Dynasty: A Mafia Collection

by Jen Davis

  “Are you okay?” Why the fuck did I care?

  She snorted. “That’s a funny question, actually.”

  “No. It’s a simple one.”

  With her palm against her forehead, she looked up at the ceiling. “Nothing about any of this is simple.”

  For a second, I allowed myself to look at her. Like a normal man would look at a normal woman, not like a captor would at his prisoner…or slave. Tatum Linscott was beautiful. Her blonde hair hung in long waves over her shoulders, her blue eyes shimmering like sapphires. Even though she was probably consumed with fear on the inside, on the outside she looked strong, resilient…dazzling. No wonder I wanted to be inside her so goddamn much. No wonder Carlo wanted her. I finally saw her for her, a gorgeous woman with enough strength and intensity to bring any man to his knees. How was it possible that Tatum went from a guilty murderer to a beautiful woman within the span of a quick fuck?

  Unable to look at her anymore, no longer able to stand the ridiculous thoughts occupying my mind, I tucked my shirt into my pants. “I’m going to ask you again, are you okay?”

  “I really have no idea how to answer that.”

  I straightened my jacket and looked her way. “How about honestly?”

  With clear defiance, she crossed her arms in front of her chest as she glared at me. “I’ve been better.”

  “You and me both, sweetheart.”

  “Castello—”

  I shot her a warning glare, biting my tongue. “You can’t get that right, can you?”

  “Calling you sir just feels wrong.”

  “It didn’t feel wrong a few minutes ago, did it?”

  Her cheeks flushed, embarrassment painting her face with the kind of red I wanted to see on her ass.

  “That was different,” she whispered.

  “How was that any different?”

  “It just was.”

  I stepped forward. “Tell me how it was different, Tatum.” My voice boomed through the room, and I noticed her flinch. I wasn’t angry; I just needed to know what was different for her.

  She looked at me, and the intensity in her eyes momentarily took my breath away. “It was different because a few minutes ago you weren’t the man who wanted to kill me.”

  Another step, my heart beating faster, my body humming as I got closer to hers. “Who was I, Tatum?”

  She swallowed, her eyes never leaving mine as I continued forward. Something was pulling me, drawing me in, luring me to her like I was no longer the hunter but now became the prey.

  I stopped, my body mere inches from hers. “Tell me, Tatum. Who was I?”

  She licked her lips. “You were a man who could give me what I need—what I’ve always needed.”

  I leaned forward, lifting my arm above her shoulder and placing my hand against the wall. “And what exactly is it that you need?”

  “That’s another difficult question to answer.”

  “No, it’s not. Your head is overcomplicating the answers.”

  The warmth of her breath skidded across my neck, her chest starting to rapidly rise and fall—just like mine.

  Her blue eyes studied my face. “Believe me, it’s not my head that’s complicating the answer.”

  “Then what is?”

  Her eyes searched my face, and I loved the way she looked at me with equal parts of lust and fear.

  “It’s the fact that after what just happened, even if I survive the wrath of your family, I won’t survive you.”

  I lifted my other hand and softly traced the outline of her jaw. “You have that so wrong, little mouse. I no longer think it’s your survival that’s at stake.”

  A knock on the outside door pulled me back from a thousand thoughts of how completely fucked I was while staring into her eyes. I stepped back and glanced down. Her thighs glistened with the wetness slowly easing down from between her legs—the evidence of our lack of self-control. I also noticed blood dripping down the inside of her leg from the wound I inflicted on her thigh.

  “We need to get that cleaned.”

  She snorted. “You want to kill me, yet you worry a tiny wound will get infected?”

  “Irony is a bitch, Miss Linscott.”

  I tore my gaze from her then walked over to the trolley, reaching underneath.

  “Here.” I tossed her a black silk nightgown.

  She caught it then stared at me questioningly. “How did I go from a dirty rag to a silk nightgown?”

  I grabbed the last items underneath the trolley. “How did I go from being the man who wanted to kill you to the man that could give you what you need?”

  She bit her bottom lip in silence then dropped her gaze to the items in my hand. “What is that?”

  I placed it on the bed. “Your reward.”

  “My reward for what?”

  I walked up to her and took her chin in my hand. Leaning in, I placed a chaste kiss on her cheek before pushing my lips against her ears, smelling the citrusy scent of my shampoo on her.

  “For being such a good pet.”

  She sucked in a wild breath, and I turned and walked out of the room. With every step I took, I fought the urge to turn around, to walk back to her. My body felt like it was being torn in two by walking away from her.

  I’d done some wicked things with women before, things that were downright perverted and fucked up. But what just happened between Tatum and me, even though tame in comparison to what I was capable of, was the most intense and the best goddamn sexual experience of my fucking life. And as the door closed behind me, separating me from her, I knew that no matter what was to come, that wouldn’t be the last time I took Tatum Linscott. Thinking that one fuck would be enough to satisfy the hunger stirring inside me was so damn wrong. All it did was aggravate my need for her.

  There was another knock on the door.

  “Castello, are you in there?”

  Fucking Vico.

  I punched in the security code, and the door clicked open. When I saw Vico, I knew something was up.

  “What?”

  “It’s William Linscott. He got the package.”

  I glanced at my wristwatch. How the fuck did I lose track of time? Oh, right, because I lost my cock inside the pussy of the one woman I couldn’t fucking have yet had to claim.

  Silently cursing myself and buttoning my suit jacket, I walked out and closed the door before locking it with the code. When I turned around, Vico was smiling from ear to ear.

  “What the fuck are you smiling about?”

  “This shit is about to get real, bro.”

  Having it up to my eyeballs with Vico’s arrogance and lack of understanding exactly how fucking serious this all was, I grabbed him by the collar and slammed him into the wall.

  “What the fuck, man?”

  “You listen to me, and you listen fucking good. There is nothing about any of this to smile about. Our brother is dead. Our father is dead. That woman in there”—I pushed him harder—“is going to die along with her father because of the goddamn faith that’s been shoved down our throats all these years teaching us that bullshit of an eye for an eye. So you wipe that smug smile off your motherfucking face before I wipe it off for you.”

  With a final shove against his chest, I let go. Vico didn’t take his eyes off me, his face red with what I could only assume was anger.

  “What the hell has gotten into you?” He stepped away from the wall.

  I lifted my hand and pointed at him, fighting the urge to take out every ounce of pent-up fury I had surging through my veins. “You and that entourage of fuck-faces think this is all a game, some fucking power trip. You’re right, this shit is real. This shit is more real than your tiny little brain will ever be able to understand. So why don’t you just go and follow Nicollo around like he’s the goddamn Antichrist and leave the adulting to me?”

  Vico stepped up, straightening his shoulders, the challenge between us hanging like thick smoke. “I don’t know what the fuck happened to you, but do not
think for one second that I’m going to just be a goddamn spectator when it comes to all of this. My brother died too, and so did my father. You think you’re the only one who’s suffering because you now have the responsibility of making this all right?” His dark eyes bored into mine. “You act like you’ve been cursed, burdened with all of this. I would sell my fucking soul to be able to do this, to be able to avenge Carlo and Dad, to show the world that no one fucks with a Fattore and gets away with it.”

  I snorted, glancing to the floor before looking back up at him. “Believe me, brother, I’ve sold my soul, and from where I’m standing, it’s not fucking worth it.”

  I turned my back on him and walked down the hall.

  “You’re turning into a coward,” Vico yelled after me. “Nicollo was right. You’ll never be the leader Dad was.”

  I let his words wash off me like oil on feathers. Nothing he said could make me feel worse than I already did. For the first time in my life, I felt like I was drowning. I was drowning in responsibilities I didn’t want, that I hadn’t been prepared for like Carlo had been. Our father had taught him, primed him, groomed him for this role, but not me. I was never more than just another son, a son who would always follow and never lead. And I was totally okay with that—unlike Vico. I never wanted this. I’d never felt like I wanted to sell my soul to lead—yet that was exactly what I ended up doing.

  Images of Tatum’s naked body, sounds of her panting breaths, haunted my mind while I walked toward the office. It had been months, yet I still couldn’t refer to it as my office. That was the room I hated the most in this house.

  With a heavy sigh, I opened the door and walked in, not in the least surprised to find my mother already there, waiting for me. What did surprise me was seeing Uncle Gino there, and by the way he stood with his back toward my mother, pretending to stare out the window, it was clear these two had nothing to say to each other.

  “Madre,” I greeted when I closed the door behind me.

  She got up from her seat. “Everything is going according to plan?”

  “It seems so, yes.” I made my way to the desk, opening my laptop. If William Linscott was following my instructions, there should be an email in a fake account I set up for exactly this purpose.

  My mother stood at the other side of the desk. “What is our next move?”

  I glanced up at her from under my lashes before returning my focus on the laptop. “Let’s just see if the Linscotts will play along.”

  “I have no doubt they will. Their daughter’s life is at stake. If that man has an honorable bone in his body, he would give up his life for his daughter.”

  “So that is the plan?”

  Both my mother and I looked at Uncle Gino.

  “The plan is to trade her life for his? Set her free once he hands himself over to us?”

  My mother snorted, rolling her eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous, Gino. Of course not.”

  “But that’s what you just said, that he would give up his life for his daughter?” He narrowed his eyes at her, his suspicion shown in the way he frowned.

  My mother walked over to the couch and took a seat. “That’s what we want him to think.”

  “So what happens with the girl?”

  “She dies along with her father.”

  The way my heart stammered when she said those words, the way my chest tightened with an unexplainable urge to do whatever the fuck I could to stop that from happening, was terrifying.

  Leaning back in my chair, I let this conversation run its course without intervening. After what Uncle Gino had told me last night, I decided to follow his example—stand back and observe from the outside.

  Uncle Gino swirled his glass of whiskey. “Well, yes. I’m struggling to grasp the fact that you’re luring William Linscott here under false pretenses.”

  My mother laughed. “Please, Gino, stop acting like you’re a goddamn saint.”

  “Says the one with the giant crucifix around her neck.”

  Mother glared; Uncle Gino glowered. The tension between these two was downright toxic. The look on my mother’s face was that of someone who would gladly stab someone to death—who, in this case, was Uncle Gino.

  She got up, shoulders squared, chin held high. “That bastard had my son killed, ultimately causing the death of my husband as well, yet you have the nerve to stand there and act like they are the victims in all this.”

  “Aren’t they?” He set his glass down on the table. “Are you not keeping his daughter hostage, blackmailing him, forcing him to trade his life for hers, then plan on double crossing him by killing Tatum anyway?”

  “They killed my son and my husband.”

  “And you’re about to kill another woman’s daughter and husband. So let me tell you one thing, Loretta. If you think you’re better than them…you’re not.”

  “You lowlife piece of shit. I always knew you were the weak link in this family. You would let your nephew’s and your brother’s killers go free, without justice?”

  He shook his head. “This is not justice, Loretta.”

  “Of course it is,” she bit out. By the way my mother’s eyes flared up like the deepest pits of hell, her hand gripping the crucifix around her neck, I knew I’d allowed this conversation to go on long enough.

  I stood from my chair. “That’s enough. Both of you.”

  Uncle Gino straightened his jacket then stalked toward the door. “I will no longer be a part of this.” He turned his gaze to me. “My advice for you, Castello, is to not let other people define who you really are.”

  “Get out!” my mother yelled, tossing Uncle Gino’s empty glass at him. But he had already closed the door, the glass bursting into pieces, shattering on the floor.

  I’d never seen my mother this angry, this infuriated. The way her veins bulged in the side of her neck and her heavy breathing provoked a kind of suspicion inside my head that, if true, would be soul shattering. Was my mother keeping something from me?

  “Madre?”

  She turned to me.

  “Is there something I need to know?”

  She tucked her hair behind her ear, taking a deep breath. “Of course not, Castello. Do not let an old man’s ramblings make you doubt what we have worked months to achieve.”

  I cocked my head. “It’s not his ramblings causing me to doubt it.”

  Dark eyes that mirrored my own studied me, glowered at me, and my suspicion kept growing.

  “Has Mr. Linscott responded yet?” she asked in a lame attempt to change the subject.

  I would let it slide, for now.

  Sitting back down, I checked the mail, glancing up at my mother every few seconds. She was pacing, pressing the crucifix against her lips.

  Just as I had suspected, William Linscott had followed my instructions. There was one email in the inbox sent from an unfamiliar address—as specified—with subject: Final Payment.

  I clicked on it and opened the email.

  Final payment will be made in forty-eight hours into the specified account as requested.

  It would be greatly appreciated if the product of purchase could be delivered in perfect condition…as per our new agreement.

  In other words, he was giving himself up and wanted his little girl set free.

  I looked up at my mother. “He’s agreed to the trade.”

  She kissed the crucifix then smiled my way. “I didn’t doubt that he would.”

  After deleting the email and closing the email account, I closed my laptop. There was something heavy in my gut, something unsettling.

  “There is still time, Madre.”

  “Time for what?”

  “To put a stop to this.”

  “What are you saying, son?”

  I sighed, placing my elbows on the table and leaning my chin against my fist. “I’m saying there is still time to stop this from going any farther.”

  She stopped pacing. “Are you saying you don’t want to go through with this, Castello?”

/>   “I’m saying maybe we should reconsider.”

  “Excuse me?” She leaned with her hands on the desk.

  “Killing him won’t bring Carlo or Dad back, and neither would killing Tatum.”

  “Tatum?” Her eyes narrowed. “Tatum? Are you and Miss Linscott on a first name basis now?”

  Exasperated, I leaned back in my seat, slamming my hands against the desk. “That is not the point.”

  “That is exactly the point. My God, Castello, do not tell me that…that woman has managed to get her claws into you as well.”

  “Of course not.”

  “Good.” She stood straight. “Then you will have no problem going ahead with what we planned.”

  My gaze found hers. Deep inside my gut, I knew I had no choice. Whether my mother’s motives could be questioned or not, I had no choice but to execute this plan—and execute Tatum along with her father. If I didn’t, I would face the wrath of the rest of the Fattore family, risk being exiled or executed myself, and Tatum would still die. There were enough Fattore men who would happily step up to the challenge. Tatum was dead no matter what I did, what decision I made.

  With a heaviness in my chest that I couldn’t explain, I nodded at my mother. “I will see this through, Madre.”

  “Promise me, Castello.” The same words she uttered at my brother’s and father’s graves. The same vow she demanded me to make.

  “I promise, Madre.”

  She walked around the desk, placing a gentle hand on my shoulder. “I trust that you are a man of your word, just like your father was.” She squeezed my shoulder. “Do not disappoint me, my son.”

  And then she left, the click of the door behind her resonating like a drum through the room. I was left alone with my thoughts, the ache of guilt, and the twinge of dread defeating me so damn easily.

  Glancing out the window, my mind was a bloody warzone. Battles raged between my heart and my head, images of Tatum and what we did earlier the weapons of mass destruction threatening to destroy me.

  But unfortunately for her and me, my brother’s birthright had become my curse, and now I had to carry that curse up until the day I finally took my last breath. Freedom was no longer a luxury I could bask in, replaced by responsibilities I would ultimately drown in.