her voice.
Andino’s attention went back to the table because his uncle was speaking, but not because he actually wanted to talk anymore.
“How do you feel about that, Andino?” Dante asked.
“Not Siena,” he returned. “It cannot be her.”
Not for himself.
Or even for her.
But for John.
Andino would never do that to John even if the last thing he intended to do was marry someone just because the fucking Calabrese wanted him to.
Dante nodded once, and looked back at Kev. “Who else is there?”
It took Kev a second to control the emotions flitting over his face, but somehow, he managed. “I have other sisters—two are too young. One is not. They are not …”
Dante chuckled lowly. “You mean, Matteo’s bastard girls.”
Kev sighed, and nodded once. “Ginevra, specifically.”
“Ginevra Calabrese,” Dante said, his gaze turning on Andino again. “She’s young, mind you … but for the most part, appropriate. It would serve you well.”
Well … that was debatable.
Andino didn’t see where he had much of a choice at the moment, and while an arranged marriage would put a bit of a kink in the rest of his plans … it was simply something he would need to deal with.
“I’ll do that one,” he agreed.
Dante went back to Kev. “There you go. Well?”
“The violence will stop,” Kev said.
Andino’s uncle was quick to stand from the table then. “I am glad to hear it. We will be in contact to set dates, and … get the details worked out for the marriage. Have a good day, Kev. You made the right choice today.”
Dante turned to leave, and Andino didn’t waste time getting up to follow. Outside the restaurant, a black car pulled up, and Dante slipped inside the back but not before giving Andino a look and parting words.
“We’ll tell the rest of the family tonight. You also made the right choice.”
Had he?
It didn’t feel like it.
Andino nodded, and his uncle closed the door. The black town car for Andino was quick to pull up then, too, but he hesitated in getting inside only because Siena came out of the restaurant like a bat out of hell. There was no man following behind her, but a car was waiting across the road with the back door open—likely for her. Apparently, she hadn’t entirely left the business earlier.
He had to figure out a way out of this.
Why not start with her?
After all, Siena had things she wanted, too.
“Siena,” Andino called.
The woman stopped on the sidewalk, and gave him a look that burned.
He smiled, and winked. “You should take up a new hobby—yoga, even. Get yourself out of the house. You never know who you might find away from your brothers.”
Her brow furrowed, and she said nothing as she kept staring at him. Andino only nodded, and then got into the back of the car.
There, he’d planted a seed.
She just had to let it grow.
• • •
“Well, how did it go?”
The first question came from Lucian damn near the second Andino and Dante arrived at the mansion, and entered the dining room. Food was already spread out on the table, and everyone was waiting. His father, and mother. Aunts, and grandparents.
They had all been waiting, it seemed. They hadn’t even started to eat despite the fact it was well after the time their normal supper would happen.
“It went well,” Dante replied.
Lucian passed a look down the table at Andino’s father. “How well?”
“Yeah, what’s happening from here on out?” Gio added.
Dante said nothing as he took his seat between his wife, and greeted her with a kiss to the top of her red-head. His aunt, Catrina, simply smiled over at Dante, but kept quiet. It was only once Dante was settled into a chair, and Andino into his own as well that the conversation started again.
“We’ve come to an agreement,” Dante said. “Something that works for both of our families, and will end the violence in the city. No more fighting, everyone gets what they want. I would consider that a win, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes, but how did that come about, son?” Antony asked from the head of the table.
Dante looked at his father, and shrugged. “A marriage.”
Antony’s old face didn’t even crack with a single emotion to give away how he felt about that particular news. “Between who, exactly?”
Despite the fact his grandfather asked the question like he didn’t already know the answer—there was really only one person in their family who was currently single and able to enter into an arranged marriage—all eyes at the table drifted to Andino.
He stayed quiet.
“Andino and a Calabrese daughter,” Dante said.
“Which daughter?” Lucian asked calmly.
Despite his tone, Andino didn’t miss the sharp edge to his uncle’s tone. Always looking out for his son, even when John didn’t know it. There was no way in hell Lucian would be okay with Andino marrying Siena … not after everything.
“Ginevra, wasn’t it?” Dante asked Andino.
Andino nodded. “It was.”
“Isn’t that …” At the other end of the table, his grandmother, Cecelia, frowned as she looked at her own husband. “Antony, isn’t that the mistress’s oldest girl? Matteo’s mistress?”
Antony cleared his throat, and nodded once. “As far as I know, yes.”
Before anyone else could say something, Dante was quick to
hold up a hand. It didn’t matter that he was in another man’s house or that their family often let everyone have a voice when it came to things like this. When he decided to speak, everyone else was quick to be quiet, and listen.
Boss’s right.
“It’s been done, and decided,” Dante said. “This was the best course of action. Andino had his choice, before someone asks, and he agreed. It is done.”
“So, they got what they wanted, then,” Lucian murmured.
“I beg your pardon?”
“The Calabrese. The snakes.” Lucian shook his head, and smiled bitterly. “They got what they wanted brother—they got in.”
“It’s a marriage, not a business agreement, Lucian.”
Lucian nodded. “Right now. What comes later?”
That was a damn good question.
“Andi.”
The soft murmur of his father’s voice beside him took Andino’s attention away from the men glaring at each other across the table. No one noticed Gio talking, it seemed.
“Yeah, Dad?”
Gio frowned, but his face returned to a passive state when he asked, “Is this what you want?”
“It’s what has to be done.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
“I have to protect our family.”
And himself.
He had to protect himself, too.
• • •
The voices of Andino’s family filtered out from behind him even as he left the mansion’s dining room. They’d been debating and going over the Calabrese deal for longer than he figured was necessary.
It was done.
It would happen.
Or so they think.
Andino had his own plans to work on. He didn’t think anyone even noticed him leaving the dining room, which was just fine with him. He had other things to deal with at the moment, and he no longer wanted to sit around and discuss the fucking Calabrese, or his newly arranged marriage to Ginevra.
Who he didn’t even know.
It wasn’t long before Andino stepped outside the mansion onto the large marble steps. He glanced up at the inky sky, and ignored the cold biting at his skin beneath the silk dress shirt he wore. He hadn’t even bothered to throw on his coat.