1. Gio

1

GIO

M y father had been a bastard. He started beating me when I was five and hadn't let up.

I hated him from the moment I knew there was a word for what I felt toward that asshole.

He never saw me as a son. He looked at me as an asset. An heir. A weapon.

And that's what I was for him.

His gun and sword. His violence.

Marco Bianchi was weak in all ways. He was a tyrant and a motherfucker, and when it came to protecting his family, he failed at every turn.

He gave the abuse instead of protecting those closest to him from it.

But my father was no longer alive. His young mistress had killed him in a fit of passion and jealousy in front of me and my sisters.

After his death, I'd stepped into his shoes and taken on the role as head of the family and protector of those dearest to me.

My sisters Amara and Claudia.

My mother had never been a mother. She was a broken woman, a vessel molded to be whatever her husband wanted. She'd been a good little Italian mob wife. She watched her husband beat her children. She stood by and did nothing.

And because of that, I now saw her as nothing. She'd always be the woman who gave me life. I'd always make sure she was taken care of—as was my duty—but I had no love for her.

The scars my father and his men had given me and once covered my whole body were no longer visible. I covered them in dark ink—sweeping lines, artistic impressions, and patterns that illustrated the story of the vicious monster I housed within me.

I did what I did because I didn't know any better. I didn't know anything different.

All I saw and felt was the need for destruction.

All I wanted in those moments—the moments in which I was known as D'yavol— Devil—was to end the threat that was about to step into the ring with me.

To deliver the pain that my sisters and I were subjected to our entire lives.

To feel good when blood splattered my face and a body lay at my feet.

I sat in the back room of the dilapidated warehouse and waited. My eyes closed. My heart rate steady.

Butcher and Son had been a slaughterhouse back in the day. It held the city together economically. But after the business's collapse, the city of Desolation, New York, had fallen apart, broken even more than it already had been.

The property and land had been purchased ages ago by an anonymous buyer.

I didn't need to know who actually owned it. I knew it was someone just as bad as the men in my part of the underworld, but I wasn't sure if the title holder was actually a part of it. Maybe a former crime boss. Maybe a legitimate businessman who dabbled in money laundering or sex trafficking.

The person who owned this old slaughterhouse was most definitely not a good person, since they allowed torture, beatings, and killings. So most likely, they were deeply involved in the international crime syndicate I was a part of.

On the outside, Butcher and Son looked like a ruined building hanging on to its last thread of life.

But to the men like me—the violent criminals—it was a hub for illegal activities, underground fighting, and a place many took their last breath.

And the cops didn't fucking care. They turned a blind eye because it filled their fucking pockets with blood money.

The East Coast was swiftly becoming more of a home to me than the West. And because I came to New York several times a month, I got myself set up with a penthouse right outside this shitty city.

I could hear the muffled chanting coming through the dilapidated walls of this broken-down building.

I slid in my earbuds, cranked my music, and closed my eyes. My face was concealed, a vicious half-skull mask hiding my identity. But, fuck, I hadn't bothered to cover the inked markings all over my body.

My tattoos were proudly on full display, like a neon sign warning everyone off, letting them know how violent I really was .

Then again, no one saw me without a shirt when I wasn't D'yavol.

The vibrations of the thick metal door opening had me lifting my head and looking over to see the man standing on the other side. He was strapped with guns and wearing all black. He pushed the door open wider and gave me one nod.

I stood, rolled my shoulders, cracked my knuckles, and cranked up the music until it blasted through my ears and drowned out everything else.

And then I headed to the blood-stained cage, feeling the adrenaline pump through me at the thought of adding another tally mark to my death count.