Love is Rage

Prologue

16 YEARS AGO

Standing on a rooftop, Viking watched his girl walk out of the chapel across the building. Elena wore a white dress with a lace veil that covered her dark curls, and was on the arm of another man. Her new husband, Lorenzo Morelli; the man who first stole his turf, then his woman.

Witnessing her betrayal with his own eyes, he stood rooted on the spot. His stomach felt like it had been cut open with blunt razors. His eyes burned with pain and hatred.

I’d rather have gone blind…

Anything was better than seeing the woman, who he thought one day would be the mother of his children, wearing another man’s ring.

“Just say the word, and I’ll finish them.” His little brother Sy had a rifle aimed at the happy couple.

He tried to answer but his throat refused to move; his vocal cords were useless. Every bone in his body felt broken, his veins doused in acid. It felt like that time he’d been bitten by a snake and left for dead in the desert, a hot burning venom spreading over his body, paralyzing him limb by limb.

How the f**k had this happened? He’d only been in the can for a week, and his life was turned into ash.

Everything he had ever done was with Elena in the back of his mind. Every penny he earned had her name written on it. He was going to dress her in silk and overload her with jewelry.

Another man will do that now.

Kristoff came to stand next to him. “Think before you act, bratan.”

Yeah, they were brothers, not by blood in the traditional way, but by bleeding for each other. Even though it felt as if he was looking into a deep abyss trying to swallow him whole, he wouldn’t want anyone else by his side right now but Sy and Kristoff. Funny, how Kristoff tried to save him from a snake bite for the second time.

His eyes were glued to Elena and Morelli. He had his hand on her elbow, guiding her toward a car across the street. He had his f*****g hand on her. An ice-cold darkness crept inside his heart, hardening it, covering it in cement, and decorating it with barbed wire.

Do you love me, Lena?

I do, Viking. Only you.

How much do you love me?

I can’t put it into words, that much.

Big. f*****g. Lie.

In his world, liars got punished. And he’d warned her. If she ever cheated on him, he’d make her bleed. His word was his bond.

“Sy.”

His brother nodded and took aim.

“Don’t.”

Easy for Kristoff to say. “Not your woman cheating on you.”

“Not your woman anymore either.”

His words were as painful as his upper cut.

“I told her.” He grabbed a hold of the railing. “I said if she’d ever cheat on me, I’d make her pay. I f*****g told her I’d hurt her every day for the rest of her life. And we were going to take out the Morellis one day anyway. They’re growing too big to handle.”

Kristoff’s eyes narrowed on Morelli and his crew that surrounded him. The greasy Italian had been a thorn in their hide for months now, slowly starting to claim more and more of their territory. The soon to be dead asshole was a small-time hustler dealing drugs and trafficking women. As of a week ago, he had his eyes on their gun supply chain. Since he had his big ass Italian family of soldiers, he believed he had the upper hand.

Except, he didn’t know Kristoff the way Viking did. Their crew of misfits was small. They didn’t have the traditional blood bands or shared racial background that formed gangs and groups. But they had something what the Italians, Irish, and the Armenians in San Francisco lacked: they were blood brothers, bound by loyalty forged in hardship. They were the future. They were the Bloody Ones.

At least, that’s what he’d always thought. Right now, seeing his other future walk away from him to be with another man, he didn’t care so much anymore. The other Families could have the streets. All he needed the streets for was to paint it red with blood.

“Remember when that cop tried to rape Angel?” Kristoff’s eyes turned into black pits.

“Yeah.” Viking remembered all right. It was the day they had met. The day he accidentally walked into a shake-off under a bridge. A cop and a pimp walk under a bridge. It was like the beginning of a bad joke.

“Remember what I told that cop I’d do if he wouldn’t let go of the kid?”

How could he ever forget? “You said you’d make him eat his own dick.”

“Was I true to my word?”

“Hell, yeah.” The image of that faithful night was etched into his mind forever. Angel on his knees in front of a crooked cop. His brother, Damon, raising hell against the pimp, but battered and bruised and with his hands tied behind his back, he didn’t stand a chance.

“And when we found that case filled with cash, didn’t I divide it between us, asking you for only one thing?”

Stand by me, and we’ll end up running this town.

“Whatever you do, don’t get your ass in jail,” Viking repeated.

“Exactly.”

He hated it when Kristoff used reason to calm him down. He didn’t know how the man could be so cold-blooded. Maybe it was the Russian in him. Either way, despite his promise, he failed Kristoff as well since he did get locked up, even if it was for only a week. Seeing his brother’s face smashed by his stepfather had pushed all his buttons. He knew what he was—violent, impulsive, and sometimes acting rash. Sue him. But when a man put his hands on your brother, you broke those hands. Or, in his case, grabbed your ax and cut off his fingers, one by one.

“But I did get my ass in jail.”

“And I got you back out.” Kristoff put a hand on his shoulder. “Believe me when I say that you’ll get your revenge. We’ll take everything from him. From both of them. Revenge is like vodka. It’s best served ice cold.”

Sy made an impatient sound from behind. “They’re almost in the car, Vik. I’m losing my window of opportunity here.” He snorted. “f**k this. That b***h don’t deserve to live.”

He aimed, and Viking lurched at him, pulling away the rifle. When his brother wouldn’t let go, he smashed his fist in his face. Sy was out cold.

Kristoff looked down on Sy and shook his head. “Youth.”

“You’re barely two years older.”

“I’m an old soul.”

That, he was. Just like Viking had believed Elena had been. Like they were two old souls who had found each other in this rotten world. He’d been wrong, so f*****g wrong.

“I will be the one,” Viking vowed. “I don’t know when, don’t know how, but I swear on my father’s grave that I’ll make her pay. Skarsgards always hit back.”

The last he saw of Elena was a piece of her white veil when she got into the car and drove into the f*****g sunset.

May you never smile again.

May you never find peace.

May you never enter heaven.