Echo, p.16
Echo, page 16
Then I had let Ademaro take the phone, my freedom and my innocence.
I could have fought back, I could have attempted to leave, I could have ended my life, but I had done none of those things.
I had endured all of my choices, and I had owned them.
Every one.
I did it because for one brief moment between innocence and fate, a moment so short-lived and so long ago that it now felt as if it had been a dream, I thought fate had been giving me a gift.
A six-foot-six, mysterious-eyed gift of a man who was so inscrutable, but so handsome and mercurial, that he had taken my breath and my soul and had never given them back.
I had not wanted him to.
I had wanted to cling to his dominance and his strong arms. I had wanted to drown in his voice from those clandestine calls, and I had wanted to hear the way he said my name for the rest of my life. His mere presence had woken me in a way art never had.
But then he had said a word, a single surname, and revealed the one crucial fact about my existence that my father had neglected to mention, and life as I had known it imploded.
Now the cruelness of fate had come full circle, and I was standing in front of a hazel-eyed, larger-than-life man who had unerringly referred to himself as Ghost.
Except this time, he was not an illusion. He had not killed his brother. He was not getting out of an SUV and leaving me with a stranger. He was not an Enforcer with a blood-sworn oath to kill or be killed for false loyalty and criminality. And he was not staring down a Cosa Nostra war.
I was.
But this war did not have an army of soldiers or familial ties to protect me.
This was not the three Cosa Nostra famiglias fighting to the death.
This was a one-woman battle, and I was Judas.
I was a threat to the Mantovani famiglia if they found out I had been married to Ademaro. I was a threat to the Vincenzo famiglia if they found me. Walking into the bank Papà had told me about was a risk I was afraid to take, and I had unwittingly involved Erico by walking into this building.
There was only one way out of this.
And it was the last thing I wanted to do.
Staring at the one man I had never wanted to hurt no matter how ugly his words were, I said what I had to. “You cannot break me.” I was already broken.
Glaring at me with the same penetratingly relentless stare that no amount of years would ever change, ignoring what I had said, he pressed his thumb down hard before ruthlessly dragging the pad across my lips. “Did he fuck you here, Principessa?”
Something snapped, and all of a sudden, I was consumed with hatred. The one emotion I had spent nine years fighting off because anger destroyed. It would eat at you as sure as cancer, taking your life one cell at a time. I swore I would never let it in. I had done everything in my power to not walk down its slippery path.
But suddenly it was here, and I was embracing it.
I hated this life.
I hated how my heart still beat for an Enforcer. I hated how I could not hate him no matter what he said to me. I hated that I was opening my mouth and throwing back words as vicious as the Cosa Nostra. “I let your brothers do whatever they wanted.” And worst of all, I hated how I did not care that I was lying.
The growl in his chest turned into a roar, and faster than I could blink, Erico’s hand was constricting my throat without mercy. “Brothers, huh? How about between your legs, Principessa?” Spitting the title out in disgust, his nostrils flared. “How many of my brothers fucked you there?”
It was on the tip of my tongue.
All of you.
Every one.
Because it was true.
Every son of Enzo Mantovani had used me in one way or another as surely as this life had, and I wanted to give it back to the only person I knew who had escaped this existence without dying. I wanted to blame him for everything. I wanted to have the energy and the anger to spew more hatred as every moment of my life coalesced and played through my mind in rapid sequence.
A dying father who had wagered his own daughter. A despicable Cosa Nostra Don who had struck me, then ordered his soldiers to check to see if I was a virgin. A cold, calculating Cosa Nostra financier who had stepped up as Don, tricked me into marrying him, then spent every night with another woman while he kept me locked away as his insurance policy. A race car driver who invaded my small servant’s kitchen every night to critique my cooking as I made my own dinners because I was not allowed in the main kitchen. And lastly, an Enforcer who had given me a phone, a taste of freedom, and a kiss, then walked away.
I should have been thanking Erico for killing his own blood.
I should have told him I recognized his sacrifice.
But I did not.
Erico Mantovani had left me, and I hated him for it.
The reserved, polished exterior I had been stroking, feeding, nurturing and training like an athlete trains for the Olympics, it fell away, and I did what I swore I never would.
Lying out of spite, I became the victim. “I spread my legs for every Mantovani brother except you.”
Echo
She was fucking lying.
“Bullshit.” I saw it in her eyes. I heard it in the space between her words, that fucking silence before she spoke. She still broadcasted her thoughts.
I also tasted her fear.
I’d killed too much not to know the stench of it, but more than that, I knew her. The innocent eighteen-year-old I’d walked away from, the beautiful woman she’d become, it didn’t fucking matter, she was the same.
She couldn’t lie.
I also saw the shift that’d just happened. Hell, I felt it. My hand on her throat, the change in her pulse, her breathing accelerating, her body tensing up instead of leaning into me—she was pissed as hell.
Good.
I wanted her angry. I wanted her as fucking pissed off as I was.
Her voice pitched lower, and the Principessa came out. But this was a new version. This was a Principessa who’d spent nine goddamn years with my brother doing who the fuck knew what. “Do not curse at me,” she demanded.
“Don’t fucking lie to me.”
“And you will what? Speak without swearing? Question me without insults?”
Wearing her emotions like she wore her coat—wrapped tight and exposed for everyone to see—she wasn’t fooling anyone. Despite her lineage, despite whatever the hell Ademaro had done to her, with her, the brutality of the Cosa Nostra still wasn’t showing on her. But the weight of it was. “Careful, Principessa, you’re slipping.”
“How can I possibly slip when you are manhandling me?”
“Manhandling.” Any other Sicilian woman, any other situation, I would’ve fucking smirked. “Big word for someone who claims their English is shit.” But she was right, I did have a hold on her, and I wasn’t letting go. Feeding myself a line about doing what I had to in order to get intel out of her, I was doing the exact same shit I’d just accused her of.
Lying.
Despite what I’d sworn to myself not five fucking minutes ago, history was repeating itself. The instant I touched her and she’d leaned into my dominance, my resolve obliterated.
I wasn’t sending her back to any goddamn place where our old lives could touch her.
I’d kill every motherfucker in the Cosa Nostra if I had to.
I’d take a bullet for her.
But there was one condition.
She had to fucking ask for my help.
After nine years of her fucking my brother, I wanted quid pro quo. I wanted the Principessa who’d once begged me not to hang up on her. I wanted the woman who’d needed me. Not the one who’d spit in the face of my help.
“Manhandling is not a big word,” she argued. “It is an appropriate word in this instance, and unlike you, I do not employ such tactics.”
“You got something to say, say it.” She could’ve stepped back or told me to fuck off. Demanded I let go of her. But she wasn’t doing a damn thing except taking exactly what I was offering—dominance.
“I already have.”
“Yeah, and what’s that?” I didn’t give a damn that she was speaking. She wasn’t actually saying shit, but her expression was. Same as it had all those years ago, I could see it now like I had back then. She wanted out of her life. The old one, this one. Just like I’d wanted out of mine. That was the shit that had sealed her fate with me—was still fucking sealing it, no matter how pissed I was at her, because I wasn’t walking the hell away.
“You were a soldier before, and you are one now. You coerce, you use force, it is what you do, what you have always done. That is what I am saying.”
Perversely getting off on the size of my hand against her small neck, I made sure she knew the exact distinction of who I was. “I was never a soldier. I was an Enforcer, then a SEAL. Now I just kill for sport.” Her breath hitched, and I leaned in. “If you think this is coercion, you’re wrong.”
Her throat moved with a swallow under my hand. “I think I am right.”
“You’ve never seen me be coercive, bella.” Forceful, dominant, brutal, pulling the trigger—those she’d witnessed, but she’d never had a taste of my persuasion.
“Then this is force.”
“Is it?” Walking a fine line, the question wasn’t completely rhetorical. I’d never given a damn about any woman besides my mother. I was raised not to. Women were weakness. That was the shit my father had drilled into my head. The first time he’d said it was after my mother died. I was fucking seven. Watching her go into the ground at her funeral, I’d shed a tear.
Like it was yesterday, I remembered the exact shit Enzo had said after he’d mercilessly gripped the back of my neck and got in my face.
“Stop crying. Immediately. You are not a baby. You are a Mantovani. Mantovanis are not weak. Women are. They are helpless, feeble animals that will make you weak. Is that what you want? To be helpless? Pathetic? If so, tell me now, and I will put you in the dirt with your mother and be done with you because no son of mine will ever be weak.”
A week later, Enzo fucking Mantovani put a gun in my hand, forced my finger into position under his and pulled the trigger.
That was my first kill.
A beaten Arcuri soldier, handcuffed and kneeling on the floor of a dark warehouse in the middle of the night as he begged for his life. Then he took a bullet between the eyes from a seven-year-old kid in pajamas who’d been woken up and snatched from his bed by a sick Don who had a point to prove.
Soldiers were not weak.
Especially not Mantovani soldiers.
But I was never a soldier.
I’d been groomed and trained to be the Mantovani Enforcer.
A position I’d never wanted but one I’d been forced into.
Same as a Principessa had been forced into being a pawn.
For the second time tonight, guilt hit me.
“You think I’m forcing you?” I’d fucking never. That was my father’s MO, not mine.
“I do not know what you are doing.”
That made two of us, but I’d made a promise to get her out, and I’d failed. Redemption wasn’t in my vocabulary, and it was nine years too late, but this was my one fucking chance not to be like my piece-of-shit father or the last name I was born into.
I looked down at the woman who was going to be the death of me. “No bullshit, no more lies, ask me.”
“I did not lie. Ask you what?”
She’d fucking lied all right. “You didn’t fuck Caio.” One, no Cosa Nostra Don worth a damn would allow his wife to get near another man. Two, Ademaro, that piece of shit, would’ve told Caio she was off-limits. Three, Caio would’ve obeyed Ademaro’s orders. “And if I have to tell you what you need to ask me, then we have a bigger problem than trust.”
Her face flushed. “I did not say that word, and I know what you want me to ask of you, but I am not going to.”
Jesus fucking Christ. “Because?”
Turning her head, she dropped her gaze. “We do not have trust.”
“Look at me,” I demanded.
As if she had to think about it, she slowly turned back to me.
Leaning in, being a son of a bitch, I gripped her throat with enough pressure so she’d feel it. Then I repeated myself. “Ask.”
Her voice got smaller. “Is this coercion?”
“No. This is dominance. Ask me for help, or tell me to walk away, Principessa. Those are your two options.”
“I did not come here for you.”
“I know.” Fuck, I knew.
Glancing away, she inhaled, then looked back at me with determination. “Does anyone here know who you are?”
“No.”
She straightened her shoulders, but I saw the fear in her eyes. “Then you cannot help me. I will not expose you.”
“You’re right. You won’t.” My thumb stroked up the side of her neck. “If I get burned, it’ll be my own doing. Not yours. Ask me for help.”
She closed her eyes. “That was coercion.”
“Ask,” I demanded, cupping her cheek.
Leaning into my hand, she opened her eyes. “You are right. I lied. I am sorry.” Her eyes welled. “I did not sleep with all of your brothers.”
Taking the hit, I gave it headspace for half a second. How many motherfuckers would I need to kill to let this go? How many times would I have to pull the trigger, imagining it was my own goddamn brother, before I got the image of Ademaro fucking her out of my head? Five? Ten? Fifty? I hadn’t been celibate. But I also didn’t marry and fuck her sister. Even if she’d had one, I wouldn’t have touched her. How the fuck did I reconcile this shit?
I couldn’t.
But getting her out wasn’t directly linked to who the hell she’d fucked or what I thought about it. That was what the Teams drilled into us. Compartmentalize. Work the problem. Adapt and overcome.
All I had to do was get her the hell out. Find my targets and pull the goddamn trigger. That’s what I did. That’s who I was.
I gave her one last chance. “Ask the question, Sancia.”
A tear slid down her cheek, but she didn’t ask. She asked a different goddamn question. “Did you sleep with other women?”
Compartmentalizing went out the fucking window. “We’re not having this conversation. Make a choice. You want to walk, walk. You want my help, ask. But don’t try to play fucking games with me. I already took a deep dive into your shit, Principessa. I’m not drowning again for you.”
Her tear landed on my hand, but she straightened her posture like this was a damn testament to manners. “I do not feel as if I have a choice, and you will do what you are going to do, so do it.”
I took the backhanded response as a plea for my help, but I didn’t let it go unchecked. “You always have a choice.” Then, because I couldn’t stop myself, I didn’t let her previous question go unchecked either. “And for the record, I don’t sleep with women.” Holding her dark eyes in my ruthless gaze, I fired. “I fuck them.”
She sucked in a sharp breath, Alpha walked into his office, and I dropped my hand.
Echo
My cell vibrated with an incoming text as Alpha strode to his desk.
Glancing out the window before grabbing a burner from his top drawer, Alpha looked pointedly at me. “We need a minute.” He nodded at her. “Mrs. Mantovani.” He walked back out into the hall.
I read the text.
November: We’ve got company.
I didn’t look out the window. I didn’t have to. I knew who the fuck was here. “Wait,” I ordered her before following Alpha and closing his office door.
Alpha’s gaze cut behind me for a second. Then the SEAL who’d saved my ass downrange more times than I cared to admit gave me the look. The one that said he was done with the bullshit. “I just saw the footage November pulled from the Cipriani. It’s a miracle she walked away. Whoever executed the hit also got to those four soldiers she mentioned. The suite’s a bloodbath, and there’s no sweep team. If they’re not already, the cops will be on this any second, and they’ll be looking for answers. Start talking.”
“The police won’t find shit.”
“Then tell me how she knows you, because I’ve never seen you with a woman. Not when we were on the Teams, and not since you’ve joined AES.”
Because I didn’t fuck women I knew. I didn’t bring that shit around when I was an Enforcer, and I sure as hell didn’t do it now. Sidestepping, I fed Alpha a line. “It’s called being discreet.”
Trefor saw right through my bullshit. “There’s discretion, and then there’s concealment.”
“You got something to say, say it.”
“I just did.”
Christ. Between him and a Principessa, I didn’t know who was pissing me off more. Walking the same damn line I’d been toeing for so long it’d become second nature, I played my hand by tossing the move back on Alpha. “Fine. What do you want to know?”
I’d humor him because I was going to need some AES resources to get her out of this, but only up to a point. Then I was on my own. There was intel I couldn’t—wouldn’t—ever fucking divulge to Alpha or anyone else. Not if I wanted to keep breathing, and not if I wanted to safely extract her without my past catching up with us.
“Who is she to you?”
Fucking irony. “I can tell you who she’s not.”
“Which is?”
Mine. She never was. “She’s not a Mantovani. That isn’t what this is about.”
“Explain,” he ordered.
“She’s a Vincenzo.”
Speechless, Alpha stared at me.
I gave him the rest. “She’s Massimo’s cousin and the granddaughter of the previous Vincenzo Don who got pushed out by Massimo’s father. And don’t hold your breath for a sweep team at the hotel. There isn’t going to be one.” If the intent was to keep it off the radar, it would’ve already happened by now. “The hit was a message.” Someone wanted to broadcast this to every made prick from New York to Sicily.
