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“Where are you?”
“The dockyard. Donatello texted that he needed me here,” I muttered, frustrated. “Listen, Wyatt, if you hear from her, please tell her I’m looking for her, okay? And I’m concerned my nonna might have something to do with her being gone.”
“Why?”
His words sounded a million miles away as I focused on a sound behind me. I whirled to find Anna stepping off the office stairs. She tossed Donatello’s phone on the ground and crushed it into the concrete with the heel of her boot.
“Elio, are you still there?” Wyatt’s voice came across the line.
“I think it’s time we had a little chat.” Anna smirked as she took a step back and looked over her shoulder. I followed her line of sight and saw Stefano with a baseball bat in his hand.
Oh, shit.
Like water trickling through the cracks of a seam, at least thirty of his soldiers emerged from all around me.
“Wyatt?” I whispered, slipping back into the dark corners of my mind. “Call Vinni.”
Lowering my hand, I quickly sent the number eight on a group message and tucked my phone away, pulling the gun from under my jacket. Eight was the number for ‘shit is going down, find me.’ We’ve only had to use it one time before, and it wasn’t this bad.
“I’m listening.” I tried to buy some time as I eyed the men slowly encroaching on my space.
“I want him alive,” Stefano called to his men, and I noticed he stood back like the coward he was.
“You were so blind,” Anna chuckled loving every moment of it, “blinded by that bitch of a woman.”
“I can see why you were threatened.” I jabbed at her, wanting her to see she meant nothing to me. Most people would flip the script, give in to their instincts, and agree with the crazy woman holding the gun, but not me. Never once had I led Anna on.
“I’m not threatened, Elio. There’s no reason for me to be. She’s not even here anymore. She left on a one-way train ticket.”
“Willingly, I’m sure.” I swallowed past the lump in my throat. I needed to find her.
“Depends on how you look at it. Sure.” She smirked with a shrug.
“Where’s Mariano in all of this?”
“Ugh,” she brushed me off, “he wasn’t even a good lay. He was just convenient.”
“And this is better?” I pointed at Stefano. “Siding with the enemy?”
“At least my talents are being used for a good thing.”
“I hardly think spreading your legs for the entire syndicate is a talent.”
She glared at me and ran her tongue along her teeth as she snarled.
“It’s a shame my father tipped off yours all those years ago. Piero would be worm food now, and maybe you could have seen who was actually behind it all.”
My blood ran cold. I always wondered if Anna knew the truth, and my gut was right. She did.
“Open doors and kindness have always been, and will always be, the Capri downfall.” She peered a few feet away. “I was hoping over the years you’d see that and perhaps be a better ruler, but now, after meeting your little pet of a woman, I can see why the DeSimones tried to take out your father all those years ago.”
There it was—the truth. We had teamed up with the enemy. We had let them in. Their smaller syndicate needed help, and look where it got us. This was why we should trust no one. This was why, when I became Don, everything would change. My father seemed soft, but he had a core of steel. I’d seen his wrath, and it was time to unleash it again, starting with the soldiers who were supposed to be watching the DeSimones every step. Watching our back.
I pretended to laugh and dropped my head to check the time on my watch. Three minutes.
“Your syndicate will fall, Elio Capri, all because you men are blinded by the wrong women.”
Huh.
