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My voice lowers, deadly calm. “Let me be clear. If I see another fake photo of Kennedy or Trinity or any other member of my family, the rest of your operations will go up in flames, just like this one.”
He flips me off, and I smile. “I suggest you and anyone else who wants to live get the fuck out of here. I’ve got enough C-4 strapped to this place to send it to space, and it detonates in”—I check my watch—“twenty minutes.”
My Bella reminded me who I really am. Not some sap who enjoys long walks in the woods and candlelit dinners.
Into vanilla? Move it along.
I’m Enzo fucking D’Angelo, and for the woman of my dreams, I’ll blow up the world.
Epilogue One
ENZO
“Don’t be nervous,” she says, looking me dead in the eye like the total boss that she is.
Sofia. My diavoletta.
I straighten my tie. “I’m not nervous,” I insist. But who am I kidding? I couldn’t be more nervous if I was the one actually giving birth.
The door creaks open, and I swallow the lump in my throat. “Well?”
Kennedy, my beautiful wife, grins widely. “Soon.”
In three months, my old life has faded into a blur, replaced by this whirlwind of sticky chaos that drives me to the brink of sanity and well beyond. Half the time I’m a ruthless tyrant hell-bent on torture, and the other half, I’m a walking, breathing teddy bear, doling out hugs.
Oh, don’t get me wrong. I still relish the thrill of showing a scumbag what pain really means, whether it’s with car battery clamps or something more creative.
There’s a certain satisfaction in sensory deprivation and ripping off fingernails that ignites something deep within me—every single day. The silent terror in their eyes, the way their minds unravel under the weight of darkness and isolation—it feeds my soul in ways nothing else can.
With my psychological framework, it’s a miracle that Sin was able to make the adoption go through.
But when Sofie and Lili took Truffles for a walk and came back with a second dog—a little cinnamon-chocolate mix-a-poo they immediately fell in love with and already named—I knew I was done for.
Cocoa.
They named the floppy-eared girl pup Cocoa. Cocoa and Truffles. How could I say no? Seriously, I’m asking. It was like my heart banished the word from my vocabulary.
And even when I mustered the physical strength to utter that dreaded two-letter word, my little angioletta Lili hit me with those big, sad eyes and prayer hands. She actually said, “Please, Papa.”
Papa. It was the first time either of them had said it, and let’s be real, I’d have a better chance standing my ground against a fucking cattle prod.
I choked back the tears, trying to keep it together, and sniffled out a squeaky, “Yes.” I swear, my heart does all kinds of shit it never did before.
They cry, and it squeezes. They fall, and it feels like it’s going to explode in my chest. And don’t even get me started on when they smile at me. It’s like getting skewers to the heart, one after the other.
So, in just a few months, the family I never anticipated in a million years has grown. Truffles and Cocoa became instantly inseparable, and now we’re expecting another addition because Cocoa is pregnant.
“Have you picked out names?” Smoke asks the girls while his wife, Katarina, and Dory prepare a feast in the kitchen.
Sofie thoughtfully says, “Mascarpone.”
Lili cries out, “Cannoli!”
“Only two?” Sin asks.
I jump in with a little context. “Unlike big dogs, a half-pounder like Cocoa might only have one or two buns in the oven.”
“You look blue, bro,” Dante says, slapping me on the shoulder. “Maybe you should try some Lamaze breathing. Hee-hee-hee-hoooo.”
