Chapter 3

I had wanted to catch back up with my father, but by the time I had actually found him, he was having an intimate moment with the very woman I had just warned away from him. Viviana thought she had this handled, but she didn’t. She couldn’t. If she thought by letting him finger-fuck her like a whore in public, or spreading her tantalizing legs for him in private would help her take him out, she would soon realize her miscalculation. I just hoped the foolish twit didn’t end up learning that lesson with her life. One dead girl on my conscience was enough. I didn’t need another.

Still, I couldn’t help but watch her as she so effortlessly played along. She was either one hell of a good actress, or she truly could get off on my father’s touch. I wasn’t quite sure why that seemed to bother me, but it did. Watching her in the throes of passion, I had been bitter that it hadn’t been because of me. Maybe I was just mad because I had her in my arms minutes before my father did, or it was also possible that somewhere deep inside, I wanted to make her scream as he would undoubtedly make her do once they got back to the estate.

Rumors always circulated about my family, and some were confirmed firsthand. I knew my father was a rough man. He treated no one, or nothing, with respect or care, including his own family. He’d break Viviana, and I had tried to warn her, but her own stubbornness wouldn’t allow her to listen. I’d have to try to find another way to convince her. But how?

I decided to answer that another night. The evening was still young, and since my father had left with his comare, there wasn’t anything that I could do about Leonardo, or was there? Pulling my phone out of my pocket, I hit a number I knew well. As soon as the recipient on the other line picked up, I spoke, “Get Di Salva and bring him to the cells.”

“Will do.”

The line went dead, and I leaned against the wall. I planned to talk to my father in the morning, and who knows, maybe a night in the dungeon might make Leonardo squeal like the rat he was so I could take him out. No one dishonored the Vaccaro name, including friends of my father, and that was the reason he wouldn’t question me on this. Once I presented the evidence, Stefano might even want to do the deed himself.

I chuckled at that. It would take balls, and my father’s were probably slapping against Viviana Spataro right now. I scowled at that visual. I’d always thought her pretty enough in school, but now, she was a feisty temptress that I wanted to subdue in so many ways. I could still feel her heart beating wildly in her chest as I held her very life in my hands back in the bunker. As my hand wrapped around her throat, she was aroused, very aroused. And Cazzo! I was, too.

I remembered the feel of her lips beneath mine. I never kissed the squillos, but she was more than some common whore. She was my father’s mistress, so she should’ve been off-limits for me. Too bad for him that it didn’t mean a thing. Viviana wanted me, and I didn’t have proof outside of the bunker to prove it, but I knew that she did. My own inflated ego wouldn’t accept anything less.

My thoughts returned to school and how innocent she had been. Oftentimes, we’d been thrown together, but I had never given her the slightest inclination that I desired her in any way. She’d wear those long skirts and tight shirts, a lot like the teachers would. Thinking back on it now, I supposed one of the reasons I had fucked those various women there in the school and never anywhere else, had been because of Viviana. It should’ve been as obvious to me back then as it was now because as I took a trip down memory lane, I’d often bend those women over Viviana’s desk and raise their long skirts to their waists.

I was so fucking hard. Damn, I needed to find Ruth or someone else that I could take all that pent up energy out on, especially because I knew my father was enjoying the one thing I now wanted above all others. I was about to dial the number to one of those squillos when my phone actually rang.

“Is it done?” I asked. When I heard “Sì,” I smirked.

Leonardo was in one of the cells. They were kept just off the main property, so I grabbed the keys to my powder blue Huracan and headed toward home. Once in my Lamborghini, I sped away from the city and didn’t slow my speed until I reached the area where more men were executed than anywhere else in the city. It wasn’t often that a prisoner would emerge alive from underground. If I had my say, Leonardo would definitely not buck that trend, and would be just another statistic and example for those employees who thought they could cross a Vaccaro and live to tell about it.

I veered off sharply and came to a stop right outside of a small building that was the entry to hell. It was for most, and as I thought back to the various points of my own childhood, it had been that for me, too. I let out a growl, but pulled my favorite Glock out of the glovebox, then ventured inside.

I made sure that I kept it fully loaded, and switching the safety off, I fingered the trigger. It wouldn’t be the only weapon I would need. Producing a small, but ultra-sharp blade, I intended to torture the man before finally showing mercy and killing him where he sat. I entered through the interior door, and took the familiar descent underground.

The walls were thick and cold, most of the stone discolored from the punishment they withstood. There was a stench that had me nearly holding my breath. If these walls could talk, the stories they could tell. Thankfully, they couldn’t, so some secrets could stay hidden inside. They might not be out there for the world to know, but they would never be forgotten either. In fact, just walking these same halls, a sense of shame filled me that couldn’t be erased no matter how much I wished for it to be.

I ignored the revulsion bubbling up inside of me, and continued down to the end of the hallway and through the door where a trio of cells sat and in the center one, a scared Leonardo Di Salva stood in the corner.

“Oh grazie, a dio,” he uttered when he saw that it was me.

“God can’t save you here, Leo. No one can, including my father who is otherwise engaged at the moment.”

Fear crept into his eyes around the same time that recognition did. I smirked. His eyes grew wide, practically bugging out of his head while I stood there and watched him squirm. Seeing these prisoners plead for their lives made me feel a certain kind of way, and I was thankful that this one didn’t insult my intelligence, and temper, by trying to do the same. There was no honor in dishonor, regardless of how it was spelled.

“Do you know why you’ve been brought here?” I asked.

Leo shook his head. “This is a mistake.”

“Is it?” I produced the blade and the stripe of light coming from inside of the cell bounced off of it. “I think you know exactly why you’ve been brought here.”

“I don’t. I swear. I—”

“If you want to keep those slick fingers of yours then I suggest that you start talking about that Swiss bank account.”

“What account?”

I loved to watch these men sweat. I hated to hear their pleas for their lives, but everything else about these encounters made me hard. “The one where over a hundred thousand Euro have disappeared.”

“I don’t understand. I—”

I moved to the cell door and knowing his feet were shackled, I wasn’t worried about him escaping, so I didn’t even bother to close the door behind me. I laid my gun down just outside of what would be his ultimate reach and proceeded closer with my dagger in hand. When close enough to him, I grabbed the old man by his hair and pressed the blade against this throat.

“An insult for me is one for my father who has done nothing but protect you over the years. Right now, he can’t do that so I would suggest you start talking and tell me whatever I want to know.”

“Y-you’re going to kill me,” he stated, and I grinned.

“Actually, I’m going to cut off every finger, starting with each phalange. If you still don’t tell me what I want to know, I will continue to the metacarpal, and if you don’t pass out or die from the blood loss alone, I will cut off both fucking hands until I decide to end your miserable life. Just know, Leo, it won’t be until you have truly suffered.”

“B-but, I have been by your father’s side for—”

“Thirty years. I know. Spare me the sob story. It’s for that reason alone I won’t show you an ounce of fucking mercy, so unless you want to lose the tip of your thumb, I suggest you start giving me what I want to hear. You’ll learn I’m a very impatient man.”

A sob escaped him, and I grabbed one of his hands. As easy as taking candy from a baby, everything came spilling forth. Stefano should be proud of me for my actions, however, something told me that he wouldn’t be. Nothing I’ve ever done had ever made him respect me the way that a father should a son. The man was pure evil and as other memories came rushing back, clarity only proved that nothing I did would ever be good enough for him. He hated me, perhaps even more than I hated him. He had everything I wanted from power to fear, and he even had the girl. I had his right-hand man, or what was left of him, and as he bled out on the floor, I picked back up the Glock and a shot between the eyes ended his miserable life. Now, it was time to take what Stefano had, everything that was rightfully mine. Maybe not tonight, but it would be soon.