Caged by His Criminal Kiss

3

“I have to be out of town for the next two days. I don’t want to hear that you’ve stepped one toe out of line.” His corrosive voice hung in the air around me like a noxious gas, poisoning my insides.

I hadn’t had a day of reprieve from his sinister presence since I left the hospital. The thought of two days away from him made my heart flutter with anticipation.

He must have sensed my response because the corners of his eyes tightened. “Don’t try me, Noemi. Bad things happen to people who defy me.” He stepped closer into my room. “I think you know that, don’t you?” He studied me, and I tried to regulate my breathing, though my lungs seized at his insinuation. It was the first time he’d ever indicated he suspected that I knew the truth. Why now? Because he was leaving town and wanted to ensure I behaved?

“I’ve seen the way you look at me,” he continued. “You don’t have to say a word for me to read your thoughts.” His deep mahogany eyes dropped to his hands as he casually assessed the state of his manicured fingers. “Two days. I’ll be watching.” He gave me one last glare before walking away.

His not-so-veiled threat was unnecessary because he was right. I knew exactly what he’d done, and I was plenty terrified of him already. If he thought there was any chance I’d tell someone what he’d done, he’d kill me in a heartbeat.

I couldn’t fathom what my mother had ever seen in him. Had he always been so heartless? Was it possible for someone to start out as sweet as my brother and be transformed into something so cruel?

My stomach clenched tight at the possibility.

It would break my heart to sit by and watch Sante morph into something unrecognizable.

They aren’t all so bad as Dad.

True. Uncle Gino was decent enough. He seemed to care about Aunt Etta, Mom’s twin sister. But if he was faced with choosing his wife or his ambitions, which would come out on top? I wasn’t sure, and that spoke volumes. The answer was no clearer for any of the family men I’d grown up knowing. Sure, they were friendly enough at gatherings, but they could also be frighteningly cold.

I wasn’t willing to bet my life on the outcome of that question. I wanted no part of the mafia world.

I didn’t have my own money or an obvious way out, but I wouldn’t give up. An opportunity would present itself, and I’d be ready when it did.

One Week Earlier

“You know we won’t quit until every last one of them stops breathing.” I held tightly to Aunt Fiona as the last of the family filtered to their cars after saying their final goodbyes to Uncle Brody. Only the immediate Byrne family remained, which was still about three dozen of us. Hundreds had turned out for the funeral. Even my grandparents had been driven the hour outside the city for their son’s burial, though they rarely left their house anymore.

My uncle’s widow shook with muffled sobs. It made me want to light the entire city on fire.

The Albanians had put five rounds into Brody’s chest outside one of our clubs. We’d immediately gone after them and struck back, taking down a half dozen of their men, but those fuckers were like cockroaches. We hadn’t seen the last of them.

“Come on, Ma. Let’s get you home.” Oran, the eldest of Fiona and Brody’s kids, took his mother into his side and gave me a grim nod of thanks before leading her to their car.

As I watched them walk away, my uncle Jimmy came to stand at my side. While the three Byrne brothers and my father had jointly brought our organization back from obscurity, Jimmy was the unspoken leader. He was also my godfather and the man I aspired to be. I respected and loved my dad, but Jimmy had an untouchable quality to him. The world quieted in his presence. As a kid, I studied everything about him. Now that I was grown, I spent every day striving to earn his respect.

“This never would have happened fifty years ago.” He clapped a hand on my shoulder. “Back in the day, when the Irish owned Hell’s Kitchen, no one would dare f**k with us.”

“I wasn’t around then, but I’ve seen what you’ve been able to create in the last ten years alone. We’re close to regaining the power Paddy and the others knew back then, thanks to you.”

“We’re getting there, but the other organizations still think we’re weak. That’s the only reason they came after us. They’d never dare move on the Italians or Russians.” Jimmy began to slowly stroll toward the street with me beside him. “What does that say about us? It says they think we’re vulnerable. A target.” He paused and stood silent for several beats. When he spoke again, his voice was the low rumble of distant thunder. “Things have to change.”

I met his steely gray stare with unwavering confidence. “You tell me what’s needed, and I’ll do it.”

Chin lowering a fraction in approval, he continued walking. “Tell me, how did your dinner go with the Italians? I never got the chance to ask with everything that's happened.”

The same night my uncle was gunned down, I’d been off at Jimmy’s request to meet my birth mother for the first time. Not only was she f*****g Italian but she was also a goddamn Genovese—wife of the Lucciano family consigliere, Edoardo Genovese. I’d been having dinner like the f*****g Brady Bunch while Uncle Brody was bleeding out on the sidewalk. I was pissed I hadn’t been there to help him, but Uncle Jimmy had been insistent about me going to meet my birth mother. I had no interest in bonding with the woman who had given me away. But from the minute the adoption agency had contacted us to say that Mia Genovese was interested in meeting her son, Jimmy swore it was fate. The start of a new era in which the Irish and Italians were allied.

I was skeptical.

But as I’d said, I trusted Jimmy and was prepared to do what he asked of me.

“It went as well as could be expected. Edoardo Genovese knew from my choice of restaurants that I was connected to you, and he still showed up.” The dinner hadn’t been as terribly awkward as I’d envisioned. I still didn’t plan on extensive bonding with my birth mother’s family, though my half sisters were surprisingly entertaining.

“I’d say that’s a good sign.”

“Sign of what exactly?” I asked, a niggling sense of unease tensing my shoulders.

Jimmy stopped again, this time pinning me with his impenetrable stare. “I know how you feel about your past, Conner. It’s understandable. But you’re rooted in our family now. Ties with the Italians won’t change that.”

Logically, I knew he was right. But aside from being adopted, I wasn’t even a Byrne in name. My adopted mother was the only sister of the Byrne brothers. Her married name was Reid, which only served to separate me further in my mind’s eye. I doubted the others would have agreed if I’d voiced my feelings, but their thoughts on the subject didn’t change the way I felt. I had already spent my life defending my right to sit alongside my cousins. Highlighting my newly discovered Italian heritage only made things worse.

“I hear what you’re telling me. Doesn’t mean I want to hang out with them.”

His features hardened. “It might be time you work on your perspective, son. We’ve been handed a golden opportunity. A way to ally ourselves with the most powerful families in the city. Think of what that would mean for us.”

This time, I was the one to stop and stare. “What exactly are you getting at?”

His chin lifted and chest expanded before he spoke the words that would change my life forever.

“A marriage. The Italians and Irish bonded by holy matrimony.”

I might as well have been sucker punched in the gut. His statement winded me, tilting the world on its axis.

“You want … me … to marry … an Italian?” I asked, struggling to even say the words.