Bound by Hatred (Born in Blood Mafia Chronicles 3)

“Really? That seems unlikely.”

“Not really. Luca made sure I didn’t get in trouble when I was younger. He was a protective big brother.”

“I can’t even imagine Luca being a kid, much less him making sure you stay out of trouble.”

“He did. Is that really that surprising? Didn’t Aria try to protect you when you were younger?”

“She still does,” I said with a grimace.

“See. Luca’s the same way. Of course now I’m making it harder for him to keep me in check, just like you make it hard for Aria.”

“I think there’s a huge difference between the kind of trouble I stir up and the trouble you cause.”

“Give it some time. I have a feeling you haven’t reached your full potential yet.”

A laugh bubbled out of me. Damn it. Why did he have to say things that made me laugh? “You didn’t answer my question. When did you kill the first time?”

“It was a few weeks after my thirteenth birthday.”

“That’s what you call a late bloomer? Most guys that age worry about their sprouting pubic hair and not killing someone.”

“Oh, I’ve come to terms with my pubic hair a long time before,” he said in a teasing voice. “And most guys aren’t the second son of the Capo of the New York Cosa Nostra.”

“Good point. But Luca can’t really have protected you very well if you had to kill when you were still so young.”

Matteo’s gaze became distant. “He did what he could. Our father wanted me to kill one of the boys Luca and I had been hanging out with occasionally because he’d tried to get out of the mob.”

My stomach tightened. “And?”

“Luca pulled his gun and killed the guy before I could. Father was majorly pissed. He beat Luca within an inch of his life.”

The idea that Luca had done something so considerate for his brother was strange, but it wasn’t all that surprising if you watched how those two interacted. It was obvious they cared for each other, cold-hearted bastards or not. “Luca is huge. How could anyone beat him?”

Matteo smiled wryly. “Luca could have wiped the floor with our father if he’d tried, but he never fought back. Father was Capo and would have put Luca down like a rabid dog if he’d raised his hand against him.”

I sometimes forgot that things weren’t all sunshine and rainbows for men. They had more freedom when it came to promiscuity and going out but they had their own burdens to bear. “I guess your father found someone else for you to kill pretty quickly after that.” I’d barely known Salvatore Vitiello but he’d seemed like a creepy fuck.

Matteo nodded. “He found out about another traitor a couple of months after that. He made me slice his throat.”

Girls weren’t given many details about the induction ceremony, but Umberto had often let something slip when he’d guarded us. Usually the first kill of an initiate happened from afar with a gun. “He didn’t let you shoot him?”

“No, it was probably meant as additional punishment because I’d wormed my way out of killing the first time. Shooting is easy, it’s less personal. Using a knife is dirty work. You have to get close to your victim, have to get blood on your hands.”

I held my breath. His voice had become very quiet. Slowly I raised myself up on my arm. I wanted to touch him but I didn’t. “That sounds horrible. Could you do it?”

“What do you think?”

There was the scary shark-grin. The one that made me believe Matteo was capable of anything.

“You killed him.”

“I did. It was messy. He was tied to a chair, so he couldn’t fight back but it still took me three tries to cut his jugular. I was covered in blood from head to toe. I still found blood under my nails the next day.”

“Then why do you prefer knives to guns? You really don’t seem to mind getting your hands dirty anymore.”

“In the beginning it was to prove to my father that I was tough and that he hadn’t broken me like he’d probably intended. And once I got really good with the knife and everyone admired me for my skills, it seemed like a waste to give it up.”

I searched his face but it was blank. I couldn’t tell if it was the whole truth, or if he was keeping the worst of it to himself: that he’d come to enjoy the more personal kill. For a moment we stared at each other until it became too personal again and I lay back down and turned on my back.

“Did you ever consider killing Luca? If he were dead, you’d become Capo. You wouldn’t be the first Made Man to kill a family member to climb the career ladder,” I asked.

Matteo’s expression hardened. “I would never kill my own brother. I don’t care about becoming Capo, and even if I did, I still wouldn’t get rid of Luca to improve my position. Luca’s got my back and I’ve got his. That’s the way it’s always been.”

“That’s good. It’s important to have people you can trust,” I said honestly. Loneliness was a big problem in our world. You had always people around you, but you could trust no one. There was only one person I trusted absolutely and that was Aria. Lily was too fragile and young for many of my secrets, and Fabi was a boy and Father’s influence on him was growing by the day. And I couldn’t even talk to them anymore.

“What will it take for you to trust me?” Matteo asked curiously.

“A miracle.” I turned my back to him and shut off the lamp on my nightstand. The look in his eyes had stirred something in my chest that terrified me.

Matteo shut off the other lights, then leaned over to me, kissing my ear. “Who doesn’t like a good miracle?”

***

Matteo’s arm was heavy around my waist, his breath hot against my neck, and the leg that was thrown over mine was cutting my blood flow off; then why did it feel strangely good to wake next to him?