Dirty Look - Dark Desires

“He didn’t forgive him. And he does not have any kind of a sense of humor,” I say. “I’ve seen literally no sign of one. My father’s men don’t get senses of humor issued to them. They get guns. And hammers.”

“To like, do handy work with?”

“To break kneecaps with,” a growling male voice cuts in behind me.

Of course. Of fucking course I was followed.

I turn to see not only Enzo, but Emilio, three other men I remember from Calabria, and my father.

Enzo’s glaring at me. My father’s got pictures in his fist. I don’t know how the fuck my father came to be here, but it is the sort of perfectly awful coincidence that would happen to me.

“Phone’s tapped, princess,” Enzo says with a sigh, but he doesn’t look angry with me. He looks relieved, and something else. I can’t put my finger on it.

“I should’ve known better than to let you come to America,” my father says, his accent thickening in anger. “I should’ve known!”

I stare at him in disbelief. He’s never raised his voice to me, but it’s like something’s snapped. My dad has been pissed before. Actually, he’s angry most of the time. But never at me. I don’t like it one bit.

“Piero,” Enzo begins, his voice gentling, and I swear it makes him that much hotter. I take a step toward him.

“And you!” he says to Enzo. “I trusted you!”

My father is about to lay into Enzo, but Enzo is saved by an unlikely source.

“Hola, muchachos!”

A man walks into our midst like he owns the place. Dark hair. Dark eyes. Tattoos all up his neck and over his hands. As old as my father, but without any of the honor.

“See!” Davo says, his voice pitchy with nerves. “I didn’t just fuck with you all. I also told Alejandro about this place, so you could, like, yannow, talk and shit.”

Oh. Jesus. Christ. The stupid just keeps coming.

The cartel is here. They’re not made up. They’re not one of Davo’s distractions. The one in front of us is six feet plus of teeth-grinding, devil-eyed danger in the form of one man: Alejandro Ramirez. And he is backed up by at least half a dozen of his men.

Enzo and my father now wear the same expression I did the moment Davo revealed his plan. This absolute idiot has not only played a shitty practical joke on us, he has also organized some kind of kumbaya meeting between Enzo, fucking Alejandro Ramirez, and by sheer chance, my father.

“You are some stupid fucks,” Alejandro announces. “From your boy to your girl, ain’t one of them who don’t do dumb shit.”

“Who are you?” My father insults Alejandro by not knowing who he is. A cartel leader like Alejandro isn’t the sort of person on my father’s radar. My father considers men like Alejandro to be brutal, dangerous, and not on his level.

“I’m the guy who's going to take your game and put you in the ground.”

Alejandro isn’t here to take prisoners, and he seems to know precisely who my father is. He’s probably been manipulating Davo for weeks, which wouldn’t be hard. Davo’s basically a human golden retriever you can train with drugs.

Alejandro, on the other hand, is smart enough to know that you don’t get two chances at my father in person. I guess he’s cocky. Or maybe he’s got cocaine or heroin coursing through his system, telling him this is a good idea. Whatever the hell is going through his brain, it’s deadly. He pulls a gold engraved gun from a shoulder holster and takes a wide legged stance right out in the open like a stone cold psycho.

“Adios, perra,” he grinds out, squeezing the trigger.

I see the blood spreading across my father’s shirt before I hear the gunshot. Fuck knows how that works. It’s like I am watching in slow motion as my father goes down, clutching at his chest and arm.

No one expects the woman to be packing. Alejandro immediately turns his gun on Enzo. He’s not even looking at me when I shoot him right in his stupid fucking face and make a mess I’ll never forget.

That’s the shot that stars the war. There’s more small weapons fire. More screams. The sounds of fists and punches and fights all around me fade, as my father’s men put a decided end to the cartel threat. When I dare open my eyes again, Davo’s tight in Emilio’s grip, and Enzo’s got a handkerchief wrapped around my father’s arm.

“He’s going to be alright,” Enzo says. “Just a superficial wound, baby.”

My father’s eyes go from Enzo to me, then back again, before he closes his eyes and passes out.Chapter 16Enzo

I want to wrap her up in my arms and hold her until the sun rises. I want to turn her over my knee and redden her ass, then tie her to my bed until she’s thirty. I want to haul her to the nearest chapel and put a ring on her finger. Mia Russo brings out every goddamn emotion known to man.