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Maybe today I wasn’t supposed to know what would happen next. Maybe today I just needed to put one foot in front of the other and tackle what was right in front of me.
Finding out a way to tell my dad could wait, at least for a few days until he got home anyway. By then I’d have a plan, I’d be able to explain it all to him without his head exploding. All I had to do now was figure out how to tell my dad that his eighteen-year-old high school student daughter was pregnant.
Easy enough, right?
* * *
DANTE
“What about the shipment?” I asked Remy.
Remy didn’t turn away from his computer as he told me, “Chatter on the line is that it comes in tomorrow night.” He typed away like a madman, pushing his face closer to the screen. “But I may have a better lead coming in.”
I pulled up a chair to sit next to him, watching his fingers fly over the top of the keys at an almost impossible speed. Remy had been the first person I’d met when I got here to atone for my sins, but it hadn’t been right away though. For weeks I’d drowned my sorrows in a bottle of amber liquid, emptying them over and over again as I attended any club and bar that I could find.
I’d made a mistake, one that I wasn’t sure would ever be forgiven. Deciding to move to the other side of the state was meant to be my way of showing my big brother that I was ready for the “business.” He thought I didn’t know how to do half the stuff he did, but he was wrong.
Still…I’d fucked up big-time, putting us all at risk. It didn’t matter how much I wanted to be the soldier or captain my brother could rely on, it just wouldn’t happen while I was there under his watchful eye.
So here I was, not sure if I’d made the best decision in proposing I set up another faction on the other side of the state and take some more territory to add to the huge amount we already had.
But I was here now. Ready and willing to do whatever I had to so that I could show Lorenzo that I was the man who should be at his side. The thing was, I wasn’t just showing him, I was proving it to myself too. It wasn’t just Lorenzo I’d let down when I hadn’t vetted the guy we’d been holding. FBI. He was the damn FBI and I hadn’t found that out. I’d put us all at risk, I’d caused us to get raided by the Feds. It was my fault Lorenzo’s wife was taken into the FBI to be questioned and had come out with bruises on her face.
I’d lost myself to alcohol for weeks, trying to drown my sorrows and take myself to a place where I hadn’t messed up so epically. I’d been achieving it too, until someone had tried to knock me out and take the keys to my Ferrari. I’d attempted to fight back, but I was way too far gone to do anything but reach for the air in front of me.
That was when Remy had come out of nowhere and whacked him over the head with his laptop. He’d not only saved me from getting robbed, but he’d also let me keep what little dignity I had left. We became fast friends after that, and the more I got to know him, the more I realized that he could be an integral part of what I wanted to set up here.
It was the first best decision I’d made since I arrived. That and to stop downing alcohol like it was my life’s work.
Now here we were months later, and I wasn’t sure what I would do without him. He had information at the tips of his fingers, knew exactly where to look for intel on the dark web, and could hack any system he felt like.
I wouldn’t have been able to do this without him. He was the missing link we’d been searching for all of these years. He could easily become our secret weapon. A secret weapon thatIhad found. One who would be loyal, I had no doubt. Now all that I had to do was persuade him to come back home with me when I finally decided to venture back across the state and to the family mansion.
It wouldn’t be anytime soon though. The longer I was away from everyone I’d grown up with, the more clarity I seemed to get. For so long I’d been overshadowed by my big brother. He’d been molded from a child to take over running the family business. And now that he was at the helm, there was no doubt things would change, most probably for the better.
But still, I didn’t feel like I had a place there, not yet anyway. I’d been sheltered, or at least, that was what everyone else thought. What they didn’t know was I’d followed my big brother everywhere he went, just in case he needed backup.
I leaned forward, resting my elbow on my thigh and my chin in my hand, mesmerized by what Remy was doing. I was falling into a trap—a trap my own brain was making. I didn’t want to think about the past, I didn’t want memories to flash in my head, but I was helpless to stop them.
“This is how men handle their business,” Dad told Lorenzo, his Italian accent still thick. “You never give them an inch.” He handed something to Lorenzo, but I couldn’t see from this angle. The musty smell of the basement burned at my nostrils, the cold brick wall pressing against my cheek in the small corner I was hiding in. They’d never know I was here, not unless I made a noise.
“If you give them an inch, they’ll take a mile,” Uncle Antonio said, stepping forward and coming into view. He was the scarier uncle, the one who I never spoke to unless he asked me a question.
“Go ahead, son.” Dad waved his arm, moving to the side to reveal a man strapped to a table. “Take your first cut.”
My eyes nearly popped out of my head as I watched Lorenzo step forward, not hesitating at all. He’d only just turned thirteen yet he looked so much older than his age as he lifted his arm and swiped it across the man’s chest.
Blood pooled from the cut, the man screamed, and then everything went black.
I gritted my teeth, hating that it was always that memory that haunted me. Lorenzo thought I didn’t know what he’d gone through when we were kids, but I had. I may not have been the person doing the acts and learning the ropes, but I was right there, waiting in case he needed help from his little brother.
Which was why when I fucked up so epically after he married Aida, the only thing I could think to do was run.
“I don’t want to see your goddamn face in my house until you learn how to be a real fuckin’ soldier.”
His words echoed over and over in my mind, haunting me—taunting me. I could have told him right then and there that Iwasa real soldier. I could have told him about all of the secret things our father had had me handle. I wasn’t the innocent person he thought I was. In fact, the more time away from him, the more I understood that he didn’t really know me—none of my family did.
They all saw the fun-loving Dante. The one who was easy breezy and cracked jokes. They didn’t see the darkness that ebbed away at me. They didn’t know my need for violence. They had no idea that every weekend I would take part in fights, just to get some of my pent-up frustration out. It had been fun for a while too, that was until my dad had found out and used it as yet another business opportunity.
