Cade Burns
I took a risk, and I had to believe it would pay off. People didn’t survive long in this line of business without taking risks, and I’d put off taking the most important one for years. I’d put off attacking Alessandro because of the loyalty I’d felt for Matteo Ruso, but his father had taken our rivalry too far, and I had to reciprocate.
I’d been in my office, going over all the potential movements of the Ruso family in retaliation. Sergeant Carter Burns, my cousin, best friend, and underboss spent just as much time as I had in my office, going over all the possibilities. There were too many of them to count, and as the third day passed, I began losing hope that the outcome of this would be beneficial to us.
But there hadn’t been a choice. He could threaten us in small ways, but this attack had been personal. He’d taken it beyond what we could accept. The fucking Ruso family had taken jabs at us for years, trying to detect weaknesses in our ranks. They’d killed our soldiers, and I’d allowed it to go unpunished for too long.
I imagined we’d have until after the funeral to prepare for the Rusos’ counter-attack, but a mere three hours after the funeral, my phone rang. Serg sat on the other side of my desk, feet propped up on the surface, and I glanced at him before answering the unknown number. He leaned forward, and I put the call on speaker, hoping above all odds that this wasn’t a notification about the attack that I anticipated.
“What?”
“Cade? Is that you?” the person on the other end of the line asked.
I recognized the voice, though it had certainly matured in the years since we’d been friends. The voice on the other end of the line was the reason I hadn’t launched an attack on the Rusos up until now. He was the reason I’d kept a cool head through all of this.
“Matteo, I didn’t expect a call from you,” I said, meeting Serg’s glance. Matteo. The new and undisputed boss of one of the five Italian mafia families in New York. With his father’s death, he’d inherited the title, and I’d hoped that with his father out of the picture, our people would be on better terms.
It had been a calculated risk that I hoped had paid off.
“You killed my father,” he commented coolly.
I took a deep breath. “I sent someone to kill him,” I clarified. “But it had to be done. He’s launched attacks on my family for years, and I gave him leeway for too long out of respect for you. I couldn’t continue losing family and friends to targeted attacks without any form of retaliation. I’d hoped you would understand that.”
I didn’t mention the years of friendship he’d thrown down the drain for the sake of his father and his rules. I didn’t even bother bringing up that old friendship that I’d continued honoring for years.
“I appreciate that you waited so long before doing what needed to be done,” he said. Serg narrowed his eyes and shook his head. His jaw ticked as the words registered. “Now that he’s gone, things are going to be different on my end, and I want one of those differences to be an alliance with you.”
An alliance. I’d hoped for a general understanding among us-a vow to leave one another’s people to do business as usual without interference. I had attacks on too many fronts, and I couldn’t be in dispute with the closest mafia boss to us. The other four Italian families didn’t respect our position here, but they were far enough that we could remain separate.
The Rusos had always been the primary threat.
“What do you propose to cement the alliance?” I asked. “We have nothing to offer to you.”
“You do have something to offer,” he told me. “You can marry my sister, and it will cement the alliance between us.”
I froze, gaping at the phone as I remembered the young thirteen-year-old girl who had always been more of a nuisance than anything else. I recalled all the ways I’d fucked with her, and I remembered the day that Matteo told me how she’d snitched on him. She’d been the reason for our lost friendship and all that had happened since then. Aria, I recalled. She was ten years younger.
She would be only twenty-five years old if my calculations were correct.
“She’s the one who burned the bridge between us, and she’s agreed to help mend it. With my sister as a new bridge between us, I believe we can accomplish a lot of great things together. If you agree, it will be the start of something unstoppable.”
My job was my entire life, and aside from fucking women when work became too stressful, I had no interest in marrying anyone. And even through marriage, there wasn’t anything stopping me from sleeping with other women discreetly. We wouldn’t be married in spirit. Just in name.
And I’d finally have a chance to get revenge for all the shit she’d caused.
“Okay,” I told him. “When do you want to meet?”
Serg reached forward and put the phone on mute. “We have to be careful. You just killed his father, and I wouldn’t put it past him to plan an attack on us. He may be speaking of an alliance, but it wouldn’t be the first time something like this went south. A head for a head is their biggest motto, so we have to be careful about how we do this.”
Simultaneously, Matteo spoke on the other end of the line. “The sooner we get this taken care of, the better. We have too many people on my end hungry for revenge, and we need to have this taken care of before someone decides to act out.”
I processed all the words from Matteo and Serg, both making good points, before unmuting the line. “I can clear my schedule at your earliest convenience.” I muted the phone again. “Serg, we will have five tactical teams ready and on guard outside the venue. Four of them will be in civies, and the other will be in full tactical gear.”
“We need to get this done right now,” he said. “Secure this alliance before anyone gets wind of it occurring.”
“I agree.”
“We can meet at my house-”
“A neutral location. I’m not going in somewhere blind. I respect that we used to be friends, but this situation is too delicate to trust you after what your family has done to mine.”
His end went silent for a moment. “You attacked us just the same,” he retorted.
“Then we can each be hesitant to trust one another. How about the courthouse in the center of your territory and at the edge of mine? The one on Old Brooklynn Boulevard.”
Serg nodded in approval. He may have been the tactical expert and the one I turned to for decision, but I’d been maneuvering through political bullshit long enough to know the game and how not to lose it. I felt a tinge of concern as Matteo didn’t speak for nearly a minute, and I wondered if he spoke to someone else, as well.
Finally, he replied. “We’ll be there within the hour.”
I exhaled deeply, allowing myself to speak one truth. “It’s good being in contact again, Matt.”
He made a sound of acknowledgment but gave me nothing more than that. He’d just lost his father, and I couldn’t expect him to be overly friendly with the person who had ordered his murder.
The call ended a moment later, and Serg was on his feet, making calls the moment the line disconnected. I listened to him recite the same thing he had told me a few minutes prior. “I need four tactical teams surrounding the Old Brooklynn courthouse ASAP. All in civies and in striking position. Disguised. Don’t let them give away whom they’re working for, even if asked by the Ruso boss.”
The person on the other end said something, and Serg continued in response.
“Yes to all of that. We also need a fully equipped tactical team to meet at the manner in fifty minutes sharp, ready to move.”
“An hour and a half,” I corrected. “We won’t show up on time. We don’t need them scouting us.”
“Correction, ninety minutes,” Serg said before ending the call.
“We need to have Elizabeth get a room ready for the girl,” I told him.
“Nothing fancy.”
“I can take care of that.”
I nodded and gestured for him to go and get all the details in order. He didn’t hesitate to turn and leave me alone in the room. I envisioned Aria in my mind and ground my teeth. I couldn’t truly torture her the way I wanted -not if I wanted this alliance to remain intact. She had done more than I could put into words by destroying the friendship Matteo and I had, and she’d certainly pay for it now.
This didn’t have to be a happy or beneficial marriage. It only had to be for appearances, and I wouldn’t give it the opportunity to be more than that.
***
I walked into the courthouse, Serg at my back and a tactical team out front. I made sure that they looked intimidating, and I also ensured that we took our time. I wanted Matteo to know that we had a team here. It would make him hesitate before pulling anything. But I had to use restraint. I knew that if I brought too much force, the show of power would be construed as a threat. One team was a necessary caution.
That’s why the other teams were hidden in plain sight.
I strode through the wide double doors, and my eyes flashed between a handful of people waiting with the chaplain at the end of a church-like aisle. I saw Matteo, looking almost the same as he had over a decade ago. He had more facial hair now, alongside a few stress lines and shows of age, but overall, he looked like the same man I’d been friends with. He looked hardened by life but physically the same.
I wondered if I looked the same. My face had hardened with age, and I had become much more dominating and less forgiving. I, too, was a different person, and I had no doubt I looked it.
I glanced at the next person, not recognizing him and assuming he was some sort of guard. Then, at the end, stood a woman that didn’t look at all familiar. I eyed her for a long moment, and when she glanced up and met my eyes, I finally recognized her.
She wasn’t a child anymore.
Aria stood with her shoulders back, wearing a baby blue dress that hugged her hips, frayed out past the knees, and danced across the floor. Her black hair was just as dark as mine as it dangled down both of her shoulders, but that wasn’t what held my attention. It wasn’t even the abnormally bright green eyes that stared widely at me that captured my attention as I remembered them from all those years ago.
My attention was fixed on the womanly curves that had certainly not yet formed when we’d first met. The wide hips and the full breasts-the cleavage peaking from the light blue of her dress-distracted me more than I wanted to admit, and my step faltered slightly as I approached. My cock hardened before I reminded myself who exactly stood there.
Aria may have been more of a woman than the last time I’d seen her, but she was the same person. The same God damned traitor who ruined what Matteo and I were trying to build together.