NINE

Arturo

of the docks a few hours earlier than I usually would have, uneasy at the thought of Florence being left alone at home with Sofia in her current state. I knew Marco had things under control anyway, and besides, he liked looking out at the river from the window in my office. I had the blinds perpetually closed, but I knew he opened them when he worked alone. I knew all sorts of things about my men. Predominantly what made them tick - and how to take them down.

The soft leather seats in my Lamborghini were cool beneath me as I sped through the gates, inclining my head towards the guards who were on duty. They worked long shifts, but they worked hard. All my men had to.

I was surprised to find myself looking forward to getting home. I skipped a few red lights in my haste and stepped on the gas. All it could take was for my sister to do something weird or have another break down and Florence may well run for the hills. I wouldn't blame her, though perhaps she was stronger than I gave credit for.

I usually gave credit where credit was due, but it seemed like my judgements around her were always clouded. That was a concern.

Just as I turned a corner another car came screeching towards me from the right. It swerved as I did and we both slammed on the breaks, coming to a halt mere inches from one another. The other car was right in front of my own. I sighed and waited for them to pull away. When a full minute passed and the vehicle still hadn't moved, I reached for my gun. I had several stowed away in this vehicle: three in the back, two beneath the seats and one in a secret middle console, then three in the front, organised in the same way. I reached under my seat and felt the familiar cool metal. My hand and my gun were well acquainted.

There was a sharp tap on my window but I didn't release the weapon. Slowly, I looked to my right. A man in faded black jeans and a grey polo shirt stared in at me. A cigarette hung between his lips, and as far as I could see, he was unarmed. The whole situation felt off. I rolled down the window.

"Mister Lucchese," the man greeted. He must have only been my age. He looked shifty, but not sure of himself; I could hear the jitter in his voice and see it in his body language.

I smirked. "Will I be needing to get my gun out for this, or are you wasting my time for fun?"

The man's eyes flickered around my car. He was searching for weapons. "No, no need for guns."

"Who do you speak for?" I raised a brow.

"The Genovese Mafia."

He was a soldier, I could pinpoint it instantly. To them, he was nothing more than cannon fodder, which was precisely why they assigned him this high risk job. If I shot him, it would mean nothing to them. I began rolling up my window. "I have nothing to say to you."

The man placed his hand through the window as if he could stop it from closing. He kept it there as it kept on moving up, until the force of the mechanism was crushing him. His skin grew red immediately, and I saw the twinge of pain in his face. He clenched his teeth. "You're going to be coming with us."

"Like hell I am," I snorted, keeping my finger down on the button. His pain was almost comical. "Get your hand out of my door before you break my car."

"I'm telling you, you're going to want to come with us."

"The only place I'm going to be coming is inside your boss' daughter."

"Get out of the car."

This fucker really didn't give up. His life would be so much easier if he did. "No."

"You'll regret that," he choked out. His face had now also gone red - my hand was firmly on the button, the glass was firmly crushing his wrist. "Do you not remember your meeting in the hospital?"

Of course I remembered.

"The only thing I'll be regretting is that I ever met you in the first place," I sneered. "I could always start my engine and drive off with your arm still stuck inside of the car. Maybe you would hang on a while. Perhaps you could count out loud the seconds until you pass out, or end up smeared against that car you parked so inconsiderately. That sounds like fun to me. So tell me, why would I regret it?"

"We'll kill her."

His eye contact didn't waver. Either he was telling the truth, or he was a very good liar. But he couldn't have Florence already, it simply wasn't possible. I had men guarding the house twenty-four hours a day, every day of the year, unless my idiot sister told them to go home.

I shrugged and leaned back in my seat. "You'll kill who? You have nobody of importance to me. The only person you could hurt me with is safely at home." The man smirked through his grimace and I pulled my gun so that it was aimed at his head. I repeated, slowly, "you'll kill who?"

"Cecelia."

I faltered. Just for a second. "Cecelia is gone."

He shook his head. "Not any more." I rolled the window down and the man pulled out his phone. He showed me the screen, and there she was - tied to a chair in a darkish room, I could tell it was her from her honey coloured hair and warm brown eyes, the scar she had just below her right eyebrow from when we were both kids. It hadn't faded a single bit. The hollows beneath her cheeks were darker than I remembered, perhaps she had just lost weight or perhaps they were starving her, or perhaps even my memory of her was not as good as I'd have liked it to be.

"You have her?"

The man nodded. "Get out of the car and come with us. You won't be harmed."

I stepped outside with my gun. "I'm supposed to take your word on that, I suppose."

"It's all that you have."

"I have my gun." I pointed it at him for good measure. His eyes widened slightly and then narrowed.

"Leave that behind."

"No."

He shrugged. "Then the girl dies."

"And if I come with you, she lives?"

"Depending on the agreement we reach. It's all up to you, Arturo. Just the way you like it."

"I like it when I don't have to do anything some Genovese scum tells me to," I spat, keeping the gun steadily aimed.

The man smiled. "But you are happy enough to fuck Genovese scum, yes?"

I rolled my eyes. "Florence is no more Genovese than I am. She's a Lucchese."

"Last time I checked her surname was Genovese."

"Perhaps not for long."

"She won't marry you," he chuckled. It seemed he had gained confidence, now. Even with my gun still raised. "She's got a life ahead of her. Sooner or later she's going to realise that you can give her nothing more than death and sorrow. When you live in the darkness, Arturo, you can't steal the light."

"How poetic," I mocked.

He simply shrugged. "Not to mention the fact that a Lucchese-Genovese marriage would cause a whole new war to erupt. Daddy really wouldn't be happy with you, then, would he? Are you ready for a war, Arturo?"

"I'm ready to snap your neck."

"Then let's proceed, shall we? Set the gun down, and get in our car."

The second we stepped into the warehouse I saw her. She was in the middle of the huge, empty building, tied to a chair next to Raimondo Genovese himself. When she saw me her face pulled into a frown. "What are you doing here?" There was a long cut above her left eyebrow and her lip was split, dribbling blood down her chin.

I had only just stepped out of the car when several guards surrounded me. "Sit down," one of them commanded, inclining his head towards the table behind which Raimondo stood. He pulled a gun and pressed it to my skull. I rolled my eyes.

"Mind if I smoke?" I pulled out a cigar.

Raimondo's fingers drummed against the table top. He was like an agitated cat. "Be my guest."

I turned to Cecelia. Her long blonde hair had been cut into a pixie bob that suited her strong bone structure. She narrowed her dark brown eyes at me. "What are you doing here?" she repeated.

I took a deep drag on my cigar. "Saving you, what does it look like?"

"I don't need fucking saving."

I ignored her and turned to face Raimondo, who was watching us with a smirk on his face. "What do you want?"

He stared at the cigar in my mouth. "You and I are not so different, Arturo. We want the same things."

"I highly doubt it," I scoffed. "Cut the crap and tell me why I'm here."

"You are here, Mister Lucchese-" he reached for my cigar and placed it between his own lips, "-because I want my daughter."

"Florence," I spat, teeth gritted. The memory of his visit all those months ago tasted sour in my mouth.

"Yes, my dear daughter, Florence." Raimondo took a drag of the cigar and grimaced. "I never have been a fan of these." He ground it out onto the metal table top.

"This is about your vow," I surmised.

"Aren't you perceptive?"

I shrugged. "She is mine. She isn't yours to take."

"But on the contrary, I will not be taking her. Do you not remember what she did to you? You will be giving her to me."

"Over my dead body."

"No, mister Lucchese. Not yours." He pointed to Cecelia. "Over hers."

Cecelia shot me a scowl. "Don't do what he says, I'm fine."

She always had been stubborn. I ignored her and leaned closer to Raimondo over the table. "I give you Florence, and you give me Cecelia, is that what you propose?"

He shrugged. "It isn't what I propose. That is what happens, unless you want her to die."

"Why not just shoot me now, then? Your men took my gun. You could shoot me and take her."

"I asked them to confiscate your gun, not to search you for weapons. I don't doubt that you are armed, at least in some capacity."

"And what makes you think I care about all of this? About her?"

"Let's not play games, Arturo. You and I both know you care."

"So you think I will let you have Florence? To marry her off to the Russians?"

Raimondo shrugged. "She was never yours to have."

"I think she has made her position quite clear."

"Her position," he spat, "is irrelevant."

"Perhaps." I pulled out another cigar and lit it, then blew a heavy cloud of smoke into his face. "But my position is not, or I wouldn't be here."

"You being here is a formality. This choice is a formality. You bring me Florence, or Cecelia dies."

Cecelia snorted from beside me and I finally glanced over to her. "As if I would let you kill me," she growled. She was as feisty as ever, but also as reckless. She was in no position to be threatening anyone.

"Shut up, Cecelia," I snapped.

"Charming."

"Loud, isn't she?" Raimondo smirked. "Quite the opposite of Florence, though perhaps that is what you like about her."

I leaned back in my chair and exhaled heavily. "Kill her, I don't care."

Raimondo smiled. "Did you hear that, Cecelia? He doesn't care."

"Non ho bisogno di lui a prendersi cura."

(I don't need him to care)

The fluorescent lights that hung by chains from the high warehouse ceiling flickered ominously. They swung faintly from the breeze that creeped its way inside; the whole building was freezing cold. I could see Cecelia shivering, despite herself. It had been eleven years since I had last seen her.

Eleven years was a long time, yet it felt nothing when her dark eyes captured mine. It was as if we were back in Italy again, before life became a complicated mess.

"I will not give you Florence," I said finally.

Raimondo cocked his head and appraised me. The wrinkles around his eyes deepened as they narrowed. "Either you give me her, or I take her, and Cecelia dies. But you are right: we cannot make reckless decisions. You have a month to say your goodbyes and bring her to me."

"Vai all'inferno, bastardo," Cecelia spat. Her eyes burned with a furious rage that I hadn't seen in so long.

(Go to hell, bastard)

I couldn't have agreed with her more.

I pushed back from my chair and stood. "I'm leaving now."

"Sit down." I ignored him and kept walking with my back turned. "I said, sit down," Raimondo bellowed.

Something heavy and hard smacked into my skull. Metallic. I stumbled but kept upright, unsheathed the knife from my belt. It was too late. Two guards had their machine guns aimed straight at me. Head and heart. I spat blood at their feet and turned. "I thought we were done."

"You thought wrong. Sit."

The butt of one of the guns slammed into the side of my face again. I stumbled into a seat and held my nose. Blood dripped between my fingers. Raimondo smiled again - that lazy, careless smile. The brown of his eyes was different than Florence's - darker, harsher, less like coffee and more like black slate. He rested his hands in the middle of the table, fingers linked together. "Arturo, I will forge an alliance with the Ivanovs. And I will do it with my daughter. Whether you give me her or not, I will get her."

I clenched my jaw. "You know she'd never last with Viktor."

"I've always found it incredible what people can learn to tolerate. After all, she can tolerate you, can she not?" he chuckled.

"She loves me," I growled, hands slamming onto the table. The thought of him packing Florence off to marry one of the Russians was enough to make me see red.

"And she will learn to love him."

"You're wrong."

Raimondo opened his arms in a wide, careless gesture. "Irrelevant. Viktor is looking forwards to meeting his new wife. Should you fail to provide her, well, I won't be the only family coming after you. I heard your daddy told you to stay away from war with the Russians, Arturo." He shook his head. "He won't be happy. But war with the Ivanovs and the Genovese? Your scum family will be finished for good."

"You're wrong," I growled, "about all of this."

"We shall see."

"You have no fucking idea who you're dealing with!"

Raimondo pushed back from the table and stood. With his back to me, he ran a hand through Cecelia's hair. She struggled against her restraints, but she was trapped.

"Bring me Florence, Arturo. Or death will be all that you know."