“Get me Jake …” Jake, the head of Kyle’s security team. “The rest of you get in the cars and get ready to go.”
“You don’t want any of us to … you know, stick around here, clean up while we wait for the new team to …”
Kyle was pretty sure it was his facial expression that caused the idiot’s words to trail off. It was as if his rage swept the entire area, causing a wave of fearful silence to fall over every single man around when he ceased his progress to the car, and turned to face the man who dared question him after he’d given a very clear order.
“What the fuck did you just say to me?”
Silence. Kyle even saw a few of the men back away from him. Smart. He was far from his usual self right now. He actually felt as if he were outside of his body, watching himself be completely out of control. It was frightening, even to him. He was acting like Lucca.
“Did I ask for any fucking suggestions?” Kyle continued, taking a step toward the big-mouthed dumbass. “Did I look as if I were unsure about any of the words that came out of my mouth?” Still, silence. “Answer me!”
At the roaring command, the man shook his head. “No, consigliere, you didn’t.”
“Exactly!” Kyle shouted. “I said what I fucking meant, and I’m not looking to any of you motherfuckers to tell me different. Now close your fucking mouth, get your ass in the car, and send me my goddamn head of security!”
“I’m right here, sir.”
Whipping around, Kyle turned to face the man he’d been searching for since before he’d stormed out of the building.
As everyone else began to move in effort to do as Kyle had told them to, Kyle narrowed cold, angry eyes on Jake.
“What the fuck?” he growled at the man.
As calmly as any man could when faced with his angry superior, Jake raised two hands in surrender. “I can explain, boss.”
“You can explain?” His jaw ticked as he took a step closer to the man. “Very well … explain to me why you neglected to share that those piece of shit, Bonaducci scum have been following me for the last few fucking days.”
“I didn’t tell you because it wasn’t important. We caught them, and scared them off before we even got near your cabin.”
“And what about when we got back?” Kyle snapped. “They know where she works, watched her go into her job!”
“They always test us like that, but they won’t be back, sir. They know we’re there now. We scared them off.”
“They know she’s my fiancée. He threatened her life!”
Yes, David Mitchum had indeed delivered a low, unfortunate blow by attempting to use Kyle’s newfound love for love to manipulate him into adding more perks to the contract. To be more specific, the man had threatened Reanna after receiving the newly made peace deal in which the bastards of the Bonaducci clan received nothing, and S.O. took everything that was taken from them in the attack back … and a little extra. After they’d received the deal David had gone ape shit, which Kyle had expected. He’d expected threats from the bastard, he’d even planned a crafty way of responding to said threats that hadn’t involved any use of force. And that had been his plan in going after this peace deal in the first place—to find a way to ward off a war for the time being—but then Kyle had fucked up.
It had happened after David, in a fit of rage, informed Kyle of the intelligence the Bonaducci clan had gathered on him. He’d said they’d been watching him, watching who he’d been with, and … saw that he’d recently acquired a lover that had an exceptionally large ring on her finger. Now, in David’s defense, he hadn’t actually said he’d kill Reanna per se, but he had said, “It’d be such a horrible shame if something were to happen that would possibly put a sad hitch in the wedding plans.” Now, the jackass could have been hinting at doing something to Kyle, but for some reason, in Kyle’s mind, all he’d picture was that motherfucker putting his hands on Reanna.
After that Kyle had blacked out.
And since it wasn’t something that normally happened to him, being out of control like that, when he’d come to, he’d been completely shocked by what he’d done. David had been lying on the floor in a pool of his own blood, a little more than a few of the Bonaducci men had been dead, and the rest were fleeing, taking the beaten David Mitchum with them … Yes, Kyle believed this would be a potential setback to the peace deal. It would possibly come off as retaliation … even though it had only been him who had fought and killed anyone, and not a formal attack to gain back territory, which, after Kyle’s outburst, they had consequently gained back anyway.
“Sir, any threat that David may have dished out was empty. I bet my fucking life on it. They can’t touch you, Ms. Sofi, or Ms. Pierce. It’s impossible.”
“How impossible is it when they can get visual on us, Jake?” Kyle asked the man angrily, and even still, it didn’t look as if Jake’s confidence in himself and the other Salerno soldiers had been shaken in the slightest.
He just shook his head, maintaining his cool demeanor. “They can stare at you as much as they want, sir—I even told a few of their dumbass spies that myself—but they will never be able to get to you, any of you. God’s honest truth is there have been a lot of attacks, and assassination attempts over the years which have been easily neutralized before they’ve even gotten close. To report to you every time one of those Bonaducci bastards attempted to get to you would just put more unnecessary stress in your already fucking stressful day, boss.”
Kyle’s eyes widened. “So, you are telling me there have been unreported security breaches—”
As respectfully as he could, Jake cut Kyle’s words off. “With all due respect, sir, they were hardly security breaches,” he corrected. “And they are not unreported. Dante,” who was head of all Salerno security now, “knows of each attempt. In order to understand the security system he set after he took over, we’d need an entire day, but to make things simple and quick …”
With a long sigh, Jake attempted to explain. “Salerno soldiers are vast because of the size and wealth of the empire, and for such a vast empire we have a very small group of people that are in leadership. Because of this, the security protecting leadership go through intensive training. Of course, there have been mistakes in the past—the biggest being the taking of Mrs. Salerno—but since then, all of the proverbial holes have been filled, and the levels were created.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Kyle asked, shaking his head impatiently. “What the fuck is a level?”
“Well,” Jake shrugged, “the quickest way I can put it is this … even if an attacker was across the street from your fiancée, sir, there would still be too many obstacles for him to overcome in order to get close enough for her to even notice she was being targeted. For example, today,” he shrugged again, “a man recognized as the enemy attempted to walk up to her before she went into her job, and was taken out before she even noticed him. Another example, the moment you laid down that new deal, those fuckers got word out and attempted to get past our guys, probably to take her, use her to turn negotiations their way, but they were caught, and executed per Michele’s orders in the blink of an eye. And Reanna; she’s sitting in the car— with Michele—in front of McDonald’s eating some French fries and ice cream that he treated her to because he could tell she’d had a bad day. She’s safe, unharmed, even still insisting she doesn’t need the security that has been sent to protect her … which kinda means we’ve been doing our job, boss. We’d rather her think she doesn’t need us, than know how much she does. You just have to trust us.”
“So that’s what she’s doing now?”
Jake nodded his head. “Yes, sir.”
“And she’s safe?”
“I swear to you, she is safe.”
Shaking his head, Kyle looked away from the man. It still wasn’t enough for him, and it wasn’t anything against Jake, but Kyle wouldn’t be satisfied with only words. This being in love shit—and the worry that came along with it—was still too
new to him for that. When his emotions were this high, he needed to see for himself, not be reassured. He knew Sofia was safe and sound, protected at school, but Reanna was out, wandering around the city, and just Jake’s word, though confident, was not assurance enough for Kyle.
Walking past Jake, Kyle made his way to the car. “We have to find her. I need to see for myself that she’s safe.”
“Whatever you say, Consigliere,” Jake agreed, promptly following behind him.
~*~
I need to see Kyle. I need to see Kyle. I need to see him …
To feel him, to be touched by him, held by him; she needed it, and she needed it now.
This day was not going well for her at all; too much was happening and being said, and it was beginning to get to her. She longed to disappear again, to be back in the world she and Kyle had created for just the two of them over the weekend. To be … ripped out of that, and tossed back into a world of negativity, screaming little sisters, and packed work schedules was wrong. So wrong. And Reanna’s entire system was not adjusting well to being back home. It wasn’t working for her. She’d tried everything from eating her feelings, to trying to force herself to bury them, but nothing was working. She wanted to cry. Not just cry, but to cry in the arms of her fiancé. However, he was too damn busy apparently. Every time she called him she’d been turned away because he was, quote, “busy”. And even though Reanna was sure Kyle was indeed busy, she couldn’t fight the feeling there was some—for lack of a better way to describe it—force keeping her calls and messages from getting to him. It was just a feeling brought on by the fact the secretary who’d been answering her calls had really come off as a total bitch.
“I’m sorry, Ms. Pierce. Mr. Valente is in a meeting.”
“Again?” Reanna had almost whined. Quickly pulling herself together, she straightened in her seat. “Well …” she sighed. “Do you know when he’ll be finished?”
She’d been calling him all day, both on his cell, and his work phone—his cell went straight to voicemail and he wasn’t answering any of her texts. At work, his assistant insisted he’d been too busy to talk to her, and would be busy all day. She’d even told her not to call back, which Reanna refused to do because the woman, in Reanna’s opinion, was out of line for saying such a thing to her, not to mention she’d been extremely rude about it, acting as if Reanna’s calling was annoying her. Each time Reanna called the office, the woman had a damn attitude with her.
“Look … Reanna is it? I told you that Mr. Valente is a very busy man. He won’t be available for the rest of the day.”
Reanna frowned.
See? The bitch had an attitude.
“You can try back later if you’d so choose, but as I said earlier, you won’t have much luck, so why not just wait until tomorrow to attempt to reach him?”
Reanna rolled her eyes. Little did the tramp know, Reanna would not have to wait until tomorrow seeing as she lived with him now. Whore. “Well, did you at least get any of my messages to him?”
She heard what sounded like an irritated sigh from the woman before she answered her question. “Mr. Valente is not accepting messages today.”
“But,” Reanna shook her head, “you said you’d given him my last messages—”
“Let me be clear, Ms. Pierce,” the woman snapped abruptly.
Stunned to silence, Reanna pressed her lips together tightly.
“Mr. Valente is accepting messages, just not from you.”
Reanna’s brows lifted at that. “Excuse me?”
“Consider yourself excused. I don’t know who you think you are, but calling here as often as you are is a bit inappropriate for a nanny, don’t you think? Unless there is an emergency with Miss Sofia, there is no reason for you to be calling this office. If I spent my day transferring calls from Mr. Valente’s mistresses all day, then he’d never get any work done.”
“But I’m not—”
“Furthermore,” the woman cut her off. “While I’m sure he made you feel like you were special whenever he was with you, you should know that he is very much in a committed relationship with a good woman, and has been for nearly two years.”
Yes, Reanna’s heart stopped.
“They may be going through a rough patch right now, but trust me, sweetie, they always get back together. So just let it go. Whatever fairytale ending you have going on in your head, just stop dreaming and move on. He loves his girlfriend, okay? Don’t be a home-wrecking whore. Stop calling.”
And with those last few painfully piercing words, the evil bitch had hung up the phone.
“See what I’m saying?” Reanna stressed to Michele as she relayed her experience.
They were sitting in the car on the side of a busy New York street, people watching and talking about life … her life. Not much about his. All he’d been willing to share was he was indeed a Salerno, he was here to work for a while, maybe longer, and he’d been honored when she told him he had qualities that reminded her of Nathan.
So cute.
But yeah, back to the present.
“She was a bitch, right?”
As he had been doing most of the time during her story, Michele chuckled, giving her a smile which made her feel far more charming than she actually was.
“I agree she was quite unprofessional indeed.”
Shaking her head and taking another lick of her incredibly delectable, milky, vanilla ice cream, Reanna voiced her agreement with Michele rather clumsily, then wiped the fallen ice cream off of her chin.
“Why do you not just tell your husband what she has done?” Michele asked, taking a few more French fries into his mouth. “I’m positive he will do something about it.”
Stuffing a few French fries of her own in her mouth, Reanna frowned. “Something like what? Fire her?”
He nodded. “Yeah. Salerno organization doesn’t tolerate unprofessionalism.” He chuckled. “And then there is your husband, who wouldn’t tolerate anyone upsetting you.”
“But I wouldn’t …” Reanna shook her head vehemently. “I wouldn’t ever want to get anyone fired or anything.”
That’d be so horrible, so mean. All throughout her life Reanna had never been vindictive, and doing something like that would definitely be vindictive … right?
“No,” Reanna resigned, “I can’t do that. I couldn’t.” It’d be wrong. She’d be the worst woman ever …like, just ever. “I am not the type of woman who would do that to another woman.”
Nope, no way.
Michele’s laughter rang out through the car. “Gesù Cristo, woman.” He found whatever she said so damn amusing he could barely keep the fries in his mouth.
Reanna pursed her lips at the jerk. Whatever she said hadn’t been that damn funny.
Lightly kicking the back of his seat, Reanna gave him her best scowl. “What the hell did I say that was so funny?”
Once his laughter calmed, he turned to look at her. “Everything you said was funny,” he answered honestly. “Especially the part where you tried to convince yourself you don’t want the woman fired.”
“I don’t want the woman fired!”
He chuckled deeply as he glanced back down at his ice cream sundae. “Uh huh, sure you don’t.”
“I don’t,” Reanna pouted, stuffing more fries in her mouth.
“I will never understand you women …”
Reanna gasped in dramatic shock. “We women?”
“Yes,” Michele emphasized unashamed. “You women. Reanna, you are marrying one of the most powerful men in New York City. You know what, actually, you are marrying one of the most powerful men in the world. The Salerno Organization’s reach goes further and deeper than your pretty little head can ever imagine.”
Time out! Time out!
He thinks my head is pretty? Aww. Reanna knew she liked him the best.
Okay, back to listening.
“You can have anything you want.”
“I cannot,” Reanna protested.
�
�You can,” he insisted. “Anything your heart desires, that man will do it for you. All you have to do is say please, or show him a few tears, and wars will be started just because you say so. Don’t tell me any different, because I’ve seen it before. You are marrying the consigliere of one of the world’s most powerful and deadliest crime families, and with all of that power in your delicate little hands you can’t even have a woman, who referred to you as a whore for calling your own husband might I add, fired.” He slapped his hand down on his leg. “Fire the bitch, Reanna.”
“No!”
“Fire her!”
“No,” Reanna laughed, then kicked the back of his seat again. “I will not be the bitch who gets the secretary fired just because she can.”
“That you will not be, Mrs. Valente,” he corrected, turning to face her, a smirk appearing on his face. “You will be the wife who had the secretary fired for pissing her off. There’s a difference.”
Chuckling softly at the silly man, Reanna sat back in her seat, and refocused her attention on eating her feelings. “Whatever, crazy man. Just shut it and eat your food.”
Michele chuckled.
“And don’t tell anyone about this impromptu snack we’re eating.” She peeked up at him playfully. “I’m cheating on my diet right now.”
She wasn’t really on a diet. She needed to be, but she wasn’t because she didn’t have the patience or willpower. But she didn’t want Michele to think she snuck to fast food places for a few ‘guilt’ fries every now and then. Or rather, she didn’t want him to know she did. Because she did. Way more often than she should.
“Please, woman,” Michele said, seemingly dismissing her words. “You do not need this diet. You are a bountiful, beautiful, full-figured woman, with child bearing hips that would be praised in my country.”
Raising a brow at his words, Reanna smiled. “All that, huh?”
Dangerous Beauty: Part Four: Beautifully Broken Page 37