chiara
Juan García, the man who did the cartel’s dirty work, stepped out of the car with an umbrella and walked into the nearest warehouse. Rain poured down around us, and I shielded my face with my hand as it flew in all sorts of directions. About twenty of his men stood around outside of the building, guarding it from cops.
Alessandro opened the door for me and shook the umbrella out, leaving it by the door. The warehouse smelled like fish and sewer, a disgusting mixture that I would be fine never smelling again. Rain beat down outside of the rusty garage door. I walked into the room, gazing at the dozen more men from the cartel, all equipped with guns and all staring at me … the only woman here.
Juan gazed at me, lips curled into a smirk. “You brought one of the Capitelli whores for me, Alessandro?” He stood about twenty feet away, his fingers locked on to his gun.
“I’m Piero Capitelli’s daughter,” I said, staring blankly at him and trying hard not to get riled up from the mere thought of being associated with our family whores. I wasn’t Kiara or whatever the fuck her name was.
Juan walked around me and looked me up and down like I was a damn prize. “Capitelli’s daughter?” He chuckled menacingly and turned toward Alessandro. “Did the boss make you bring her? Get her out of his hair?”
“We’re here to talk business.” Alessandro paused and glanced briefly at me, gaze lingering on the buttons I had popped open on my shirt. “Not pleasure.”
Juan nodded and stepped toward me, brushing a finger against my cheek. “As long as you and I can talk pleasure later, bonita.”
I slapped his hand away from my face, clenched my jaw, and said, “Don’t talk to me like that. I’m not one of the whores. I’m the next Capitelli boss.” Because I would be, whether anyone believed me or not.
Mom had wanted to rule beside Dad, to take a bigger role in this family, before someone killed her ruthlessly and let her bleed to death in the streets.
And on that day, I’d promised her I would follow in her footsteps.
I was up for whatever it took.
“You think your father would let a woman run the family?” Juan let out a laugh and shook his head, muttering something incoherent under his breath. He turned around and nodded to a few men, who threw three black duffel bags in front of us. “If you want to be the boss, you might want to cover your tits, bonita. People won’t take you seriously with them hanging out like that.”
All I wanted to do was tell him that I could dress however I wanted and still mean business, but then I’d look like an emotional mess, as Alessandro had suggested.
Alessandro clenched his jaw and grabbed the bags, handing me one. “Where’s the rest?”
Juan waved the gun in the air. “The deal was fifty now, fifty later.”
“We agreed on seventy now, thirty later, bastardo,” Alessandro said.
Juan stepped forward, trying to intimidate Alessandro, but he didn’t move an inch. Instead, he stood there, staring at Juan with the most sinister look on his face. One that even scared me—just a bit. It was nothing like any expression I had seen Tommy give anyone before. It was fire. It was lethal. It was so damn frightening.
Juan nodded to one of his men again. “Give him ten more.”
“Twenty,” Alessandro said, refusing to back down.
His fingers twitched, and I could tell he was aching to reach for his gun to shoot this stronzo dead right here. But we wouldn’t get out alive. Not with all his men around us.
Juan pressed his lips together and shook his head. “Ten more and some information on Mamacita Capitelli.” His dark gaze lingered on me.
Alessandro didn’t even look at me, but he tensed. “Depends on the information.”
A guard threw Juan another bag of money.
“There’s a hit on her,” Juan said.
I crossed my arms over my chest, my patience running thin. “The Sicilian Mafia,” I said, shaking my head. It had to be. Even though I had changed my plates and junked my car, they knew who I was. I had been digging into their business and hanging out with their former man. “We already know that.”
Juan tilted his head at me, excitement filling his brown eyes. “No. From the Capitelli family.” He paused and looked between us, then at me solely. “Someone wants you dead …” He pulled out his gun, stepped closer to me, then held it right to my head. “Willing to pay two hundred million for your head.”
My heart pounded hard, but I refused to show him my fear.
The Capitelli family? Someone in my own family wanted me dead? First my mother and now … me? Who could it be? Maybe it was the whore Tommy had been fucking with. Maybe some other whore who wanted to weaken my father or even someone who wanted me out of the way so she could have Dad all to herself.
“You kill her, and I’ll kill you,” Alessandro said, face void of emotion.
Juan chuckled and tipped the gun back. “The offer was tempting, but I’m not into killing women who look like you, so I passed it up. Maybe next time.” He winked at me.
When he stepped back, I inhaled sharply and tried so desperately to calm myself down.
Alessandro snatched the bag of money from Juan. “Who?” he asked, a tenseness in his voice that I’d never heard before—something that I’d never thought I’d hear from him.
“That’s all I know,” Juan said.
After Alessandro gave him one hard stare, he grabbed my wrist and pulled me back into the car, not even bothering with the umbrella. We walked into the rain, and he threw the bags into the backseat.
“Get in the fucking car, Chiara.”
Chiara …
My name had rolled off his tongue so rough, and part of me loved it. It was the first time he had said my name—my real name. Deciding not to be a total bitch now since we were in the rain and since I had found out that I had a hit on my head, I slid into the car.
Alessandro got into the car, started it, and drove for a long time before he spoke a single word. After about thirty minutes of silence, he tightened his grip on the steering wheel. “Who the fuck is after you?”
I widened my eyes at him. “You think I know? You think I walk around, knowing there’s a hit on my head without having fucking protection?” I stared out the window and shook my head, watching beads of water race down the windshield. “You’re a fucking idiot if you think that.”
“It’s because of the damn police you’re fucking with,” he said, angrily shaking his head. “The family thinks you’re a rat.”
I slammed my hand on the seat. Those were the same damn words the family had used to explain Mom’s death. She was a rat … when she wasn’t. I was sure of it. Absolutely sure.
“I’m not a rat,” I said through clenched teeth.
“Then, why are you sleeping with the cops?”
I turned to face him, droplets of water racing down my chest from the rain. “Just like what you do is none of my business, what I do is not any of yours.”
Something in his demeanor changed, and he saw a damn opportunity and took it. “So, you bribe cops with sex to get information for you? Is that all I need to do? Give you some information to get you to take the rest of your clothes off?”
Instead of scowling at him like I wanted, I stared out the windshield and laughed. “Oh, it’s not like you haven’t been thinking about it from the damn moment I met you.” I crossed my arms over my chest. “But, unlucky for you, I don’t go for man-whores.”
“You went for Tommy.”
“I need Tommy,” I said, jaw twitching. Don’t let him get under your fucking skin. “There’s a fucking difference.”
He drove down some side roads and then onto a run-down road, his hand inching closer to me every moment. “You need me too, reginetta.”
“And why do I need you?” I asked, suddenly starting to feel how damn wet and sticky my shirt was from the rain.
“Because I’m the only one who will take you out on business and I’m the only one who knows your little secret. I hold your future in my hands. I can break you, or I can make you better than your father.”
I scoffed. “Why would you do that? Why would you even consider helping me?”
“Because this family is more corrupt than you think it is.”
“Corruption,” I muttered. Corruption wasn’t the word I had for it. Fucked up sounded more like it. But this life was all I had known, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. All I cared about was getting revenge on the person who had decided to kill Mom. “If you care about corruption, you shouldn’t be in this business.”
He chuckled and pulled onto some dirt driveway. “I don’t give a fuck about corruption. I relish in it.” He gazed at me and cracked a smirk. “Maybe that’s why I always find myself in your company.”