“I don’t want you to spend time on it. Give her to Inez.”
He arches a brow. “Inez? If the girl’s going to be working here, we might as well make her a dancer. She’ll do well with the VIPs.”
The thought of her dancing in front of groups of drunk men spreads a burning sensation through my chest. No fucking way. “I said give her to Inez. If she lasts a week, I might reconsider, though I don’t expect her to.”
He lets out a long breath through his lips. “Va bene.”
“Did you talk to Napoletano?”
“A few hours ago,” he says. “The construction project was greenlighted by Sal this morning.”
“Merda.” Sal’s going to be pouring concrete for a factory that’s on another clan’s territory. Our don is a fucking idiot. I know it, Ras knows it, everyone fucking knows it. And yet no one speaks up. “We’re going to have a war on our hands.”
Ras shakes his head. “You already made your opinion known last month. Leave it.”
I don’t like his tone. “You think I should have stayed silent at the meeting?”
Ras sighs. “You know Sal will never listen to you, even if you’re one hundred percent right and he’s one hundred percent wrong. Speaking up will only make things worse. You pissed him off by questioning his judgement in front of all the other capos at the meeting, and now we have Nelo and Vito here, sticking their ugly noses into our business. Who knows how far he’s willing to go to bring you in line?”
Our eyes meet. Yes…how far?
I lean back into my chair and look at the picture hanging on my wall. Ras, his parents, Martina, and I. It would have been a different photo if Sal hadn’t killed my father and taken his place as the don of the Casalesi clan, one of the most powerful in the Camorra sistema.
My mother would still be alive.
My family would be intact.
I would be next in line.
“He’s going to turn our clan to dust,” I mutter.
“They’ll turn on him before it comes to that.”
I flex my hand. “They need to turn on him faster.” We might have a way to turn the tide, but only if we get the proof we need.
Ras knows what I’m thinking. “I’m on it.”
“Put extra protection on your parents,” I say as I rise to leave. “Just in case.” If it wasn’t for Ras’s father-Uncle Julio-Sal would have killed me the same day my parents died. I was eleven years old, still a kid whose balls hadn’t dropped, but even back then Sal saw me as a threat. Killing me would put his worries to rest, but it wouldn’t be well received by the capos. Clan children were generally off-limits, something Uncle Julio made sure to remind to everyone in Sal’s vicinity.
I was spared.
But the first chance he got, Sal sent me away. To Ibiza.
It’s always been one of the clan’s foreign strongholds-there is no Ibiza without the drugs we provide. Being capo here sounds fine on paper, until one realizes it’s the equivalent of being in exile. Clan business doesn’t happen over the phone or the Internet. It happens in person, in Casal di Principe.
And Sal really doesn’t like it when I go back home.
I bid goodbye to Ras and make my way to the parking lot.
“Take me to the house,” I tell the driver as I climb into the car. Beyond the window, the sky is still dark but soon it will begin to lighten. We pass by the long line of green taxis outside Revolvr, and I catch myself looking for Romero in the queue. She’s not there.
When we drive past the bus stop, I scoff. No way she’d take one of those to wherever she’s staying. What the fuck is she doing looking for a job in Ibiza? A part of me is curious. I’m ninety-five percent convinced she’s just a hot rich girl who decided to rebel and prove something to her family. Grass is always greener. Once she sees what I have planned for her, she’ll run right back to Daddy with her tail between her legs.
But there’s one thing that makes me pause. Inside her eyes, I thought I saw a glimpse of real desperation. Maybe even fear.
What could she be scared of?
I twist one of my rings. When someone’s never been truly desperate, it doesn’t take much to bring that feeling on. That must be it. She’s probably just scared of getting her ego bruised.
With a sigh, I run my hand over my lips. Why the fuck am I analyzing her? Enough. I can’t remember the last time I spent this much time thinking about a woman my dick hasn’t even met.
The closer we get to home, the darker my thoughts turn. I don’t know for sure who’s behind what happened last night, but it’s got Sal’s paranoia spelled all over it. If we can prove our don is the culprit, he won’t have long to live.
A made man outside of the sitting don’s bloodline can take over the position by strangling the sitting don to death with his bare hands. It’s barbaric, but that’s how it’s always been with the Casalese. It takes intelligence and strategy to get into the same room as the don-there’s no one better protected. I’ll have to turn some of his closest friends to my side first, and if I don’t do it right, they’ll run straight to him. I need to show them definitively that Sal is no longer fit to rule.
I flex my hands. It’s a high bar.
But if I want to protect the person most important to me, it’s what I have to do.
People have always told me my level headedness is my biggest strength. I don’t make rash decisions. I don’t act out without thinking the consequences through.
A weaker man would have gone after Sal by now, but I know better. I’ll wait until the perfect moment.
And then I’ll take back everything he stole.
VALENTINA
On Monday, I disembark the bus that stops across the street from Revolvr at ten forty-five am. The surroundings look so different in broad daylight I have to convince myself I’ve come to the right place.
I’m nervous. All weekend, I tossed and turned at night, worrying about De Rossi changing his mind and putting me right back where I started. I managed to spend barely any money in the past two days, surviving on ramen and free breakfast at the hostel, and taking up Astrid and Vilde on their invitation to move into their cheaper shared dorm. Still, neither of those things change the fact that I’m practically broke.
I make my way inside the club through the main entrance.
“Over here.”
I turn in the direction of the voice. It’s Ras. He’s sitting on a stool by one of the bars, a sweating beer in his hand. Dressed in a pair of well-worn jeans and a washed-out gray T-shirt, he almost seems approachable…that is until I register the weary look on his face.
“Hi,” I say in a voice that comes out like a squeak. “Thanks for meeting me. I really appreciate this opportunity.”
He looks like he’s trying really hard not to roll his eyes. “Just doing my job,” he says gruffly. “The scope of which apparently keeps expanding.”
“You don’t usually do this?”
“You mean take on a new staff member after we’ve already hired everyone for the season? No. I don’t.”
Heat blankets my cheeks. “De Rossi agreed to a trial.”
“I know what De Rossi agreed to. Lucky for you, I just transferred an employee over to Laser. You’ll be replacing them.”