Page 57 of Captivated

“I could come to—”

“No, you can’t come to New York with me,” Joe interjected.

Cory scowled. “Why do you have to ruin all my fun?”

“Because you don’t know how to stay under the radar, Cory.”

“Fine—that’s fair. What’s the problem?”

Joe wondered how much he should tell his brother, but it really wasn’t all that much of a question for him. Out of everyone in his life, he trusted his brother the very most. Maybe it was their raising, or the fact they were so close in age and only really had each other to fall back on a lot of the time in this life. Nonetheless, he would give his life for Cory, and knew his brother would give his in return, too.

“All right, it’s like this,” Joe started.

It took a good ten minutes for him to get through the job the Marcellos asked him to do, and then all the weird shit that came up after. He didn’t leave out the fact he thought the two hits were too high profile to be doing close together, not to mention that he all but knew the Marcellos had to have a good reason for doing it, and it was likely going to draw attention to them. He added on the son of the politician approaching Liliana at her show, and then the meeting Joe had with Lucian just before he came.

“They keep telling me to mind my fucking business,” Joe said, “but I feel like there’s a lot of shit going on under the surface, and I need to know why this job was put in my hands to begin with.”

“The Outfit’s spoiled you, man,” Cory said.

Joe’s brow dipped. “What?”

“You’re a hired gun. A hitman, at the most. And you were hired to do a hit for them—nothing more, Joe. You’re used to Tommas or Dad giving you every reason why someone has to die, so you can do your strange guilt shit when you have to justify it to God.”

“First of all—”

“Shut up. Point being, they don’t owe you that information. You took the job, so that means you do it.”

“No, I took it because Dad asked me to,” Joe replied.

“You didn’t mention that.”

Joe shrugged. “Yeah, basically said because he’s asking me to do it, so I did. And even now when I try to raise my concerns about all of this, he brushes me off.”

Cory frowned. “That’s not like Dad, either.”

“See,” Joe said pointedly, “something is fucking up, man. I’m not crazy.”

“You think it maybe has something to do with Liliana? You said Lucian told you on the surface it may look like Dante was paying you, right?”

“Kind of suggested it was Lucian who was getting me to do the job, yeah.”

Cory nodded. “All right, now add on the fact the son of a senator you’re meant to kill was acting kind of friendly with Lucian Marcello’s daughter—”

“She has a goddamn name, Cory.”

“First, I realize she has a name, Joe. Step out of your feelings for five seconds, and think about this whole thing objectively. That’s probably half of your damn problem. You haven’t been able to really get your eyes away from the prize long enough to properly think about all of this.”

“The prize—what?”

“Liliana’s pus—”

Joe punched his brother again, but this time, in the shoulder. “Watch your fucking mouth.”

Cory rubbed the spot, and scowled deeper. “Keep hitting me, and I’m not going to help you at all.”

“You’re not helping very much right now.”

“You said she looked uncomfortable, and this … Rich Earl, the senator’s son, acted familiar with her. Maybe a previous relationship or something?”