A Vow of Lust and Fury (Underworld Kings)

I was angry beyond reason but worse, I was hurt, and men like me didn’t get hurt. Men like me were supposed to be invulnerable, and maybe that was her entire purpose. Emilia Donato was a trojan horse designed to rip me apart from the inside. And she might have succeeded.

22

Emilia

I lay there in the darkness, Gio’s even breaths a melody I would have listened to forever if I could. I always knew he would have to call time on our weird limbo eventually. I never meant to distract him or for it to result in anyone getting hurt. He wanted marriage, and honestly, I wanted to give in, to be with him, because Giovanni Guerra was a man I could love. But it was exactly what my father and Uncle Sergio wanted me to do. Rolling over for them felt like an acceptance of what they had done to me, to Chiara. It would make me complicit in everything they did to her, the marriage, the abuse, her death. I just couldn’t.

And he couldn’t keep doing this dance with me while he had an empire to run and a war to fight. We had our one night, and I knew he wanted to send me off to some apartment, but he wouldn’t just keep me safe forever. I didn’t want him to. I wanted to be free. Of him, of my family, of this pain and grief that hung over me like a dark cloud, tainting everything. But I’d never be free of The Outfit or the brutal injustice of Chiara’s death. Not while Matteo and Sergio lived.

The only way I would ever truly find peace was with them both dead. Would Gio kill Sergio and Matteo for me if I asked him to? Maybe. Or maybe I didn’t need him to…. Sergio was in New York. And he’d be in the same hotel he always stayed in, the same suite…. The thought teased the edges of my mind, calling to me, demanding I answer a higher power, something greater than myself. No one could get closer to him than me. They thought I was the girl they broke, but I would be the weapon they had forged.

That was how I found myself outside the Forsyth Hotel, the weight of Gio’s gun pressing into my back as I stared at the shiny exterior.

Escaping was easier than I thought it would be. The key card to the front door was in his jacket pocket, the same as always, his gun in the nightstand. It was easy, really, easy enough that I could have done it on any of the nights that I’d slept in his bed and had access to his room. But I hadn’t because I wasn’t sure I truly wanted to escape him anymore. Because I felt safer with him than out here in the big wide world.

I’d been so grateful to find none of his men in the hall because I didn’t want to hurt anyone. Until I had to. I felt bad for shooting Philipe, but given what I was about to do, I could afford no room for weak sentiment.

Pushing those thoughts away, I stepped into the hotel’s lobby, taking in the marble floors and glittering chandeliers. An older man I recognized as one of my father’s capos approached when he spotted me.

His brows were pulled together in a tight frown. ”Emilia Donato. You should not be here.”

“I need to see my uncle.”

“He’s not—”

“Take me to him, or I’ll be sure to inform him that he missed out on valuable information because of you, Julius.” It was bullshit. I had nothing to say to Sergio.

Julius’s brows rose as though he was surprised I knew who he was, or perhaps he just didn’t expect me to talk to him like that. He didn’t even pat me down before escorting me to the elevator. After all, I was just a woman. Weak. Subservient.

When the doors opened on the top floor, I was led to my uncle’s suite. With every muted step over the thick carpet, my heartbeat threatened to choke me. This was it. Vengeance for my sister had never seemed like a possibility, but the moment I’d decided on this path, it felt like my sole purpose. I’d never thought I could bring myself to kill my own uncle before, but my time with Gio and Tommy had shown me that family was not blood. It was loyalty and love. I had no love or loyalty for Sergio.

If I succeeded, then killing the boss of the Chicago Outfit would have consequences. My only hope was that the ring on my finger would buy me some time. There wasn’t a man in The Outfit who didn’t fear the name Giovanni Guerra, and I was sure none of them wanted to be the one to kill his fiancee. They weren’t to know it was all fake.