AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Unless the son had turned his back on that, the women wouldn’t know anything, and were more than likely the wives or girlfriends of the other men involved in Nicola’s plot. I wouldn’t go after them unless I had to, and I doubted I would.
Even if the men didn’t want to talk, I had ways to make them open their mouths.
“We’re here, Don Mastro,” Flavio said, pulling me out of my thoughts as the car rolled to a stop outside my home. I pocketed the photos with a sigh.
“Grazie,Flavio. Will you be using your room tonight?”
“No, sir,” Flavio responded. “If you don’t need me, I’ll spend the night at my place.” I nodded, sliding out of the car.
“Very well. Goodnight, then.”
“You too, Don Mastro.”
My house was beautiful, and it was one of the reasons I pitied the bosses who were stuck in places like Chicago and New York, where the height of luxury was a penthouse suite.
Nothing would ever match up to a freestanding home. I was often grateful to have been born into Buffalo—a city of significant size, yes, but with a far more suburban feel. The buildings here had individuality.
I left my shoes and coat in the foyer, unsurprised by the silence that greeted me.
It was far too late for the maids or cook to be here, and the house was far larger than I needed for just myself.
For now it felt empty, but someday I’d fill it with my children.
It was my job to revive my family, so I would need at least four kids to secure our lineage for the future.
In the meanwhile, I had the space to have overnight rooms for my underboss or consigliere should our business run particularly late, so it worked well for now.
I followed the curve of the stairs up to the second floor, deciding to head straight for the shower and neatly peeling my shirt and belt off on the way. My bedroom was massive, with high ceilings and enough space for two beds, but I barely glanced at it.
I’d bought this house the day I turned 18, selling the home where my family was slaughtered, and had lived here since.
Nothing about this opulence was unusual to me—if anything, I had downsized from the mansion I’d grown up in.
I stepped out of my dress pants and dropped my clothing into my dirty laundry bin, not sure if the cleaning service could salvage them now that the blood spatter had dried into hard brown scales. If they couldn’t, no biggie, they’d provide perfect replacements.
I didn’t care much about clothes, luxury cars, watches, or private jets.
Money couldn’t buy me what I wanted.
Sure, by most people’s standards I was living like a king, but it was all surface level.
Until Pellico’s head was served to me on a platter, using my father’s fortune felt like spitting on his grave.
I entered my bathroom, moving past the full-length mirror to start the shower. I barely bothered looking at my reflection.
My body, like everything else, was a tool.
My slightly above average height made it easy to blend in to crowds, my black hair just long and shaggy enough to help cover my facial features if I needed it to but could just as well be slicked back into the sharp, clean visage expected from a Don.
I kept my body muscular so I could handle any situation with force, but leaned into a wrestler’s physique more than visible muscle definition, because defined muscle was intimidating but not as useful.
I was less threatening this way, clearly strong and capable, but not in the way that made people stare.
Staring meant you were noticed, and being noticed meant you’d lost your element of surprise.
Being underestimated, would only ever work in my favor.
I had my father’s tan skin, and my mother’s blue eyes. My mother’s father had passed down the square jawline to me, and I never knew where my thick eyebrows came from.
