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I suffered a moment’s uncertainty; just a moment when I had to consider the possibility that I’d been wrong about the Lucas, that they’d been part of this from the beginning. But one look in Dominic’s eyes and the moment was gone. Pain, uncertainty, fear; things I’d never expected to see in a Luca’s eyes.
He was here for Raven.
I hadn’t considered it before, but there was no way Berlusconi could have guessed what lengths I’d go to for a woman I’d only known a couple of weeks. And that’s why Dominic was here. Berlusconi had taken Gabe, thinking he could draw me out. He’d taken Raven to draw out Dominic to the same place at the same time.
This was the same goddamned game he’d been playing all along.
I looked around at my men and the Lucas’ men, all itching for a reason to pull the trigger, all unknowingly letting Berlusconi pull their strings like puppets. I was wound up too tight to play arbiter, but I wasn’t letting Berlusconi play me.
“Why are you here, Costa?” Dominic asked. His voice was level and his gray eyes assessing. Maybe I hadn’t given him enough credit.
“He’s got my brother in there,” I said, nodding toward the warehouse.
Letting him know I’d been fucking his baby sister probably wasn’t conducive to the arbiter role.
Dominic nodded. “I don’t know who Berlusconi is,” he admitted, though it seemed to pain him. It was a testament to how important Raven was to him that he’d make such an admission in front of more than a dozen Costas.
“He’s Fiorenzo Avalone’s son. He’s been scooping up men from wherever he can and has been trying to pit one family against another for quite some time now.”
“Then what the hell are we waiting for?” Dante piped up then turned to his brother, “I say we gun them down and take back what doesn’t belong to them, Dom. Right now.”
“It won’t work,” I said, wishing like hell I was wrong.
Berlusconi was smart. He was prepared for a gunfight. He’d let the Costas walk right in and gun down his men just to see what he was up against. Going in with the same old tricks now wasn’t going to work.
Dante glared at me, but it was Dominic who spoke up, his expression a mask of indifference.
“How can you know that?” he asked.
My respect for the man grew. He could keep his wits about him no matter the situation, and that was no simple task.
“Salvatore,” I called and held out my hand.
Salvatore handed me a pair of infrared binoculars, and I held them up to my face all the while hoping I was wrong.
“That’s how,” I said, then handed the binoculars to Dominic who handed them to his overzealous brother.
Dante took a look at the same scene I’d been looking at.
“Fuck me,” he breathed and lowered the binoculars.
Despite the two dozen men between us, we were outnumbered at least five to one, all of them strategically situated around and inside the building.
One of the Lucas’ men sidled up next to Dominic.
“You want me to call for reinforcements, boss?” he asked him.
Dominic didn’t answer right away, but it looked like he was considering it.
“No,” I said.
“No?” Dominic asked, an eyebrow cocked. “What do you mean, no?”
“I mean, my brother and the woman I love is in there, and…” I clamped my jaw shut. My stomach bottomed out. “Look, I don’t give a fuck about families or turf wars or pissing contests. We do this my way and we do it now because if there’s one thing I know how to do, it’s how to take down a fucking monster.”
Once again, Dominic’s intelligent eyes were busy assessing. “How can you be so sure?”
“Because I am a monster.”
