I needed to think. To figure out what to do. How to proceed. How to make Victor pay and stay alive in the process.
I needed to figure out how to manage my captor, how to align his goals to mine, and ultimately, I’d need to figure out how to escape him. I had no doubt his hands were as bloody as Victor’s, and I couldn’t forget that, no matter how attracted I was to him.
11
DOMINIC
Gia fell asleep sometime in the next hour, leaving me in blessed silence as I drove toward Salvatore’s house.
My house.
All my thoughts led to the same place: I needed to figure out the extent of Roman’s involvement, and hewasinvolved. Everything in my gut told me so. Every instinct told me he and Victor were partners in this secret endeavor, at least to some degree.
But I needed to remember he was my mother’s brother. He’d loved her. Franco trusted him. Sergio had too. Salvatore didn’t trust anyone, and it sounded like the last seven years had only put distance between him and the Benedetti family. Me? Roman and I had a strange relationship. He’d known all along who I was—and who I was not. He’d been decent to me, to some extent. Roman was always good to Roman first, though. But hell, same could be said of any of us. Except maybe Salvatore.
Roman had helped to organize the buying of Salvatore’s house, helped me sell off the cars and much of the furniture. He’d made sure the house was maintained, even though no one lived there. Why? Why would he help me after that night, whenI was out, finished? When I was no longer a threat? One more Benedetti son out of the picture.
Why not, though? Why raise my suspicions by denying me help? And couldn’t he then keep better track of me? Keep me in my place, which was far from his.
I thought back to those years and wondered if he’d been a friend to any of us, really. Or did he manage each of us, his eyes on the prize all along—becoming head of the Benedetti crime family.
No, that seemed too far-fetched. Too impossible.
But maybe it wasn’t. To be so close to the kind of power Franco Benedetti wielded and sit impotent at his side for so many years? I knew how that felt. I knew what it made of me.
Power corrupted. And Roman was corrupt. I’d bet my fucking life on it.
I slowed as I drove the final mile toward the mansion. Night had fallen, and a crescent moon illuminated a thousand stars in the clear night. Gia stirred beside me.
“Are we there?”
“Yes.”
She rubbed her eyes and leaned forward to get a better look as we got close enough for the lights of the SUV to shine on the gates protecting the property.
I slowed the vehicle, and she took it all in.
The last few miles I’d been tense. Now, that tension had reached a new level. I hadn’t been back since that night. I hadn’t been in the dining room since the shooting, and I was about to face it all now.
“Stay inside,” I told her, climbing out to punch in the code. I watched the gates slide open. The single change I’d made to the property after buying it was to have all the locks changed and a keyless entry system put in.
Once the gates opened, I drove the SUV through, then stopped again to watch them close behind us. I’d change the code tomorrow. Roman also knew it. I hadn’t thought twice about him having it, not back then.
Gia sat awestruck at what she saw as we drove the long drive toward the front door.
“What is this?”
“My house,” I said, realizing it was. I’d taken over Salvatore’s home, kept some of his furniture. And he didn’t even know it.
I didn’t bother trying to figure out my own twisted motivation.
“Your house?”
“Mercenary life pays.”
“Can’t pay this much.”
I parked the car. Gia climbed out. I walked ahead to the front door and punched in the code. The number combination registered, and a click signaled the unlocking of the door. I pushed it open, memory of that last night flooding all of my senses as I stood on the threshold, gripping the doorknob to remain upright as the wave crashed over me, then, slowly, way too slowly, passed. I swallowed hard and reached a shaky hand to switch on the lights. The hallway illuminated immediately, and I moved aside to allow Gia to enter.
