Page 20 of The Cost of Corruption
If I thought my confession would cool my father’s anger, I was dead wrong. His face only turned a deeper shade of crimson.
“Harlot.” Shame and raw hurt deepened his voice, making the insult land like a hammer against my heart. “I thought you’d get over this ridiculous childhood obsession with him when I sent you away all those years ago. But you always were weak,weren’t you? I should the second you were back in the city, you’d go running off to find him.”
“That isn’t what happened, papa.”
“No? You expect me to believe it was just coincidence that you and your cousins ended up at his club tonight?”
No.Coincidencewasn’t the right word. But I certainly hadn’t planned any of this.A cruel twist of fatewould have been a better way to describe it.
“Please, papa,” I tried again, but he wasn’t listening.
Not anymore.
“You want to be a slut?” he asked mockingly. “Fine. But don’t come crying to me when this shitbag shows you the door like all his other whores. And don’t think that the church will take you back either. He might be the one I murder with my bare hands, but as far as I’m concerned, you’re both dead to me.”
I gasped.
My father’s temper was legendary, sure. All Costa tempers were. But he’d never been this publicly cruel to me before.
Then again, I’d never screwed up this badly.
I opened my mouth, a thousand apologies and pleas for forgiveness ready to tumble out, but before a single one could fall, Matteo nodded toward the security guard.
“Marcus, get him out of here,” he ordered. “And tell the boys at the door to bar anyone associated with the Costas from the club until further notice.”
“You think that will stop me from getting to you?” my father demanded as he was forcibly pulled from the doorway. “I’m still going to kill you.”
Matteo smirked at the threat, then raised a hand, stopping his security guard with a simple gesture. Stepping across the room, he didn’t stop until he was face to face with my father.
“You can try,” Matteo answered with a shrug. “But I’ll tell you one thing, Costa. If I ever hear you talk to your daughter like thatagain, I won’t be sending either of my brothers after you. I’ll deal with you myself.”
“Is that supposed to be a threat,” my father laughed. “You don’t scare me, D’Angelo.”
“I should,” he answered back. “Because you’re right about one thing. I’m not like my brothers. They’re a little like you—the ‘eye for an eye’ type. But not me.”
“No. Everyone knows that Matteo D’Angelo is a fucking coward.”
“Only agidrulmistakes patience for cowardice.” Matteo’s lips twisted in a humorless smile, his tone icy enough to send shivers up my spine. “And I’m averypatient man, Costa. The kind who isn’t satisfied with a single eye. No, I’d need your wife’s and your sons’. Your sisters and brothers. Nieces and nephews. Cousins. Friends. Associates.Everyone. I don’t stop until your whole world is blind, and you are on your knees wishing you’d fucked around with one of my brothers instead.”
I watched in horrified awe as the color drained from my father’s face as he stared into Matteo’s hard, unflinching gaze. I’d never seen him like this before—speechless and shocked.
In all honesty, my reaction wasn’t all that different. I was still standing slack-jawed when, in the next instant, Matteo flicked his fingers and turned back toward me.
“Throw his ass out on the street with the rest of the bastards, Marcus,” he said over his shoulder.
“Gladly, sir,” Marcus said, gripping my father even tighter by the shoulders as he dragged him down the stairwell. The door swung shut behind them.
I’m not sure exactly how long I stood there, mouth hanging open, pale from shock, Maybe a few seconds. Maybe more.
But eventually, I was able to shake enough of the disbelief out of my head to look over at Matteo and say, “Oh God. What am I going to do now?”
“Just like I said,” he answered calmly as if the whole world hadn’t just shattered and was raining down around us. “You’re staying with me.”
Chapter Five
MATTEO
By two o’clock in the morning, Chastity was asleep on my office couch.
