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And my rage continued to increase, my thoughts all over the place.
Loyalty.
The word meant more on this night than it had ever before. Loyalty of my family and friends, of the men who worked for me and the rest of my employees.
The opposite was true as well, betrayal a heavy burden that needed to be flushed out.
I’d spent the drizzly afternoon attending a funeral instead of a wedding reception, the somber event putting me in a shitty mood.
Then I’d had to pretend the world hadn’t been rocked on its axis, laughing and having cake smashed in my face by my four-year-old niece on her special birthday. All the while I’d fumed, planning a bloody revenge on the entire Bianchi family, even if it went against the express orders of Don Powers, the man wearing the crown in the empire.
Someone in my employ had sold their soul to the Bianchis for a price. And I had a feeling I knew exactly who that was. The man would pay dearly for what he’d done, the family he’d torn apart. I’d held Julie close, her emotional state wrecked. When she’d finally become hysterical, she’d been taken to the hospital given the fact she was three months pregnant, her blood pressure skyrocketing. She couldn’t lose that baby too. Goddamn it, she just couldn’t.
My thoughts were all over the place, my emotions as well. I couldn’t think, the need for revenge the only thing that mattered. Suddenly, thoughts of my dead father oozed into the back of my mind.
King of the hill.
My father, Tony Arturo, the former Don of the New York Cosa Nostra had once called me that years before. Before everything had changed, my world turned upside down, his murder unexpected. He’d been the strength behind a powerful family, one that been rocked by the death of a mother who’d loved her two children with all her heart. Or so I’d been told. She’d died providing life to me, something I believed my father blamed me for until his death, although he’d doted on Raleigh, their closeness akin to a freaking Hallmark card.
My sister had tried to keep our mother’s memory alive, although Raleigh had been too young to embrace but so many memories of her own. Only a couple of years prior to my father’s death had he finally unlocked the vault holding the vast majority of her pictures and what few personal items he’d kept. What I’d realized was she’d been a devout Catholic, an innocent woman who’d fallen in love with the wrong man. But by all accounts, their love was one for the ages.
I’d thought he’d been paying me a compliment at the time with issuing the phrase, but I’d learned during the course of the almost nine years since his brutal murder that he’d been challenging me to become a man instead of acting like the impetuous brat I’d been at eighteen.
Little had I known that he’d be dead only weeks later from utter betrayal, his bullet-riddled body far too disturbing for his children to see prior to being buried. He’d left us orphans, forced to endure a new family, a man my sister had barely known as a child placed in charge.
We’d both fought the intrusion, refusing to accept or obey his commands. We’d learned the hard way that Maxwell Powers’ control wasn’t to be taken lightly. As a former Marine and owner of a prestigious security company in Los Angeles, he’d been considered far too decent a human being to shift into becoming a worthwhile leader of the merciless syndicate. We’d both treated him as inferior, Raleigh accepting him long before I’d been able to. In turn, Max had considered me a child incapable of decent decisions, refusing to promote me within the ranks until I learned my place.
That had been next to impossible for a kid who’d ruled since he could hold a weapon in his hand.
The ugly truth was that I’d wanted to be king of the hill for as long as I could remember, the top dog in what was widely considered to be the most ruthless and powerful crime syndicate in the country. I’d tried to undermine Max’s decisions, fighting his control with everything I had. I’d planned his death on more occasions than I could count. I had no idea why I was reflecting on the time spent together other than given the fact I’d just left a family get-together. Maybe Max had taught me a thing or two after all.
One vital piece of information I’d learned was that being king of anything meant having a target on your back, one so large that anyone standing in your shadow could easily be struck with shrapnel. That’s why Joey was dead, his life stripped away prematurely.
I was to fucking blame.
If I hadn’t attended the fucking party or if I’d required additional soldiers to watch the perimeter, he’d be alive today. The guilt was killing me.
Everything I thought I’d wanted was waiting in the wings as I continued to prepare for the honorable duty of becoming the Don that would be bestowed on me when Maxwell retired. I’d earned the loyalty and respect of my father’s men and of the soldiers my godfather had brought to the organization. In turn, I’d created an empire of my own, building my troops until we were considered formidable by almost everyone.
Now I wasn’t certain I gave a damn. Not when I’d lost a part of myself in that bloodbath.
What I found interesting after all the hard work I’d put in building my reputation and wealth was that I’d yet to find happiness. Christ. What the hell was I thinking? I had business to deal with, which was necessary even after a birthday celebration.
I dialed Cayman’s number, my patience already tested to the point I needed some kind of release, or I’d go off the rails.
“I’m here, boss. Sadly, I don’t have any good news.” His voice was as tense as mine.
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning the rat has fled his cage.”
“Oh, for the love of God, Cayman,” I told him after hissing into the phone. “How difficult can it be to find the son of a bitch? He betrayed us.” The fact the fucker had fled proved his guilt. I wondered what it had taken for him to shift sides. And how the Bianchis had gotten to him.
I flicked the wipers onto high as I made my way to the main road. Goddamn fucking thunderstorms. Even worse than the challenging weather, I’d sent my soldiers to hunt down a single man, the lowlife piece of trash betraying every single soldier in my organization. They were all incensed, searching for the prick, yet he was nowhere to be found. Hell, to add fuel to the fire, he’d stolen almost four hundred thousand dollars of product, likely giving it to the Bianchis. I wasn’t entirely certain how the warehouse had been broken into, the security system recently installed worth millions.
That left the possibility the treacherous rat had additional inside help. That also meant some of our product would help foster connections for the Bianchis.
I’d flush out every single traitor later. First things first. The asshole’s punishment.
