AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Okay,” I drawled.
“She is to be treated as a part of the family, not just the help.”
His voice sounded both firm and scolding. I considered how I’d treated her. I’d tossed my coat at her without any regard. I hadn’t evenhandedit to her the way a decent person would have. It was the way we treated the staff in Valentino’s residence, but maybe that wasn’t a universal treatment.
Embarrassment flooded me.
Lucia wasn’t my target. Dante was. I thought about how I’d treated all our hired help at home and cringed. How had I not thought about treating them more like family? They lived in my stepfather’s house, too. They deserved respect, even if he denied that fact.
I never thought of myself as ignorant, but this basic human decency should have been common sense. I couldn’t believe I’d let myself fall so deep into the rabbit hole of brutality and violence that I forgot something so simple.
My cheeks burned brightly as I looked between all three people and bit my lip.
“Understood,” I said, despite the blood pounding through my ears.
I was meant to kill him for being a horrible man. Hell, I’dseenhim be a horrible man. But there was a moral compass hidden behind the brutal antics and reputation.
Dante asked about dinner, and I went through the motions of silently following him into the room. Bria talked more than any child I’d ever met, and she didn’t stop even when she got a plate of food from Lucia. Between each bite, she had another story to tell about her day. Some were true, but most were overimagined tales of false adventures she’d gone on during the day.
“Remember that time you had to go to the doctor because of seeds in your food?” Bria said to Dante with a giggle.
Lucia chuffed. “Bria, honey. That’s a serious allergy.”
“There are seeds in this, but Uncle Dante is eating it,” she pushed.
“It’s not sesame seeds,” Lucia said. “He’ll get sick if he eats them.”
Bria jumped into a dramatic story of the time her uncle ate sesame seeds and got redder than a tomato. It was the first thing I’d mentally cataloged all evening, but once the subject dropped, I went back to staring at my plate of food and avoiding eye contact.
I tuned them all out, not allowing myself to dwell on the relationship I’d be ripping away from this child when I completed my mission.
Their family hadn’t cared about ripping my father from me.
Why should I care about taking away Bria’s uncle?
I made my way to the room before anyone else left the table, excusing myself as politely as possible. I didn’t need to be surrounded by people who cared about this man. I didn’t need to see anything else.
I just needed to find the time to snoop through his house.
I was here. I could at least find something before I killed him.
When I reached his bedroom, I closed and locked the door behind me, falling back on his bed and groaning. I had a lot of assumptions about Dante that he’d disproven today. He held his title of mob boss close to his chest and commanded his people impressively. But I’d expected him to be like Valentino.
I wasn’t quite sure what I’d stumbled into instead.
The door handle to Dante’s room wiggled, and I wondered how long I’d been lying there. “Sienna,” he said through the door.
“Go find somewhere else to sleep.”
I expected some level of frustration in his tone when he replied, but there was nothing. He didn’t say a word as his steps trailed off down the hallway.
I hadn’t expected it to be that easy, but I sighed in relief. I rolled over and exhaled a long breath as I closed my eyes. Tonight, I’d sleep. I’d wipe away all that had happened today and start fresh.
The retreating footsteps returned a couple of minutes later, and I ignored them until they paused outside the door.
I groaned. “I said go away.”
When the knob jiggled, I stiffened, and when the lock twisted, I jerked up in the bed and gaped. Dante strolled into the room, that infuriating smirk lighting his face. Fury burned through me so blindingly that all my self-control failed. A yawning pit of rage opened within me from both my embarrassment and the way he constantly butted in where he didn’t belong.
