AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Bruno lies center stage on the carpet and groans when he senses me. Tasha can get any dog she wants, but we won’t be getting a fucking coyote mutt.
The Don is sitting behind his desk, just like always. He’s shrunk into his chair, oxygen attached to his nostrils. He bats the hovering nurse away and she gives me one look before she scuttles out of the office. Clearly the stage has just been set. I bet the Don forced himself out of bed to meet me in his seat of power, even though he looks half dead.
I close the door and lock it. “Dad,” I say in greeting. I haven’t addressed him like that for years.
He raises a brow at me. “Mio figlio,” he mocks me back.
I walk over to his desk and put the plate with the cutlery down, then pull the two sardine cans from my pocket. “Evidence, as requested.” I put the tins by the plate and sit down in one of the chairs facing the desk. It’s time for a long overdue talk.
“Is that a wedding ring on your finger?” the Don asks.
I haven’t taken the ring off since I put it on while flying over to Sicily. “Yes. I married Natasha Armstrong.”
The Don starts to cackle but it turns into a coughing fit that has him shaking. I wait for it to pass. I don’t stand and help him. I don’t hold out the glass of water that’s on the desk. He eventually manages to take a sip himself and raises the glass in toast to me. “Sometimes I really wonder. Only a real Scalera could have come up with that plan.”
A quiver trickles through me. Ever since I set eyes on Emilio Randazzo, our resemblance has been eating at me. The moment of truth is now.
“What do you mean?” I prompt.
“I’ve raised you well to think like me. This cuckoo in my nest.” He lets the words hang, but they don’t shake me. This is how far I’ve come. “Any normal man would think you’re a fool for marrying your enemy’s daughter, but what better way to torture a man than to rape his girl every day, day in and day out, for as long as she lives. For him to know this, and not be able to do anything about it.” He sneers at me. “Only a Scalera would do that.”
Mom. Raped. Day in and day out by this man. Forced to breed his children until it killed her. Only problem is, I’m not a Scalera.
“She was pregnant with me when you married her, wasn’t she?”
“Oh yes, the fucker got me there. Randazzo made sure she was pregnant with his child, planning to sign her away to me. This baby girl he stole from the streets in Naples, to bring up as his own daughter to use as collateral when he needed her. He gave her to me as his ‘treasured’ prize, already carrying his bastard.” He sneers. “How clever of me to in turn send his own son to kill him. I bet he didn’t see that coming.”
Fuck, they make me sick. Women are only objects, there to serve their needs, whichever form they take. Thank God I had a mother who had twelve years to nurture me, love me, quietly on the side where this man never saw the love she had for her children, regardless of who fathered them. Her life was hell, but she lived it for us.
“Randazzo is dead. His compound torched and burned to the ground. I’ve completed your first request.” I stand and take a sardine tin, pick up the lever and pull it open. It looks so authentic, even I shudder when an eyeball stares out of the can. I pick up the fork and poke at it, lifting it out of the tin and putting it on the plate. “Eyes like mine,” I say as I lift them out of the tin and spread them out on the plate. “Ears like mine.” That diamond stud is the only thing that looks good as new. I take the next tin and open it. “Fingers like mine.” The little finger, slightly bloated now as it got tinned, still has the gold signet ring on it. No wonder I felt like I knew Emilio Randazzo. I was looking at myself in forty years’ time as I cut him into pieces. “Help yourself.”
The Don blinks up at me, and for the first time in my life, I see a flash of fear in his eyes. Yes, you fucker, little kids grow up and bide their time. Just like our mole in Sicily did. No wonder we hit it off so well. We got each other, no words needed.
“Good job, Matteo,” he says, pushing the plate away. “You know you’re Randazzo’s only son. His sole heir. You can go and take over all his operations in Europe. Here you have his DNA, nobody would contest it.” He speaks fast, as if this idea would be his saving grace.
The thing is, he sent me to kill my biological father, who anybody already could have believed was my grandfather. Why would I hesitate to kill this man who is nothing to me? Ever since Mom died, I’ve been his tool. He used me for every dirty wicked thing he could use me for, shielding his other sons. His real sons. No wonder Alex’s death hit him so hard. Alex was his real first-born son. Imagine the war this man would have fueled between us brothers if Alex were still alive today. This man in front of me would refuse to let me be the Don, even though he groomed me for it. I bet he planned for Alex to kill me when we were ripe for it. Maybe those bullets in that warehouse were meant for me and not for Alex. Sounds about right.
Whatever his plans, to the last I will protect my brothers. “How many people know that I’m Randazzo’s son?”
The Don leans back, lured into a false sense of security by my question. “It was only us three. Randazzo, your mother, and me.”
Good. There’re only two of us left to keep this secret, and you know what they say: two people can keep a secret only if one of them is dead.
“You haven’t tried your meal. Do you need help?”
“Fuck you.”
He reaches underneath the desk, but I anticipated it. He is weak, and I am fast. I’m around the desk and have my hand around his throat. It’s thin, the skin soft and so easy to bruise. I force him back in his office chair, making it impossible for him to reach any of his panic buttons, his guns, his knives. He grips my arm, but he has no strength left.
Now that I have him like this and look down at his body, I want to laugh. He’s half gone already.
“Come on, Dad, eat a bite. You look like you need it.” I poke at the ear with the diamond, and a soft bit of lobe comes off on the fork with the stud in tow. I pull down his jaw, forcing it into his mouth. He gags, but I keep on pushing it down. At last, revenge for feeding me raw deer liver straight from the kill. The oxygen pipes unhook from his ears as he shakes his head, trying to avoid swallowing. It’s laughable how easy it is. I pinch his nose closed so he must choose. Swallow and breathe or suffocate.
He’ll be dead soon enough.
He does what any other human in this situation always does. You choose to live. With satisfaction I feel how his throat works, how he pulls in a ragged breath as soon as he can. His grip weakens and his eyes roll up to stare at me, horror in his gaze.
“More?” I ask.
