49. Stephano

49

STEPHANO

I walk over to where Matteo has Franco at gunpoint. Franco's dark gaze jumps around the room, from me to Luca, then back to me. The exact moment he realizes he's seeing double of the same person and that he's fucked, clocks on his face.

I bet somewhere out there someone is trying to take out either me or my lookalike. Probably some mercenary who didn't have time to do a proper background check. It's well known that there were six Scalera sons. What isn't well known is that two of us are identical twins. The Don always made sure this didn't become common knowledge amongst our kind, and now, it's played out to our advantage.

I strip off my jacket and toss it away. For a moment, I stare at this man who has no limits to his cruelty. Every feature on his face blurs, and I need to force myself not to see the Don in front of me.

"Franco Fiore. You hit my wife." My voice is low and menacing. "You bruised her beautiful face. You hurt her sister." I lean in and hiss in his ear. "You've cut into her flesh, leaving a mark I'll still erase. Let me show you how Il Consiglio deals with men like you."

I strip off my shirt as I look him in the eye.

Franco starts to mirror me while Matteo holds the gun right there.

"Fight to the death?" he sneers, and I smile as he tosses his shirt to the side.

Physically, he's in good shape, but he's had habits. Everything he's done would have weakened him. I drop my gaze to his tattooed torso. Man, this guy's committed.

"And that after I brought you someone in exchange for Gigi Trapani. Someone you can all share," he says.

Matteo stiffens, and he presses the barrel deeper into Franco's neck. "You are a sick fuck, aren't you?"

"That depends." Franco has a wicked grin on his face that I want to swipe off with my fists. "If you're into incest or not."

What the actual fuck?

My eyes flash to Matteo's where he stands behind Franco, the implication of those words slowly sinking in. Incest? Matteo's gaze wanders to the woman I can't see. Behind my back, Dominic is giving emergency care to her in the corner… Impossible .

I didn't get a good look at her, not that it matters, so I shake my head in annoyance.

"What the fuck are you talking about?" I bite out, hating how we are stalling.

Franco stares at me. "I'm talking about a baby sister you all took for dead."

A baby sister. We took for dead.

Luca steps up and grabs Franco by the throat. "Sick way to buy yourself some time, don't you think?"

"If you kill me, you'll never know." Franco strangles the words out between labored breaths.

Luca lets go of his throat, but I don't take my eyes off Franco's face. He is baiting us, fighting for his life with words. I don't know this guy; right now, I can't read him beyond the rage boiling in me. It's as if he knew exactly how to mess with my head. Forcing me to choose between his lie and atonement for that night decades ago where Don Scalera marked my soul. I know once I've killed this man, those memories will stop haunting me.

"If you know, others will know," I say, "and we will hunt them down."

"If she survives your bullets." He sneers again.

"I'll kill you with my bare hands," Luca spits in his face, "if it weren't a pleasure reserved for Gigi Trapani's husband. Those bullets weren't ours. You shot her."

"Fuck this shit," Matteo says as he pushes the gun into Franco's neck. "This party is over. Check his weapons so that Steph can wrap it up."

For a few tense seconds, time stops as we call him out on his bluff. Then Luca pats Franco down, pulling out two knives and another gun. Tired of playing games, he slices Franco's pants off, leaving the man standing in his boxer shorts.

Naked, we're all the fucking same; it's what's inside my head that differentiates me from this psycho. And what's inside my head supersedes what's inside my blood. I choose how this ends. Today, I'll finally take all control over my body and my mind.

I roll on my heels, cracking my neck, ready to rip him to shreds. A nod at Matteo, and he lowers his gun.

Nobody needs to ask us twice. Franco comes for me with an upper cut, but I block it and crack his jaw with a punch that has all my body weight in it. He staggers.

"Come on!" I scream as he circles out of reach. "Take it like you give it!"

I go at him, the adrenaline in my blood poison whose only antidote is to beat this guy to death.

We circle each other, slowly warming up to the fight with random punches hitting the target, but Franco soon realizes he's no match for me. Of course he isn't. Franco Fiore has demons of his own, but they aren't born out of my level of physical violence.

He manages to hold me off for a while, with the superhuman strength that surfaces when you're fighting for your life, but I'm fueled by something else. Every kick, every punch, is fueled by the need to find justice for Mom, for that night so long ago when the Don made me do shit no kid should ever do, telling me to do it harder, until I hit her with a punch that satisfied him.

When Franco finally crumples to the floor and curls into himself, I feel only warmed up. Nothing stops me now. I'm on top of him in destroyer mode.

It's only when I don't recognize his face anymore that I stop, chest heaving, blood all over me. Fuck, for a long time, it wasn't his face I was beating to pulp. It was Don Scalera's. Franco still breathes, but his chest wheezes with each labored breath. I squeeze with my thighs, and he struggles even more.

Fuck. This must end.

"The axe!" I call out. "Bring me the fucking axe."

When Matteo walks up to me, I glance up at him. Our gazes hold for a long minute, and in his eyes, there's approval for this thing we were groomed to do. For these men we've become under the Don's sick manipulation and guidance. It's in our blood, and we're only perpetuating the violence, but on our terms.

"Do it," he says. "It's like shedding old fucking skin."

Just like he shed his past when he killed Don Scalera.

I nod, knowing I will never tell a soul that my oldest brother murdered our father. "Where's Gigi?"

"Benedict took her and Carla to the clinic," Luca says. "Carla was coming to. Dominic is still with the other woman. She's unconscious."

Our little sister.

Or not.

Fuck.

I glance down at my body. I'm splattered and smeared with blood. Bruises bloom where Franco managed to get in a hit. At least Gigi isn't seeing me like this. She'll never see me like this. "If I do this, there'll be no more information from him."

"I don't care," Matteo says. "If there's any truth to his words, the woman will talk."

"If she lives." My final strike can't be the reason we're hitting a dead end.

"I have her," Dominic says as he walks past us, her body in his arms. "She'll live."

We watch him leave, then Matteo looks down at me. "If there's any truth to it, we'll figure it out some other way. Get it done, Stephano."

Matteo lowers the axe to the floor, and he and Luca step to the side. The body underneath mine drags in strained breaths, blood oozing from his lips and nose and ears. For all we know, the damage is done, and he'll never speak again.

I stand, pick up the axe, and hack off both his hands in two swift swoops of the blade.

"I promised my wife you'll never touch a woman again. I never break my promises. And it's only fair to deliver her the proof."