I grit my teeth. “Matteo.”
You complete and utter asshole.
He makes a humming sound down the phone. “Actually, I’d like a chat with my littlecuginafirst. It’s been so long since we spoke last that I wonder if you’ve been avoiding me. Anything interesting happening down there on the schoolyard?”
His tone sends a warning down my spine, and I sit back, lips pursing in irritation. “Nothing of interest to you, I’m sure.”
He cackles, the sound starting low and getting higher. There’s something inherentlywrongwith Matteo. Always has been. But in recent years, his penchant for cruelty has only sharpened under the direction of the Cosa Nostra. My father uses him liberally for wet work, despite my concern that it would only make him worse. He sees him as a guard dog. Leashed. Under control.
There’s nothing controlled about him. He’s psychotic.
“Oh,” he purrs, when his laughter dies down. “I wouldn’t say that at all. Not when I had so muchfunrecently. I thought word might have spread by now.”
Jesus. My stomach twists. “What kind of fun?”
He hums. “She cried so prettily for me. Bled prettily, too. Such lovely patterns it made, all across my walls. She didn’t last very long, though. I didn’t expect that. Quite fragile, really.”
I have to pull the phone away from my ear, breathing in through my mouth and out through my nose at the image he paints all too vividly.
But his words confirm what I already knew, even as I tried to deny it.
Matteo killed Nicoletta Fusco.
Wekilled Nicoletta.
He’s still fucking talking, lost in his own sick little world. “I put her back together, and I left her for them. What was left of her, at least.”
“Put my father on, Matteo.Now.” I don’t want to listen to his shit. Don’t want those thoughts of Nicoletta in my head. Nausea sweeps through, climbing up my throat.
She was innocent. Barely a fucking adult.
Not a part of our world, not really.
“Rina,” he admonishes. “Your father is a busy man.”
“Put him on immediately.” My voice lowers. “Or have you forgotten where you sit in the hierarchy,cousin? Are you in need of a reminder?”
He goes silent, and I hear what sounds like the snapping of teeth. “For now. Nothing is permanent, Rina. Perhaps it is you who needs the reminder.”
Before I can respond, there’s a shuffling sound, and my father’s voice comes through.
“Carissimo. What is it?”
There’s no smile in his voice, no fondness despite the nickname. I may as well be any of the men calling in. So I adopt the same tone.
“I need to understand the motivation behind Nicoletta Fusco. Word is spreading here and I need to contain it.”
“So contain it.” He sounds impatient. “Is that all?”
I blink. “I need to be aware of these things as and when they happen. We don’t exist in a vacuum down here, Papa. Giovanni Fusco will return soon, and I need to be prepared when he does.”
My father sighs. “I told you that the Fuscos were getting out of line. We handled it.”
“By settingMatteoon Carlo’s eldest daughter?” My voice rises. “That’s not handling it, Papa. That’s inviting a damn war between the families.”
“It’s a reminder of who they’re dealing with.” My father sounds brutal. There’s no softness in his voice, no trace of the man who raised me. “This is the world we live in, Caterina. The world you need to embrace. There’s no room for sentimentality here, not if we want to stay on top. This is a warning – not just to Carlo Fusco, but to every family, not to put a fucking toe out of line. There are enough enemies outside of the Cosa Nostra, and they’re growing every day. The world is changing, and people don’t fear us like they used to. If we fight among ourselves, wehave already lost. Obedience is paramount, and I have taken steps to ensure it.”
“You didn’t need to do this,” I force out. “There are other ways. You have broken something fundamental to who weare—,”
