When Villains Rise (Anti-Heroes in Love 2)

Rage sparked deep in the heart of me.

It was the worst insult in Italian, one that infuriated any local because family was sacred in this country.

But it made me see red.

Because my mother, Chiara, was dead. Murdered before her time by my psychopathic father because she’d dared to threaten to go to the authorities about murdering his long string of mistresses.

No one––no one––spoke about my mother like that.

Swiftly, I held the spoon to the flame just long enough to sear the pure silver but not warp it, and then I lunged forward, grabbing Umberto by the hair in one punishing hand. He kicked out, struggling in the chair, but I had him paralyzed in my hold. My right hand was steady as I brought the smoking metal to his left eye and dug the edge into his tear duct.

His cry pierced the room, vibrating the old, dusty chandelier Tore had never bothered to take down from the ceiling. The chiming sound was almost as pretty as this bastard’s cries.

“Bene!” he screamed as I dug deeper, catching the edge of his eyeball. “Fermata!”

Okay, stop, he begged.

So, I did, the spoon hovering an inch from his bleeding socket.

“Yes?” I coaxed.

His breath heaved through his lungs as if he’d run a marathon. I waited a moment for him to catch some air then lowered the spoon again.

“Wait, fuck,” he called out again in Italian. “You crazy bastard.”

“This is nothing,” I said with a humble shrug, twirling the spoon between my fingers. “Now, tell me why you came for me.”

He glowered at me, but the effect was somewhat ruined by the pulpy mess my fists had made of his face. “You think you can just come back to Napoli and slide right back in to your old role?”

“Ah, so you do remember.” My smile was smug and I felt a resounding pang of triumph in my chest.

The truth was validation was important to me. I’d grown up the second son of a powerful man, the spare to the prodigal heir. No one had their eyes on me and it chafed more than I cared to admit. I was shaped by that need for glory, so much so that it was entirely too easy to settle for infamy in the place of fame.

I’d wanted to make a name for myself in the world and I’d done it.

There was no shame in being Dante Salvatore, ruthless mafioso, the Devil of NYC, the Mafia Lord, or the Crown Prince of Hell.

I’d forged him like a weapon from the ashes of my old life as Edward Davenport, parentless, with a brother who hated me and no home to return to.

So, it pleased me deeply to hear that my name still echoed through the alleys and underground backrooms of Naples.

“You think you’re entitled to whatever you want just because you’re some hot shot capo in America? You’re all soft and weak. Porci.”

Pigs.

“No…” The word slid from my mouth on a hiss. “We are crafty and relentless. Where you would have shot me dead in my bed, I have you here about to confess all your plans like a talking toy with a pulled string. Who, may I ask, if the weaker man here?”

He tried to spit at me, but there was only sticky blood in his mouth so the effort failed.

I sighed wearily and tensed my fingers in his hair again, yanking his head back for a better angle for my spoon.

“Che palle,” he cursed. “Okay, you bastard, no one sent me because I came myself.”

This was a surprise. I studied the younger man again, but I was certain I didn’t know him. When I looked up across the room at Tore who leaned against the wall with his arms and legs crossed casually like he was waiting for something as mundane as a bus, he shook his head.

We didn’t know this man for him to hate us enough to kill us.

“Why?” I demanded, dropping the spoon, because I was bored.

Umberto sighed in relief until I grabbed the abandoned torch and lit it an inch from his eye.

When he finished screaming, I repeated myself.

“Because I love Mira,” he shouted hoarsely, too loud and forceful, the tendons in his neck straining.

It was the look and sound of a man at the end of his rope.

This pleased me.

“You’re in love with Mira?” I asked, vaguely surprised that the meek woman could inspire such passion that this stronzo would risk his life trying to take mine in my own home.

He clamped his mouth shut truculently, but before I could light the torch again, a soft, lilting voice spoke in a language that I wasn’t used to hearing from her.

“In love with her? No, you love her, though, don’t you?”

I sucked in a deep, steadying breath before I looked over my shoulder at the woman who could seduce me and infuriate me in equal measures.