“Why isn’t she back yet?” Santos’ question echoed the one that had been floating around my head for the last several hours. “We would have heard something by now if anything happened, right?”
My shrug didn’t seem to be what he was looking for since he cursed and stomped out of my office. As soon as I was fairly certain he was out of earshot, I picked up my phone and called my father.
“Where is she?” I demanded as soon as he picked up.
“Is that any way to greet your father, Antonio?”
His avoidance pissed me off, and I had to restrain myself from shouting into the speaker. “She should have been back hours ago. What did you have her doing?” He sighed, sounding tired, but we were all fucking tired. This shit had worn on everyone, and his continual insistence to put Eden in the middle was nearly intolerable. I wasn’t going to stand for it any longer. “Call her in. She’s done. This was never her fight, and I want her out.”
“Antonio, you’ve been left out of the planning for a reason. I’ll let you know when I have an update.” He didn’t wait for a response before he hung up on me. And that wasn’t going to stand either. It was time for him to step aside, like he'd been planning to do before Rodrigo's defection.
“Vanni!” I shouted, knowing he’d hear me. His room had been uncustomarily quiet all day. None of us were dealing very well with Eden playing bait, especially after last night, and I still couldn't believe she'd gone today in spite of it. If it were anyone else, I'd call it a straight up betrayal, but I'd just cussed her out and walked off when she reminded me that she'd already agreed prior to the night's events. I’d had enough of the fucking short leash the ankle monitors had us on; it was time rectify that issue...and several others.
* * *
Marco
When Eden got back, I was going to beat her ass for scaring us, then I was locking her in her room and fucking daring Uncle Vinnie to send her out again. He needed a few things explained to him, and if Tony didn’t handle it soon, I would.
To keep from driving the others up the wall with my observations and questions, I'd retreated to the game room to kill some time. The crack of the cue ball hitting the set I’d racked was as harsh as my mood, but as I lined up my next shot, I swore the scent that was purely Eden wafted up from the felt.
It was a mix of her, the shower products she used, and the light perfume she’d taken to wearing while she was gone. And right then, despite the time we’d had the last few weeks, I wished she’d stayed gone until Rodrigo and his ilk were six feet under so she wouldn’t be in the middle of this mess. Being apart from her would be hard, but I’d even sacrifice the memories we’d made in this very room. I knew we’d have christened Tony’s pool table at one point or another anyway, and the rest...I’d have made damn sure that happened regardless of where we were.
I finished potting the balls and had a smoke to calm myself down as I made my plans. Tony and I were about to have a talk about Eden and Uncle Vinnie. Our girl was coming home and staying home. Fuck anyone that thought differently.
* * *
Eden
Rodrigo did not, in fact, kill me on sight. He slapped me hard enough that I thought he might have broken my cheekbone, spitting out that it was repayment for Santos clocking him on my behalf, but he didn’t kill me. No, his machinations went beyond that. He’d decided that death, even a slow one, was too easy for me. And for his son’s betrayal. Fields’ words played in my head, the ones about surviving at any cost, but I was afraid that cost might be too high.
Maybe it would be better if I removed myself from the situation before my mind, and likely body, cracked under whatever retribution Rodrigo had planned. I’d have to wait and play it by ear; I wouldn’t leave the guys for anything, but they were still tormented over my past mistreatment at Rodrigo’s hands, and their parts in it. I could only imagine how they’d feel if I went through an undetermined amount of time in my captor’s possession only to have what was left of my broken remains delivered to them. A shudder worked through me at the thought that it could be in pieces. I liked to think of myself as strong, but I’d had a taste of torture…I didn’t relish a prolonged repeat of that scenario.
My racing thoughts and contingency plans were brought to a halt when Rodrigo slapped his hand on Danny’s old desk. It was surreal to be back in his office, especially while knowing he was gone, but seeing the man who was the catalyst for nearly every bad thing in my life taking over the seedy haven I’d found when I’d had nowhere else to go was hard to swallow. It also didn’t help that I’d died in one of the backrooms of the club. I’d kinda always thought that might happen, but in those imaginings, it had been from an overdose or at the hands of an overenthusiastic john, not from being caught in the middle of a power grab.
“Are you listening to me, you little whore?” he demanded, voice rising with his irritation. Staring at a point past his shoulder, I nodded. I couldn’t stand to look at the man. “I don’t think you are. I think you’re biding your time, waiting on a rescue from your not-so-white knights. You might think that will happen, but let me show you why you’re going to make sure they don’t come near my club.” While he opened a laptop, this one newer than the one Danny used to have, he continued with his warning. “If they step foot into my territory, this will be sent to the DA and the news stations. I’m sure you’re well aware that I have control of the local police, so I don’t think you want them going back there. And with all of this, it’s only a matter of time before I have every judge or official under my thumb that was dumb enough to dip a toe out of line near Danny and his propensity for recording it.”
I blanched at what was playing on the screen when he flipped it around with a smug ass smile. But he ceased to exist for me as I watched a younger version of myself clean up a room with Sam, my fear and upset plain on my pale face. I continued to watch the video as we loaded up plastic totes with the grisly remains that had been made into more manageable pieces, knowing that I was fucked if it ever got out.
“H-how did you get this? He promised there was no record of it.” My whisper was quiet, but without sound on the video, Rodrigo heard me just fine.
“Oh, Eden, you think that’s all he lied about? Here, watch.” He reached around and clicked a key, then little thumbnails of videos popped up on the screen.
I was in so many of them, doing so many very illegal things. Things that the statute of limitations wasn’t up on, I was sure. But worse than that was who else was in those insurance videos that Danny had accumulated over the years. I didn’t care about myself so much; it just cemented my certainty that I wasn’t long for this plane of existence. While I was sad that I’d miss out on so much of my life now that I’d straightened it out, I accepted it. What I couldn’t accept, and what Rodrigo was going to exploit, were the clips with the guys in them, namely Tony and Vanni. I was passed out in Vanni’s arms, and Tony’s arm was frozen partway up with a gun in his hand. I hadn’t known the exact details, but I did know that if I hit play, Tony would be finishing his act of murdering Sam. I’m so fucking screwed.
“You see, you’re going to do exactly as I say, when I say it, and before you think you can get your hands on the hard copies, just know I’ve uploaded them all to my own personally developed cloud. The Carlotti Family shouldn’t have fucked with me. This regime change was always coming, but the fact that they took a whore’s side, that my only child took your side? They’re all going to regret it. It could have been peaceful; Santos could have been at my side, working with the Carlottis, married off to one of their women to join us together. Letting Danny and the other hustlers run the neutral zone was a waste of potential, a mistake. Old man Finelli is just as much at fault for leaving an area to fester with the frustrations of the tit-for-tat skirmishes and unnecessary deaths each side dealt the other despite the truce the Families put in place. I’m preventing what would have been an all-out war that would have torn the city apart, and probably further, especially once the authorities got involved. This isn’t quite how I planned it, but I can make it work.” He shrugged as he finished his diatribe. The man was a great criminal. He had the mindset and ambition down, and he’d maneuvered each piece of his real-life game board into place, minus a few recalcitrant ones. It appeared, I was the major wrench in his plans. Coming back as I had, my fault or not, had caused a rift with his son, and now we were going to be used as an example of what happened when he was crossed. As far as coups went, it was brilliant. As one of those persons on the opposite end of the victors, it sucked ass.
“What’s the plan then, Rodrigo? Torment the guys, get whatever concessions you can from the Carlottis as a whole, and then turn me loose?” I scoffed at the idea that I’d be allowed to leave while breathing. My thumb subconsciously moved to my birthmark, rubbing it for comfort, and the motion wasn’t lost on Rodrigo.
“Something like that, minus letting you go. Might send a warning, starting with that blemish my son copied, if you give me any trouble.” He nodded at my wrist, and I covered it with my palm as if that could protect it. “For now, you can get over here and let me see if there’s any use left to you.” I didn’t understand, or move quickly enough, so he snapped his fingers, pointing to the floor behind his desk. “Now, bitch!”
I scurried out of the chair and reluctantly walked around the desk, pausing a foot away until his glare warned me to close the gap. He jerked my skirt up, fully exposing me to his gaze, then shoved his hand between my legs until I widened them and stared at a spot on the wall behind him. I couldn’t believe this was what it had come to. All those years of pain and misery, only to be right back at square one.
My heart steeled itself as he forced one finger in, then another a moment later.
“Not as cherry as it once was, but it seems to have recovered nicely from my associate’s foray into going off-script. You don’t happen to know which one did it, do you?” he asked, curiosity rampant in voice and expression. He chuckled at my lack of response in both regards, then jammed his fingers harder against me. “The cop that had his fun with this,” another wiggle of fingers had me gritting my teeth, “was tracked down and taken out, just like his partner, but Evans had himself torn a new asshole, literally, before he died. That kind of retribution only comes from someone that felt personally slighted, but I haven’t been able to determine who it was yet. I figured one of them would have told you by now.” He shrugged, as he seemed to do often, like it was his own personal tic, and removed his hand from between my legs. He made a point of wiping his fingers on my scrap of a skirt before he snapped them and pointed down at the floor.
When he spread his legs, I allowed myself one solitary tear that I hid behind my curtain of tangled hair as I knelt down and prepared to let my mind drift to anything other than what I was doing. “Bite me like you did my man earlier tonight, and I’ll pull all of your teeth out and send them to Antonio,” he threatened as he unfastened his pants and pulled his flaccid dick out.