Possessed by the Killer (Dark Possessive Mafia)

Dean helped Trent carry the gunshot man up the stoop and into the house with the red door. Blood splattered on the sidewalk and dropped up the steps. I stepped in it and left a footprint on the wooden floorboards as I went inside after them and slammed the door behind me.

I stood panting and stared into the front room. The men in black were thrown onto the floor, and the three Valentino soldiers stood around them, guns pointed at their faces.

Dean looked stricken. He paced back and forth, shaking his head, and finally looked at me.

“What the hell is happening?” I asked him, desperate to understand.

“I’m sorry, Mags,” he said. “But I think your uncle wants us dead.”

He walked to me, grabbed my arm, and dragged me out of that room. I walked, my limbs numb, and I let him sit me down on a bare leather couch in the living room, and I stared at the wall with a buzzing in my ear like cicadas climbing from their gooey nests.

17

Dean

I separated the two guys. One was tied and gagged in an upstairs room, and the other was bound to a chair in the basement. I left the light off down there as I paced across the kitchen, staring down at the old linoleum floor, mind working double-time.

Mags hadn’t said a word since it all went down. She sat in stony silence in the living room watching shadows on the wall. Trent kept an eye on the door while Tony and Oscar guarded the prisoners.

Gian showed up a half hour after we grabbed the guys. He said hello to Mags as he passed and she said nothing in response. I figured she was going through some shit, but my mind was too busy running circles around itself to help her out.

“We’ve got trouble,” I said as Gian entered the kitchen and leaned up against the counter.

“What happened?” he asked, crossing his arms.

I gave him the quick version: that note, the ambush, the two guys. “They say they’re with the Healy family and nothing else.”

“Motherfuckers,” Gian whispered, staring down at his hands. “I swear, it wasn’t me.”

I met his gaze and I saw the anger in his expression. The only people in the world that knew Mags and I were going to be at this location tonight were him and whoever he told in Roy’s crew. It was possible that Gian could’ve ordered the hit from the Healys, but he had nothing to gain, and he’d been the biggest, most aggressive Capo on the front lines. He wanted a fight, not to splinter the Valentino family further.

The only person that could’ve done it was Roy, and that barely made any sense.

“I know it wasn’t you,” I said finally, then spread my hands. “She’s his fucking niece, for god’s sake.”

Gian sucked in a breath and glanced toward the kitchen door. Mags could probably hear everything we were saying. “I leaked to Big Bruno, and he’s high up in Roy’s crew,” Gian said. “But it could’ve been him.”

“Big Bruno’s too fucking stupid to have contacts in the Healy family,” I said, shaking my head, and started pacing again. “What I don’t get is, why this whole show? Why get me to marry Mags, then try to kill the both of us after it was all done with?”

“It doesn’t make any sense,” Gian said. “Roy was in a good position before he took your side. If he wanted the Don’s job, then he could’ve pushed for it.”

A creak on the floorboards. Mags stood in the kitchen doorway, chewing on her lip. “I think I know why,” she said.

I stopped pacing and faced her. She looked so small and frail, her face drained of color, big bags under her eyes like she was exhausted. I wanted to go to her and pull her against me but Gian watched with a hawkish expression and I didn’t want to make her uncomfortable with him around.

“What do you think?” I asked.

“He didn’t think he’d win on a vote,” she said, glancing at Gian. “You have more support, right?”

I shook my head. “Probably, but it’s not definite.”

“He didn’t want to chance it then,” she said, nodding to herself like she was getting on a roll. “So he had to take you out. But he couldn’t do that, because it would be obvious, right? And your allies wouldn’t have let him get away with it.”

“Fucking right we wouldn’t have,” Gian snarled.

“That would’ve started a war,” I said, and it started to come together.

“He made it look like you were at peace,” she said, tugging at her hair nervously. “Then he went to the Healy family and cut a deal. Probably as soon as you were dead and he was in power, the war with the Healys would’ve been over.”

“Fuck,” I said, staring up at the ceiling. “I think you’re right.”