4. Cristiano

I raise my hand to shake hers and I'm surprised by the zap of electricity that travels up my arm when we make contact. But before I can figure out what that was, she snatches her hand away with a sneer. Even after knowing who I was, her attitude toward me didn't change. She didn't become docile or pretend she suddenly liked me and I like that about her. Of course, it could all be an act. She could be pretending to be hostile toward me now so that later she can fool me into doing whatever Lombardi wants. I'm all too familiar with such tactics. I didn't get to where I am by luck or with my mother's support like that bastard thinks. My father might have left me money and a book with his old contacts, but he didn't leave a step-by-step manual on how to revive the business. I did that all by myself.

The men who follow me don't do it because they love and admire me. In the mafioso, love is the most useless thing. Only loyalty matters. It doesn't matter if someone hates or loves you. Being loyal and honoring the oath is how you survive. And getting men to trust you with their lives isn't easy. Which means there's nothing I haven't done. Lying, cheating, manipulating, seducing, killing. I've done everything to get to where I am. If Marianna Lombardi thinks she can play games with me, then she's in for a disappointment. Watching her ass sway as she walks away, I wonder how the next six months will go. How long until I get my fill of her?

She will end up in my bed. That's inevitable. What I don't know is how long she'll stay there. A night? No. One night is not enough for me to do everything I want to do to her. Maybe a few nights or a week. But not for more than a month. I can't imagine keeping the same woman in my bed for that long.

"Let's go. We're done here," I tell the guys. Outside, my driver Fabian is already waiting for me. I get in and he peels away. The next time I set foot in this place, it will be to take over because that son of a bitch will already be dead.

"Padrino" Tommaso runs to me the moment I get home. It's way past his bedtime. Why is he still awake?

"Why are you still up?"

"I was watching the castle. We don't sleep when the enemy is awake and plotting," he says and if he wasn't a ten-year-old, I'd commend him for his effort.

"What movie did you get that from?"

"Does it matter?" he asks, raising his eyebrows. I laugh because I know it was probably not PG-rated. Nev lets him get away with a lot, but I'm not any better.

"No. But if you're not in bed in five, you'll be grounded for a week. "

"I can't wait to be big enough to stay up all night without your and Papa's nagging," he says and then walks away sulking. Tommaso is Nevio's son with a whore who refused to have anything to do with him. She gave birth and then disappeared. We spent months staying up all night because he wouldn't stop crying when he was born. I think he missed his mother, and that made Nev really bitter. He couldn't understand why someone wouldn't want such a beautiful child. He got over it, but the motherfucker didn't forget. He taught Tommaso to hate that woman and honestly, I can't blame him. The moment she abandoned him, she sealed her fate.

"Did I hear Tommaso's voice or am I hallucinating?" Nev asks, coming out of the kitchen, holding a large piece of pizza in one hand and a beer in the other.

"It's all in your head. You need more sleep," I say because I like messing with him. He's my right hand and I treat him more like a brother than an employee. He's the one person I trust implicitly and would probably take a bullet for. But only because Tommaso needs him.

"How was it? Did you score some hot pussy?" He asks, shoving half the pizza into his mouth.

"A waste of my time. Tomorrow you'll go pick up his daughter. She'll be staying here for a while."

"What? Why?"

"Because Lombardi trusts me with her while he's in America. I'll go change so we can leave. "

"Stop right there. " Nev can be annoying when he wants to be. I hate how he can see through me sometimes. But we grew up together, so it's to be expected. That doesn't mean I want him finding out I have a thing for my enemy's daughter. I'd never hear the end of it. "What are you not telling me?"

"To go fuck yourself," I tell him, heading to my bedroom.

"I will find out," he yells after me, but I pretend I didn't hear him.

In my bedroom, I head straight to my closet and quickly get rid of the tux, noticing I still have a semi-hard-on. Thinking about Marianna and her luscious curves doesn't help. I instantly go rock hard, imagining my cock fucking her tits. Although she's hot as fuck with the body of a goddess, she can't be more than twenty-five. Her face has a certain vulnerability she covers up with her bitchy attitude. But if you look long enough, you can see how young she is. Her brown eyes hide a lot but not everything.

I saw how she smiled at one of the girls who was serving like a little sister. Someone she would protect. I don't know who she truly is and if Lombardi has corroded her with his shit but I believe six months will be enough to find out. I want to know why she didn't live with her father. Where she's been all these years and what she's been doing. But most of all why the sour attitude? If I'm lucky, maybe I can convince her to help me take down her father.

Now I know that's reaching but still, I have to try. As someone who's been in this line of business for a while, I know how much people hide their true selves. How children turn out despising their parents and how they even kill them sometimes. It's a shitty world with even shittier people. Only when you find loyal people to stay by your side can you truly survive. Will Marianna be interested in killing her father? She didn't like how easily he handed her to me. If he cared about her, he wouldn't let her near me. We're enemies after all. What kind of father would hand over their beloved daughter to their rival? I'd never trust that fucker with Tommaso knowing he could hold him hostage and demand anything from me. Does this mean there's no affection between the two?

The shipment arrives on time and everything goes smoothly. I let Nev and some of the guys continue to the warehouse while I go home. It's been a long day and seeing that bastard Lombardi laughing and going about with no care in the world while my father has been rotting in the ground for years left a bad taste in my mouth. It actually took a great amount of restraint to not put a bullet between his eyes and be done with it. But only because I wouldn't give him the satisfaction of a quick death. When his time comes I'll torture him and let him look me straight in the eyes so that he'd know I was the one who pulled the trigger. That I was the one who finally took him down. When he dies, mine will be the last face he sees.

I'll make sure of that.

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