Page 4 of The Arrangement

“I’ll make the call, Vine; get you another watcher. I’d rather be closer to New York, anyway. Sitting around in this place really isn’t my thing. I know you’re grieving, or whatever you want to call it, but it’s been three years since your family was buried. Time to move on. It’s not like some former mafia boss’s daughter with no real connections can get her revenge, huh?”

Emotions betrayed Viviana by way of tears that welled up and threatened to fall.

“Fuck you, Sam.”

“Already did, babe.”

Standing to turn without another word, she slipped on the sneakers she managed to find under the corner chair before checking her face in the mirror. Red splotches had appeared on Viviana’s cheeks from forcing back tears, lips still swollen from Sam’s teeth biting and kissing the night before, and a small spot of red lipstick had smeared across the side of her mouth. Rubbing the stain with a makeup remover wipe from her dresser, she ran fingers through tangled waves of raven black hair as she tried to avoid the man’s gaze behind her in the mirror.

“You know you’re kind of beautiful, right?” Sam murmured behind her. His voice, thick with an Italian accent he could lay on heavy in a moment if he wanted, was rough and husky again. “They all say you look like your father, but you’re a prettier version of your momma.”

Brown eyes caught her own reflection in the mirror. What he said had some merit. With soft features, full lips, and wide eyes, Viviana certainly didn’t go unnoticed by men. Regardless, she could pick out a dozen other parts of herself that she wasn’t happy with. She hated the fact that her eyelashes weren’t as long as her mother’s once were, and that she mostly seemed to take after her in height, only standing a too-short five foot five inches.

Truthfully, Viviana didn’t think she looked like her mother at all.

“We’re not getting back into bed again, so you can stop it with your comments,” she replied bitterly. Tilting her head to the side, the red mark he’d left on the spot between her shoulder and neck was on clear display. “I don’t want your compliments.”

Sam shrugged and dug through the mess on the floor to find his boots. “Just thought you should know, considering I didn’t spend much time telling you last night. You’re gonna make a man happy someday. The perfect little mob wife.”

Leaning against the wall, he nodded at the calendar set up beside a small desk. “Your twenty-fifth birthday is coming up in three months, so when do you plan on settling down? God knows your uncle Sonny would love to see you married with a couple kids underfoot.”

Shuddering at his words was the only indication she gave that she’d heard his statement. The uncle he spoke about was the same man who reportedly put a gun to her father’s head and pulled the trigger. Reportedly because she knew it was truer than anyone else knew. He was also the man who took the throne of the Cosa Nostra within their family when her father was dead and gone. She had wondered later if Roman had seen Sonny coming, what with her uncle knowing of the deal her father had made with the Russians when she was only a toddler.

A snake, that’s what her uncle was. A turncoat, untrue, traitor to her father and the family. His own brother marked the bullet and stained his hands a bloody red.

Blood didn’t matter, though. Not in the family … or so Viviana had been told. Being a girl, it wasn’t like she had been given the advantage of understanding the Cosa Nostra, its rules and values. In fact, just saying the word mafia or mob under her father’s roof would get you one of his infamous looks, and then you knew you were in hot water.

The mafia doesn’t exist.

Yeah, right.

Viviana’s father had his own Wikipedia page, and her name was listed as his only surviving child right underneath.

“Don’t talk about—”

The words were cut off by a loud bang. Once more, Viviana found herself on the floor, pushed there by Sam’s hand.

Sam didn’t join her on the floor; instead, she watched him reach for the glock twenty-two he’d tossed to the bedspread. That same gun he scared her with earlier, but forgot about in their argument. He never should have dropped his piece. The gun was his third hand, but she had made him forget about that important rule for a split second.

A split second too long.

The near silent pop, pop, pops—one right after the other—made her squeeze-shut her eyes and cover her ears. That only served to muffle the shouts from the attackers and her scream. Raw, achingly loud, and terrified, that’s how her fear sounded. Something warm soaked into the side of Viviana’s shirt. The heavy scent of gunpowder stung inside her lungs and she screamed again.

“Shut her up!”

The voice was bottomless, scratchy with age, and thick with an accent that made a cold shiver of dread roll through Viviana’s body. She hadn’t heard a Russian drawl in years. It was the last thing she expected to encounter again, given they hadn’t come for her after her family’s murder.

“No!”

Viviana kicked out, turning to the side and stumbling over a mess on the floor. Reaching for the cell phone right beside the bed, she felt hands grabbing at her legs, pulling roughly and dragging her away from potential salvation.

If she could have reached the phone … maybe … maybe she … Viviana was alone.

No one’s daughter anymore.

The mafia princess without a crown.

“Don’t touch me! Sam!”