The Syndicates: A Dark Mafia Romance Collection

by Raven Scott

  Her slick accent faded as wide, panicked eyes met mine, and I tilted my head as I rubbed my chin thoughtfully. Small fry was annoying. I could understand how this idiot didn’t recognize me the first time, but to know Malory was my personal secretary took some research. Even then, he should’ve known Carlyle’s face, but ignorance breeds idiocy.

  “Well, regardless, it would need to stop anyway, but yes. Now . . . ” This guy, whose name I didn’t know and didn’t want to know, tore his eyes off me and ducked his head. His shoulders jerked from the force of his shivers, and disgust coated my tongue thickly. Even if it wasn’t me, this guy was supposed to make sure that, at the very least, the women he targeted to bring across the Lake were over the age of eighteen. He’d be dealt with accordingly, but he’d picked the wrong minor.

  The raging itch that shot down my arms like lightning to tingle my knuckles verified that.

  Sweeping past me, Candice shut the door to the container, but it took less than a second for the floodlights to flicker to brighten accordingly. For a long moment, I just watched this piece of scum through narrowed eyes and wondered. What the fuck made him think this was a good idea?

  Even if I asked, I probably wouldn’t get an answer. That was the thing about these guys— they knew they were done, and any information I got from him was for me, so there was no point blabbing. I pushed myself off the thick metal to walk over to him, and he stiffened as I pulled out a pair of thick, pleather gloves from my pocket.

  “I have to ask . . . why’d you keep coming after me when I warned you not to?” I couldn’t resist the need to know, to reach this depth of stupidity. It even outranked Diamon in pure, gross incompetence. Lifting his head, he scowled at me, and I reared back my arm to punch him in the cheek. His head flung back, the front legs of the chair lifting off the floor, and I wagged my hand furiously as the impact rattled my bones.

  Spitting out blood onto my shoes, the guy panted as his cry echoed off the sides of the shipping container. His eyes flashed with rage at being struck, and he struggled against the zip ties holding his arms behind his back and to the chair.

  “It doesn’t matter, I guess. It’s not only the Italians that take the crown for shocking idiocy, is it?” Taking another jab at the guy’s face, I could feel his cheekbone cracking through the glove, and a sick kind of pleasure flooded my veins. This guy . . . this guy . . . this dumbass guy . . . “Wait a minute. Now, I find that hard to believe. Candice, what’re the odds this guy didn’t know who I was and what he was doing?”

  That fucking smirk he gave me floated up in my mind from outside my office, and I turned to my favorite lackey to arch a brow quizzically. She just shrugged, utterly bored, not paying attention, and I turned back to the guy as his face paled. Realization hit me the gut, and he started to struggle even more as I opened my mouth with a soft ‘ah.’

  “You did know. You’re an agent for the Italians. Oh-h boy, I have to tell Carlyle.” All the blood from this guy’s face drained and spilled out of his mouth at the mention of my older brother, and I took off my glove to fish my cell phone out of my pocket. “This is gonna just make his day. He’s been wanting to find out what’s going on in that big head Diamon has. Ever since he killed Isobel, we’ve had no one to give us up to date information.”

  Before I could dial Carlyle’s number, my phone screen lit up, and I adjusted my glasses on my face to squint at the caller I.D. My cheek twitched, and I gestured to Candice absently as I walked to the front corner of the container to take the call.

  “May, hey, what’s up?” Even before she spoke up, I could tell she was half-asleep, and she breathed deeply in my ear. “I had an issue in one of my shipping containers. I’m at the docks right now. I’ll be back in, like, forty-five minutes.”

  “Okay, that’s not why I’m calling. Can you go to the drug store and bring back some IcyHot things?” She slurred heavily, and a small smile tilted my lips as I agreed, and she groaned loudly, above the rustling of her wiggling around in my bed. “My legs hurt.”

  “I’ll grab them. Do you want anything else?” I only received a grumble in reply before she went silent, and I waited a few, long seconds before hanging up. The time on my phone read three-thirteen a.m., but I made it a point to be out of here by three-thirty as I dialed Carlyle’s number.

  It was six a.m. there, so he should be awake.

  “What?” Whipping around, I gazed at the guy tied to the chair as Carlyle’s gruff tone seeped into my brain, and a slight grin stretched my lips.

  “I have a double agent.” The simple, short message elicited a strong response, and Carlyle sucked in a sharp breath as the left side of my face prickled wildly. “That guy from the restaurant is working for the Italians.”

  “Get rid of him. I don’t need anything on the Italians anymore.” The loose code for ‘I already have a plan, I don’t need it fucked up by new intel’ was clear, and I nodded as Carlyle summarily hung up on me. Whatever he was going to do to Diamon was going to be amazing, and it was a shame I wouldn’t be there to watch. After all that bitch did to us, Carlyle must’ve had an idea better than welding him into a concrete box.

  But I digress.

  “Are you just not going to tell your girlfriend about me?” Drawing me out of my thoughts, Candice crossed her arms with a snooty look on her face, and I frowned darkly. “Fine, whatever. I don’t care.”

  “I’ll tell her eventually.” Candice shook her head disapprovingly, and I slid my phone back into my pocket to put my glove back on. “I will, Candice.”

  “Yeah-h-h. You’re a fucking yolkless egg, you know that?” I barked a laugh at that insult, and she flipped her green hair over her shoulder with a huff. “Let’s get this over with. I go back to London in two hours.”

  Mateo

  1

  Mateo

  “Mateo.” Dry, sticky hands shook my shoulder, and I forced my eyes open as alarm jumpstarted my heart. Sitting up too fast, I glanced around through narrowed eyes, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood straight up. The room was empty but for me and Lucy, and I had a second or two before the pain in my back set fire to my bones. “Mateo.”

  “What . . . what is it?” Rasping hoarsely, I squeezed my eyes closed as a vicious throb assaulted my sides and my breaths became labored again. Turning to Lucy, her dirty face aimed at me with such indescribable emotions masking her bird-like, round features, I arched sharply only to agitate the scabs on my back. “What happened?”

  “I heard something.” Gingerly shuffling around, I grabbed Lucy to pull her to my chest, and her frail frame was stiff against me. Her shivers reverberated off my skin, and I stroked her greasy, matted hair as her sniffle assaulted my ears. “I heard something outside.”

  “It’s okay. If they were going to kill us, they would’ve done it already.” No matter how many times I said it, Lucy never believed me, and I shook my head as silence descended between us. “We’ll get out of here. My brothers are looking for me.”

  Hopefully. At least I could convince her of that despite how unsure I was, and a peculiar kind of disgust glued my tongue to the roof of my mouth. We’d been in this room for what I could guess was about six days, but it was only a guess. Sometimes, it felt like much longer, and other times, I didn’t even care enough to keep track. Closing my eyes, I rested my cheek on Lucy’s crown, and we sat, unmoving, savoring what little comfort we could from each other.

  Gulping down the dense lump in my throat, I leaned back only to wince at the shooting pain down my back, and Lucy tensed. Her breath hitched loudly, her big, blue eyes meeting mine, shimmering in concern, and I shook my head slightly. She was so sweet, and a slight crease appeared between her slender, blonde brows as that worry morphed her delicate features.

  “Just stay still. Don’t use up energy.” We got fed twice a day, assuming once in the morning and once at night, and I knew it’d be a few more hours until then. The thick, metal door rattled slightly, and goosebumps swept down my arms when Lucy whimpered.
A hard bang rattled my teeth, and anxiety gnawed at my gut as I glanced over my shoulder through tight pupils.

  “Ready to start spilling some secrets?” Two men entered the room, and my lip curled as the one who spoke perfect Italian slapped his whip against his palm threateningly. “You know, it’d be easier for you if you just gave us what we wanted.”

  His thick accent sent prickles down my spine, and I tightened my grip on Lucy as silence engulfed the room. Clenching my jaw when the guy shrugged, apprehension gripped my heart in a vise and squeezed as the door shut with a damning click. A cold sweat broke out on my body, and Lucy’s shallow breaths became wheezes as I pushed her into the corner. Standing on unsteady, weak legs, I rolled my shoulders and bit my cheek against the pain and the itch as amusement flooded both men’s faces.

  Ugly-ass grease monkeys . . . they can’t even torture someone right.

  “You obviously don’t get what growing up with Carlyle was like if you think I’m going to talk.” Grinding the words out through my teeth, I resisted the urge to spit at them and really make them mad. Eventually, Carlyle or Oran would find me— all I had to do was endure. Every fucked-up thing Carlyle had imposed upon me my entire life was all in preparation for this, and this was pitiful by comparison. For once, I was glad he was such a dick to me, and I inhaled a deep, stabilizing breath.

  “Everyone talks, kid. It’s just a matter of figuring out how much you can take.” If you were good at your job, you wouldn’t need to figure it out. No wonder Carlyle had such a low fucking opinion of the Italians— they operated like it was the fifties again, as if I didn’t grow up in the shadow of a monster. It was insulting, honestly.

  “Let’s get this over with so you can go slink back to Diamon and tell him you failed again.” Oh-ho-ho, that made him mad, and I whipped around to pin Lucy to the corner with my body as he stormed over. The metal tips of his flail shimmered ominously, but I could take it. It was only physical, after all. Carlyle was much worse in terms of creativity.

  Lucy shivered against my legs, her slender fingers gripping my jeans at the knees, and I breathed harder and faster as adrenaline replaced the air in my lungs. The hairs on the back of my neck bristled and my cheek twitched as I ground my teeth together. When the air swirled, I braced my feet firmly on the concrete, and the whip came down with all the force its wielder could muster.

  Fire surged just under my skin as it burst open, the crusted parts of previous impacts flaking off as the metal caps dug into my shoulder blade. Lucy’s quiet squawk rang in my ears, but I stayed silent, even as those flames wrapped around my ribs. Pain weakened my knees, and I squeezed my eyes shut as he sent the barbs sailing into my back again.

  I wanted to laugh. I wanted to cry. I wanted to be rescued, damnit! If I succumbed, God only knew what would happen to Lucy.

  That was the whole point of putting her in here, after all. Fucking amateurs.

  “Fuck!” Blurting out the slur hoarsely as a fourth, or maybe fifth, stroke landed against my back, I blinked back the tears that blurred my vision. I watched in hyper-detail as they fell onto Lucy’s head, and their cruel, dark laughter rang in my ears. Keeping myself as still as possible while the pair walked out, I pictured them with their stupid smirks, thinking they were so great.

  Only when the lock on the outside of the door slid shut did I collapse, and I gasped for air as my nerves threatened to explode. Trembling hands cupped my face, but even my ears hurt, so I sobbed unashamedly into Lucy’s dirty, blood-stained shirt. Violent tremors strafed my spine and blood dribbled down my back, soaking into the waistline of my jeans.

  “Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Okay, okay, I’m here, Mateo. I got you.” Lucy’s voice wavered, her own tears burning my face, and I sniffled hard in a futile attempt to fill my lungs. She kept talking, but I couldn’t hear any of it as blood thrummed in my ears. No matter how expected it was, how easy it was to see the whole picture, that whip fucking hurt, and if we weren’t rescued soon, I was going to end up with one raging infection.

  “Shit. Shit.” Panting harshly, I laid down on my belly to try to relieve the stretching of my back, and my eyes rolled dangerously. It’d be a few minutes or a few hours, but those two would be back. If it’s just the one, I could probably take him, and bitterness coated my teeth.

  The silence was deafening when the beat against my ear drums quieted as Lucy stroked my forehead and gingerly pushed back stray strands of my hair. After the first few times, I got used to the constant throbbing, the fire, the sting every time I took a breath, and I closed my eyes and managed a shallow inhale.

  “S-so, tell me . . . tell me about you . . . your fiancé.” Sniffling harshly, Lucy croaked a cry of her own at my question, and all the tension in me seeped into the cold, wet concrete floor. “He’ll be happy when . . . when you’re saved.”

  “He’s . . . he’s a great guy.” Holding my face in her lap, Lucy took a shuddering breath and wiped her face and mine. I cracked open an eye to find her exaggerated, sad, sharp frown. “We got together in high school, been together ever since. I . . . I already told you about that. Right, I think I did. Seth is . . . ”

  She trailed off blankly, and her lips thinned until a white line appeared around her mouth. Whatever she was thinking, I didn’t have the mind to guess, so I closed my eye again as she started to shake her head.

  “Mateo? Mateo, no, no. Don’t pass out. Please.“ Desperation laced her tone, but I couldn’t stop myself as the darkness closed in on me. The pain didn’t dull even a little, and she tapped my face as her panic was the last thing I heard.

  2

  Mateo

  The lack of noise sneaking under the door was worrying in itself, and I rub my face to scrub the tiredness from my eyes. Surprisingly, Lucy and I hadn’t been fed yet, and those two assholes hadn’t come back. The light streaming in from under the door was just enough to turn the pitch black into gray, and I blinked hard and yawned . The flames engulfing my back flared briefly, but I was an expert at beating down the pain— it was all in my head, and my head had been through much worse.

  “Lucy.” My voice scraped my throat, and she hummed a crackled sound as her watery, blue eyes met mine. “I made a lot of mistakes, but I just want you to know . . . taking this for you isn’t one of them.”

  She teared up instantly, and I cracked a small smile as Lucy crawled the few feet between us and into my arms. Hugging her between my knees, it suddenly became a little easier to breathe, and as she cried quietly, I tucked her head under my chin. We had a choice, though it was more of a forgone conclusion, to be honest.

  Those Italian scum were fully prepared to do whatever they wanted to Lucy unless I took it. For some reason, they didn’t want to sodomize me, which I thought was highly unfair. I got whipped, smacked around, verbally harassed, but not once did any of those grease monkeys pull down my pants.

  How fucked up was that? I mean, when he said, ‘it’s you or her’, I wasn’t wrong in expecting some sort of sexual violation. I guess I wasn’t pretty enough. Maybe it was because I had recently cut my hair? Was it the whole flat-chested bullshit, or even the fact that my back was a major turn-off? In that case, they could’ve just done it before whipping me bloody, right?

  I knew plenty of porn stars with less of a chest than me, too, for that matter.

  “That’s so fucked up.” My murmur earned me a cry harsher than the rest, and I tightened my grip on Lucy as my mind continued to whirl dangerously. “You know, Lucy, I wish I had someone to go back to. I just think it’s better by myself, so I don’t have to worry about anyone else. You don’t need all that stress on you.”

  “I think the first thing I’m going to do is eat something that’s not rice jacked up with protein powder.” Snorting a weak laugh at that, I grumbled lowly in agreement, and Lucy sputtered a breath that rolled down my sternum. “You said these guys brought me here to use me against you, right? What if they kill me?”

  “As long as I’m alive, they’re not gonna kill you,
Lucy.” The Italians were predictable thus far, so I was fairly certain about that. She flopped her head back to stare me dead in the face. “Besides, to be a good torturer, you need to have a stronger will than the person you’re torturing. Those guys think that just physically torturing me is gonna do the trick, but it won’t. If I was ever grateful to my brother for being a fucking psycho, it’s right now.”

  “How can it be worse than this?” Sympathy struck my chest, and I licked my lips as Lucy gazed at me like I had two heads. “How can you be so . . . so nonchalant? Your back—"

  “My brother heads the most powerful criminal organization on the planet, Lucy, and he’s a psychopath— at least, to me he is. This is nothin’. The truth is, a few years ago, I got a girl pregnant. I was younger and stupider, and she was after money to fuel her drug addiction. When we met, she was clean, but when she started drugging up again, I found out she was pregnant. She assured me it was mine and then she disappeared.” Shame coated my tongue, and I frowned as surprise flickered in Lucy’s eyes. “I was a spoiled rich kid, the youngest of four, but even with all that experience, I couldn’t tell she was lying. Anyway, my oldest brother, Carlyle, found out. I thought everything would be awesome— I’d get her clean, we’d have the baby, and everything would be perfect. But . . . ”

  “But . . . what happened?” Man, now, I couldn’t even remember that chick’s name, and I had been so disillusioned it was embarrassing. The older wounds on my back split open, and I arched slightly as blood trickled down my skin.

  “She wouldn’t fucking shut up. It was driving me nuts. She was screaming all the time, it never stopped, so Carlyle boarded me up in the house with her, alone, with no way out.” Lucy gasped at the horror of it, and, at the time, I had been under that same impression. I’d learned the hard way that hindsight is a wonderful thing, though, and I shook my head slightly. “Carlyle could’ve killed her himself, but that’s what he did. He didn’t let me out until she was dead, so I killed her. It doesn’t seem so horrific now because everyone was telling me it was a mistake and not going to end well. She was a heroin addict, I think, and that baby would’ve been addicted, and my own romanticized delusions blinded me.”