AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I see the look on Roberto’s face falter, and I glance at Angelo in admiration.
He is everything Roberto will never be.
Angelo may be ruthless, merciless, but he has the best interests of this city at heart and his people. And most of all, his family. He’d give everything up for all of us.
Roberto chose to throw us all away, like none of us even mattered, and that is unforgivable.
“I doubt very much that the men I have acquired would come groveling back to you, Angelo.” His tone is that of distaste. “Because, no matter what you say, the biggest thing in the city is your ego. Not your love for your people.”
“That’s where you’ve misjudged me,” Angelo says calmly. “This is exactly why you were never equipped to be Don, because you don’t think like a businessman. You don’t think like a heavy hitter. And you definitely don’t think like a man who is in charge of a city of people. You are nothing in a very large game that you have no business dealing with. You don’t know what it takes, Roberto, and you never have. The only thing you know how to do is round up the losers of the city, and promise them riches that they will never have, prestige that was never theirs to claim, anda brotherhood that is all built on lies. They see straight through you. You might think they don’t, but even the common people of the city know a liar and a fraud when they see one. And I’m sorry to tell you that your short-lived victory is about to be squashed by the true rulers of Boston.”
Roberto looks around him, like he can’t believe what he’s hearing, like someone is going to interject and tell him how good he really is, and that everything Angelo’s saying is just a lie.Was this guy dropped on his head at birth or something?
His anger and outrage seem so out of place. A lot like him, he doesn’t belong here, and he certainly doesn’t belong with a Medici name.
I can see the recognition in his eyes. He’s wary. And he has reason to be. My brother is the most ruthless man in Boston for a reason. Well, it’s true. Roberto may have gained ranks in the underworld without our knowing, but Angelo is always one step ahead. Angelo knows people in the city who will do anything to get ahead, and I have no doubt he would’ve called on those people by now, and it’s going to be truly horrible for Roberto.
I’ve not one idea why he would underestimate Angelo in this way, but he obviously thinks he’s better than what he is. He’s let his ego get in the way.
“Angelo.” He shakes his head in dismay. “The one thing my father did teach you well was how to keep your game face on. You do it very well. Just like he taught you. But I know everything there is to know about my father, and how he ran his business, and what it takes to truly lead people. It doesn’t matter how many people you think he got to, you will never be able to recover those who have joined me on my side of the city. You took away my meal ticket. The trafficking operation was all my idea, backed by the Colombians. And you ruined that as well. Of course, I didn’t have the best people working for me. My wife, for example, what a complete failure. I think she should have tried her hand in another occupation, because looking beautiful was really the only thing she was ever good at. Fuck knows she couldn’t cook a meal to save herself.”
To hear him talking about his wife that way, even if it is Allegra and she betrayed us, still sends a bitter feeling through me. In her own toxic, twisted way, she did love him, and she was loyal to him to a fault. She tried to kill Angelo, for heaven’s sake. All in his honor.
Angelo doesn’t even flinch. And Marco, next to him, is just as stoic. The two of them look ready to bury a bullet into his brain at any second. We are about evenly matched with the same number of men on either side, so if even one bullet goes astray, then it will be a bloodbath, one that none of us may recover from.
I think about Sage and the first thing my mind flicks to is if she has a baby growing inside her already. A baby I may never get to see. I grind my teeth.
Don’t think like that,I tell myself.You will see her again. You will be together. We will make a family. Everything is going to be okay.
In her eyes, I see my future. And I can’t bear to think about the decade that it took me to realize I wanted to claim her as mine again. All the years, days, hours, and minutes in between that I never got to tell her that I love her.
Does she know it?
Does she truly believe it?
Does she understand there will only ever be her?
There is nobody else for me in this life, except my Sage.
Jesus Christ, I need to get out of here and find her.
“You couldn’t keep her under your control, so you used her, just like you’re trying to use me right now,” Angelo says, his jaw steely. He spits the words like they’re venom in his mouth, and he has to get rid of the poison. “I took no joy in killing her,” he goes on. “So that death is on your hands. Not that you actually care, because you threw her away exactly as you threw all of us away, like we were nothing to you. And you hid it so well, I’ll give you that, but not as well as you think you did. Like most things in your life, you fail really well, don’t you, Roberto?”
I know Angelo is just trying to agitate him, because out of all of us, Angelo is the one who knows how Roberto’s mind works.
Roberto’s nostril flare. That hit a nerve.
“You’re all talk, Medici, just like my father; you can talk your way in or out of any situation. That doesn’t mean the words you’re saying are true, or that I believe them.”
“We need to end this,” I whisper to Angelo, so he’ll hear me. “Sage…”
My heart, I know that he’s done something with her.Why would he kidnap her just to go dump her somewhere. To ensure we would follow?
That seems to be a given.
I would follow him to the ends of the earth to get her back. The thing that he may have underestimated about us, is the fact that wearea family.Something he knows nothing about.
We all stick together. We take care of our own.
