Page 31 of Vicious Intentions
“And?”
Niccolò turns to look at me, and begins to stare deep into my eyes, and states, “It can’t be you.” My jaw ticks at that. “I’m serious, Matteo. It can never be you.” He then takes a deep breath and says, “I’ll do it.” I remain silent to his offer of killing our father. “I won’t mind it.”
“No?” I cock a brow. “You don’t care that you’ll never be anything more than an enforcer? TheCosa Nostra’smuscle and nothing more?”
“It’s what I’m good at,” he states plainly, like he’s more than accepted his fate.
This time, I’m the one staring at my brother.
In my eyes, Niccolò has the skills to be far more than just brutish force. He doesn’t see it, but he has the qualities to be a great underboss if he ever wished to. He’s calm, calculating, and possesses the same sharpness of mind that I do. Keeping him as an enforcer feels like a waste of his potential.
Instead of replying, I open the car door and step out as Niccolò follows close behind. We head for the elevator that will take us to the private penthouse, which occupies the top three floors of the building. I lean casually against the rail while Niccolò stands guard in front of me, as if needing to demonstrate just how good he is at his job.
There’s no need to be on high alert. No one aside from a select few knows where we live. But then again, you can never be too careful.
However, my calm assurance is quickly turned on its head when the elevator doors swing open, and the soldiers I had on guard are not in their posts. One glance at my brother and Niccolò’s hand is already on his gun as we step inside and find the house deathly quiet. Ever since our mother moved in, the place has never been silent. There is always music playing, or her soft singing drifting through the halls. Now, there is nothing.
“Could she have gone out?” Niccolò asks, his thoughts going exactly where mine already have.
I shake my head. Earlier in the day, she showed signs of not being herself. On days like that, I know my mother prefers to stay home, not trusting that the world outside won’t hurt her more than she’s already suffering.
Besides, with our father here, he would never allow it. He doesn’t want the world to find out that he married a woman who was not of sound mind, one who could never truly consent to such a marriage. His ego is too grand for others to look down on his choices.
The minute I hear something crash on the upper floor, I bolt up the stairs, Niccolò running right behind me. When the sound of weeping erupts after the crash, blind rage surges within me like thunder. I take the stairs two at a time and find Raffaele crumpled on the floor in the corridor. His lip is split and bleeding, his left eye nearly swollen shut, while his right eye weeps freely.
“I tried to stop him,” he whispers when he sees us. “I really did try.”
“Get out of my way,” I snarl.
Niccolò moves instantly, hauling Raffaele to his feet as I kick my father’s bedroom door open with a single blow.
The sight inside turns my stomach. My mother is naked in the corner of the room, curled in on herself like a wounded animal. Her face is just as mangled as Raffaele’s is. She doesn’t even register our presence in the room. Instead, she traces circles on the wall with her finger, mumbling incoherent nonsense under her breath.
I turn to seek out my father—the bastard who dared to touch her—and find him standing by the window. His shirt is unbuttoned, his fly still open. A glass of single malt rests in his hand as he takes in the city’s skyscrapers below.
Hate—pure and unrestrained—floods my veins.
I cross the room in seconds, grip his shoulder, and spin him around. I then slap the glass from his hand with enough force that it smashes against the wall and shatters into a thousand pieces.
“What did you do?!” I seethe.
My father looks at me with his ugly eyes—so similar to mine that it makes me sick—his smirk stretched in amusement.
“I didn’t do anything that wasn’t a husband’s right to do,” he says calmly.
My blood boils at the satisfaction in his tone, the hatred I feel for him radiating outward in waves, but it’s the sound of Raffaele’s soft sobs that scrape against my last nerve.
With my hands balled into fists, I turn all my anger solely on the cause of all my family’s pain. “You sealed your fate today, old man,” I say, my jaw tight. “You will never set foot in this house again. You have lost every privilege you ever had.”
He laughs.
He genuinely laughs at me.
That was his last mistake to make.
I pull my knife right at his throat before he can even blink, blood immediately welling at the edge. His eyes widen with a fear he never knew he possessed as I shove his back against the glass.
“What do you think you’re doing?!”
