AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“My father mentioned that the other Dons across the country were getting updates—not from him,” she added quickly. “But from someone. After your election, they probably have their own eyes and ears all over New York. And it’s all getting back to them.”
My teeth clenched. “Then let it get back to them. That’s not really my top priority right now.”
“But it should be.”
We stood there, glaring at each other as the seconds ticked by. Finally, I sighed, moving to the couch. I was just too tired to fight with her. Too tired to think of how this was all going to come crashing down any second now. Drawing my feet up, I wrapped my arms around my knees. It didn’t take much for the tears to fall.
Gemma tentatively sat beside me, wrapping an arm around my shaking shoulders. “Sienna, everything will be fine. Dante will come back once he gets all this crap out of his system. Once he gets revenge, he’ll come back to you. But, until then, you need to focus on our family.”
“A week,” I whispered, lifting my head. “Give me a week. If I can’t get him back by then, I’ll come back to the office and let him do whatever he needs to do.”
She didn’t look convinced, but nodded anyway. “Okay, fine. I’ll cover for you for my father for a week. But I can’t promise more than that.”
“I don’t need your father’s permission,” I snap. “I’m the damn Don. Not him.” I hurriedly wiped the tears away.
Gemma studied me for a few seconds, a crease forming between her brows. “I didn’t realize that you cared so much about him.”
“He was there when we found my dad,” I said, looking away. It was the only excuse I could give at the moment.
“Just…be careful, Sienna. He’s still a Scarano.” Gemma kissed my cheek gently before heading towards the door. I didn’t move from the couch, frozen in place. I could hear her stop, hear the turning of the handle pause as she turned back to me. “I love you, Si. Take care of yourself first.” And then she was gone.
By the end of the week, I was starting to feel desperate. Whenever I heard snippets of Dante’s last attack, I’d always been too late. Instead of finding Dante, I’d come across the dead bodies he’d left behind. Or…pieces of them. The first time, I’d nearly thrown up in the alley behind a dumpster, barely able to walk away on shaking legs. I never thought Dante was capable of something like this. It was as if the monster his father had carefully been training into being had suddenly sprung from its cage, forcing the old Dante to just…disappear. But finally—finally—my detective work paid off.
There were rumors going around that some members of the Rocco family had just been sent shipments of weapons—weapons that I figured had once been mine. If Dante had heard about these rumors, he’d come to the same conclusion. It didn’t take me long to find the newly acquired warehouse the Roccos had just bought. It seemed strange to me that they would buy a building so big when their own business consisted solely of lower-level drug dealing on the streets. They were nowhere near the operations that my family or the Scarano’s had.
The night I decided to finally check it out, it was pouring rain. I had Vincent drive me, too distracted and exhausted to drive myself in this weather. He parked down the street, promising to wait here for me to return. Grabbing my umbrella, I stepped from the car. Sheets of rain pounded against the red nylon, keeping my black ensemble mostly dry. My boot heels clicked against the cement, but the sound was drowned out from the storm surging through the city.
The front of the warehouse looked normal, with some office space at the front. There were no lights on in the offices, so I decided to head around the side. The left held no doors, no windows. The right had a loading dock, where a moving truck sat half unloaded. My steps faltered as I noticed the crates that had been dumped halfway between the truck and the warehouse doors.
My crates. My weapons.
The blood fled from my hands, leaving my fingers cold and shaking as they gripped the handle of the umbrella. A scream from inside, a blood-curdling howl, told me I had finally found him. Dante was here.
Hesitantly, I climbed the cement steps leading to the loading dock, legs shaking. Only one light had been switched on, leaving the rest of the warehouse in shadows. Bodies were already crumpled on the ground just outside the opening, blood mixing with water on the floor. My eyes followed the trail of blood to the center of the warehouse, where two men sat in chairs across from each other. One, I knew instantly.
Dante looked like hell. His dark curls were plastered to his forehead from the rain, his clothes soaked. His skin looked a sickly yellow beneath the lights of the warehouse. Still, the dark circles under his eyes stood out prominently. He’d lost some weight. The curves of his cheekbones, his jaw, had sharpened. I stifled a gasp, stepping back behind the wall outside, my heart hammering against my chest.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I tried to steady myself, to prepare myself to confront him. From the dark look I could see in his eyes, he wouldn’t go with me willingly. He’d been hunting for revenge, and if he didn’t get it tonight, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to stop him. Maybe for him, there was no going back. Perhaps this is who he'd become now.
I didn’t want to believe it. Didn’t want to give up on him just yet. I heard another scream as Dante’s gruff voice demanded answers. My chest constricted, making it hard to breathe. The utter brokenness in his voice was like daggers in my heart. I could hear his victim plead, then laugh as if he’d finally lost it. Maybe he had.
And then the laughter cut off abruptly, followed by nothing but silence.
Taking a breath, I stepped around the wall and into the warehouse. Dante didn’t notice me yet, giving me a chance to study him. He stared down at his victim, a look of disgust on his face, but not for his own actions. No, the disgust was clearly for the dead man slumped in the chair, his torso bound with chains. Ignoring the blood steadily dripping to the floor, I tucked the umbrella under my arm and slowly clapped.
Dante’s head whipped up, his dark eyes meeting mine across the warehouse floor. At first, he tensed, ready to defend himself before realizing who I was. Shock, then fear, crossed his face before settling into a mask of nothingness.
I stopped clapping. “Dante.”
His name seemed to break something inside him, though he tried to hide it. Turning away, he tossed the bloody pliers back into the box. It didn’t take a genius to know where those pliers had previously been stabbed into. I avoided looking at the victim’s face.
“What are you doing here, Sienna?” He’d never spoken to me like that before. The barely controlled anger made his words tremble.
“Looking for you,” I replied, holding back my nausea.
“Well, you found me.” His arms spread wide as he turned back to me, trying to direct my attention to what he’d done. I kept my eyes solely on his face.
“You got what you wanted, Dante. You got your revenge.” My head tipped towards the crates in the truck. “I’m assuming the Roccos were responsible?”
