Ruthless Empire: A Dark Mafia Collection

I knew how things went for the Varassos. The fact that Alessandro had been with me since eight o’clock last night meant he’d be getting a call anytime now to head back home and handle business. I tried not to count down the minutes when we were together, but for every second longer that he was with me, the more I started to anticipate the inevitable.

His warm expression cooled a bit. “You know my family too well.”

“I’ve grown used to never being able to have you all to myself for too long.” I traced the lines on Alessandro’s chest and stomach with a finger, trying to distract myself from the annoying gnawing at my heart at the idea of him leaving. I was a disappointed, lovesick teenager again. “It’s par for the course.”

“I don’t want it to be,” Alessandro replied. “I’m sorry.”

He hugged me a bit closer, and I breathed in his earthy scent. It was so familiar and unchanged that it made me feel even more at home than I would if I were in my own bed alone. He was home.

“So, is today the day you buy a ticket and fly back to California?” he asked. I could clearly see the thought made him sad.

“No, I don’t think so,” I replied honestly, and his frown did a one-eighty. “I haven’t taken a vacation from my job in…Well, I don’t know that I’ve ever taken a vacation from my job. It’s good to relax. The scenery is nice.” I hit his stomach. “I can spare a few more days.”

“Then, can I see you again?” I asked. “Like, all of the time.”

I laughed, realizing I was already letting myself get a little too close. “Yeah. I think that can be arranged.”

14

Alessandro

I couldn’t put into words the joy I was experiencing, knowing that Willow was staying in Philly for a bit longer. It had already been a week since I took her out on what I had dubbed our second first date, and we hadn’t stopped talking to one another for a moment. Any time Ricky came over to help us sort things out with Marco, he came with a report of Willow walking around the house with a smile on her face, in his words, “Singing like the end of a Disney movie or some shit.”

I wanted to see her again, but duty called, as it always did. We were still trying to figure out where the threat to Marco had come from, and Luca asked Ricky to stop communicating with him for the time being. It was possible that his phone or house was bugged, and even though Ricky had been clear and intentional in speaking to Marco in code only, it didn’t mean that someone else in our particular line of work wasn’t smart enough to figure out what they were actually saying.

The Binachis—Dante, Dario, and Donovan—were already convicted and sentenced. They weren’t getting out. It had been a risky move for Marco to sacrifice them for his own happiness, but I had to commend his bravery. If any of us was going to be on the outs and enjoying a pressure-free life, I wanted to protect that, if for no other reason than the dream that one day it might be my reality.

“What’d you find out?” Ricky asked Luca, having joined us for this meeting.

“I’ve spoken with everyone we know on the force, and no one can figure out how the Binachis got Marco’s new address. Which means one of two things,” Luca explained.

“Either they know and aren’t saying anything, or it was one of them,” I replied.

“Exactly. Now…”

Luca’s voice faded from my consciousness as my phone buzzed in my grip. I picked it up and smiled to see that it was a text from Willow. She was lying by the pool and decided to send me a delectable shot of the sun wallpapering her smooth skin. God, I would have given my left arm to be there next to her.

I shot back a playful text about what I would do to her if I were there, and she replied with another picture, this one of her holding up her bikini top, no longer held to her torso. Her pert breasts filled my brain alongside the memory of them filling my mouth, and suddenly my pants were getting tighter.

I felt a shove on my arm and looked up, and Luca, Gabriel, and Ricky were all staring back at me.

“Care to join us?” Luca asked like a patience-zapped school teacher.

“Sorry.” I tucked my phone away. “What were you saying?”

“We need to find out where this mole is,” Luca said. “Do you have any ideas?”

“I mean, the obvious is a false info dump,’ I responded. “Tell people in controlled groups and wait for the info to get back to us, narrowing the playing field of who knows.”

Luca nodded. “We can tell a couple of the guys down at the station about a drug drop and see if we get busted instead.”

Ricky crossed one leg over the other. “We have to start inside first. Hand out a few cards and see if any of ‘em come back to you. Here’s the thing, though. For transparency, you should all come up with different stories, and don’t even tell one another. Something obvious that you’d notice right away if someone was running their mouths.”

“Why wouldn’t we tell each other?” Luca asked.

“Simple,” Ricky said. “Because if the mole is in here, we’ll know.”

We exchanged looks with one another nervously. We hadn’t considered the possibility that one of us would be the mole. It didn’t make much sense for any of us to be. Luca’s whole life hung in the balance of our organization, and I’d been loyal to a fault since the day I was born. Even Gabriel, who could be categorized as a man having a motive, wasn’t stupid enough to cross Luca, who he was terrified of. If it had been Gabriel, he would already be in the wind, covering up his tracks behind him as he went.