But this was important, damn it. They couldn’t even let the women they rescued go back to their lives until Mancini was out of the picture.
Aside from that, so much life had already been lost. It was time to put an end to all of this. If they didn’t find a replacement for Mancini themselves, Leo was bound to take the position, and he would probably be even worse.
A part of Connor thought that Declan might decline, but a moment passed as he held Owen’s eyes. Connor wasn’t sure exactly what passed between them, but Declan nodded, looking grim.
Costa didn’t seem to be any more enthusiastic about Declan than he was about Owen, but he didn’t respond immediately. “Can you give me time to think about it?”
“You can have forty-eight hours,” Owen said.
Costa stood. “I’ll be in touch.”
He left, and the three of them stayed in place. “What do you think?” Connor asked Owen.
“I think he’ll go for it.”
Connor nodded. “It’d be hard to say no to. It’s not often that someone gets an offer like this.”
“But it’s no good until we get rid of Mancini.” Owen said. “We have to find a way to take him out.”
They started discussing ways to get to him, and Connor couldn’t help noticing how quiet Declan was. He had to wonder if the man was secretly hoping that Costa would reject their offer. It would let him off the hook.
17
ALESSIA
Alessia hoped that she steered Connor in the right direction with Joe Costa. She wasn’t exactly active in the mafia, but she’d interacted with the man to know that he wasn’t nearly as bad as the other capos. It was possible that there were others in the organization that would be even more willing to turn things around and ally themselves with the Irish, but if her brother wasn’t the one to replace her father, it would have to be another capo. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be able to command the respect they needed to be effective.
Connor was meeting with Joe now, and she was alone at his place, waiting to see how it went. Cleo was curled up on the couch while she stood in the kitchen, getting out the ingredients she needed to make focaccia bread. She hadn’t cooked for Connor since the night she made eggplant parmesan - they’d been ordering take out a lot lately - and she had an abundance of nervous energy to use up, so it seemed like a good idea to give the bread recipe she found online a try.
She was just about to start measuring the ingredients, but before she could get far into it, the door of the house was suddenly kicked open. It slammed against the wall with a bang that made her gasp and sent Cleo running away to the bedroom.
Alessia was caught completely off-guard as her father came storming into the house. His face was contorted in rage, which was horrifying, but the truly shocking thing was the man that followed him into the house.
“Ollie?” she said faintly, and the sound of her own voice zapped her out of the fog that clouded her mind at the sight of her father.
Her dad laughed darkly.
“Why, look, Ollie. It’s my darling daughter! She disappeared last week, without a word, you know. I’ve been worried sick.”
The coldness in his voice turned her blood to ice in her veins. She’d never seen him like this before, a false calm and biting sarcasm to him that indicated real trouble on the horizon. She knew that he was a scary man, but this was something different. It reminded her of a predator playing with its prey before devouring it whole.
“W-what are you doing here?” she asked, unable to even pretend that she wasn’t scared.
“I’ve been looking for you. Imagine my surprise when Ollie here told me that he saw you in this house just days ago. The house of one of my enemies.”
He grinned, but anger simmered in his eyes.
“I don’t…I’m just…
“Don’t bother with excuses,” he snapped. “Do you think I’m an idiot? No, I’m not. The Idiot is your brother, telling you about the women we took.”
The shock she felt must have shown in her expression because he continued, “You didn’t think I knew about that? Well, I’ll admit that I didn’t at first, but after someone shot up the place and stole them from me, I was able to put the pieces together.”
“You were stealing women,” she said, finally finding her voice. “Planning to sell them to the highest bidder to be raped and used and tortured. How could you do that? Don’t you have a soul?”
This time, his laugh was real, but that didn’t make it any less terrifying. “A soul? My God, you’re pathetic.”
“I’m not the one desperately trying to hold onto every scrap of power I can, knowing that I’m going to lose in the end anyway.”
