Aria Ruso
It bothered me how easily Cade was willing to trust me to go and see my brother. He never used to trust me at all, and it made it almost easier to consider betraying him. But now… Something between us had shifted, and I wasn’t sure it would go back to the pure hate and malice that we’d had before.
Not on my end, at least.
Cade had insisted on coming with me, but I knew better than to bring him here, especially when my brother was so keen on taking him out. Matteo would have to play the part of a friend, and I didn’t think he could do that.
I wondered if that friendship could ever bloom again. If our people could have some semblance of peace. I knew that between the Irish and Italian mafia, there would never be absolute peace, but we could at least coexist together without killing one another.
I knew the absurdity of my thoughts, but I couldn’t help but hope it could one day be like that.
We pulled into my family home, and I took in the tall, sided walls. The grounds were beautiful, and I felt a sense of peace as I looked at them. I felt a sense of my father. I needed to remind myself that I’d come here to avenge him. It really had nothing to do with Matteo or me. I’d lost sight of my purpose, but as I looked at the home that my father had built, I recalled the person who had killed him and straightened my shoulders.
“I can go inside alone,” I told the driver, and he nodded.
It felt familiar, walking up the stone steps to the winding front porch. A part of me expected Dad to come outside with his arms open, welcoming me back. That memory sent an ache through my chest as I considered it, and I took a deep breath to push it away.
When I strode inside the house, that feeling of familiarity fled from me.
It was nothing like the meticulously cleaned condition that my father had kept it. It looked like it hadn’t been swept in weeks, even muddy boot tracks went across the entire floor in all directions. A trashcan beside the staircase overflowed with garbage, and it looked like people had been tossing trash over the heaping mess.
I tried to turn off my emotions as I walked through the house, but all the rooms were the same as I approached the office.
Matteo had erased all of my father from this place, and I wondered if he even cared about Dad’s preferences and wishes for this home. Had he come completely unhinged in the time I’d been gone, or had he already been unhinged and kept in line by our father?
I opened the office door and stepped inside, finding the room in similar disarray. Matteo sat at the grand desk, surrounded by loose paperwork. His eyes moved up to mine, narrowing them as he looked at me. “You haven’t given me any useful information in weeks,” he shouted, standing and leaning into the desk as he stood.
Hello to you, too, I wanted to say. Instead, I held my tongue. I knew that I could be mouthy with Cade with no repercussions, but the same could not be said about Matteo. I knew better than to push him too hard. “It’s not easy to get information from a man who keeps everything behind closed doors.”
“You hung up when I tried talking to you. I see you got my message.”
His message must have been the bar fight where dozens of people ended up dead. “That was a stupid move,” I told him. “Especially when Cade is close to ending this alliance out of spite. You haven’t kept your word, and he’s noticed. You could have played this a million different, more effective ways, but you’ve been reckless. Stupid.”
He moved around the desk, coming at me quickly. I expected him to slap me or make some other move to intimidate me, but instead, he looked down at me and nodded in approval. “I knew you had this in you,” he said. “I was afraid you’d turned your back on the plan, but you haven’t, have you?”
Maybe coming here had been stupid. What was I going to accomplish when I still felt reservations about sharing information with him about Cade or any of his family? I couldn’t give him what he wanted when it would put Carter and Elizabeth at risk. And as much as I hated to admit it, the thought of putting Cade at risk had my chest aching, too. He may have been a lot of things, but a danger to me wasn’t one of them.
My mind continued circling back to the unhinged look in his eyes when he’d discovered that someone had hurt me-the way he didn’t hesitate to make it right.
Matteo had never done anything like that for me.
He turned from me and began pacing across the room, running his hand over the stubble across his face. “I have everything in order to launch an attack. I have the manpower and the resources. I have enough of his trust that it will come together easily. I’m afraid if I wait any longer, my opportunity will fall apart.”
If he waited, maybe I could get myself together and in a better headspace…
“You could work on building his trust for a while longer. He’s wary now, but he might be more trusting if you worked at it longer.”
He shook his head quickly. “I’m not waiting to do this any longer than I already have. Tell me about the defenses at his estate. The rotations.”
That was another thing that I could have easily observed if I wanted, but knowing that information felt like a betrayal. If I had it, a part of me was afraid I’d share it with my brother.
I was there to gather intel, so why the hell was I forcing myself not to learn things?
Cade’s protective stare bore into my memory, and I closed my eyes, trying to shake it away.
“I don’t know,” I told him.
“Okay, what about house guards? What are the group numbers, and how many does he keep at the house at any given time?”
I did know the answer to that question. He’d talked to Serg about it too often for me to ignore, but I shook my head, feigning ignorance. I couldn’t tell my brother these things when I knew how he’d use them. I yearned for his approval so much, but I was beginning to see the price, and I wasn’t so sure I was okay with that. It would have been so much damn easier if I continued hating Cade the way I once had.
My mind reeled as I tried to decide what to do here, but there was no easy solution. I could go back on my deal with my brother and lose him, or I could betray Cade and his family and lose them.
“What about weaknesses?” he asked. “You told me about his sister, but does he have any others?”
Why the hell had I told him about Elizabeth? I knew that a lot of things had changed, but it felt like the worst sort of betrayal. Telling him about the defenses and the house would have been one thing, but what had driven me to tell the truth about his sister? Had I really been that cruel and hateful? “He’s kept me locked up a lot,” I lied, my mind drifting to Carter. He was another weakness, but he would be far less easy to use. Thank God I hadn’t given that information. “I haven’t had a chance. He still doesn’t trust this alliance, so he can’t trust me. If you want to get the best out of this, you
need to make him trust you. Give him something.” Give me time to decide what to do here.
He shook his head. “I can’t wait any longer than I already have. You need to get something useful because I don’t know how I’ll make it work with the information I have now.”
“I’ll try,” I lied.
He reached his hand forward, and I flinched slightly as he rested a hand on my shoulder and looked deep into my eyes. He had to see that I was struggling with this, but he didn’t mention it. I wondered if he could see anything other than his cruel plan.
“We’re going to do this together, and we’re going to finally get rid of the organized Irish mob in New York-something nobody has been able to do for years. You’re finally going to prove yourself.” His smile was both cruel and thoughtful, and it turned my stomach. “Maybe when this is said and done, we’ll be able to work through all of this shit between us.”
There. That was all I’d wanted for so long. He dangled it in front of me like a prize, and I had a feeling he knew exactly how tempting it was for me to take.
He let me leave without saying anything more, believing he had me in his trap. A few months ago, the promise of a mended relationship with my brother would have been enough to convince me to kill an innocent person, but now… Now it felt like a bitter taste had risen in my throat, coating my tongue and the back of my mouth.
“How did it go?” the driver asked. Somehow, I’d forgotten he was there in the moments between sitting down and taking off down the road.
“My brother is having a hard time with the alliance,” I admitted, shaking my head. “But it will all fall into place.” Or, at least, I hoped it would.