“And I also hear you don’t like it,” Angelo says, smirking.
“I came to New York to raise an army and take back what was stolen from my family out West,” I say.“I don’t got time to babysit a bunch of women.”
I still have no idea what’s actually going on here, or what this meeting is actually about.So I better stick to what I do know—the only thing I really know—my need to avenge my family.
Angelo smirks again.It makes his face look a little less hard, but his eyes shine even brighter because of it.More deranged.Positively burning.
“I can give you that army,” Angelo says and my heart leaps for joy like it hadn’t since I was a little kid.It’s like getting everything I wanted, including my dead horse Jack back.Totally unsubstantiated, because this is nothing but an empty promise at this point, but there it is.
“As soon as you help me overthrow Codelli, that is,” he adds and the balloon of joy deflates faster than it erupted.
I didn’t come here to enter another man’s war.I have my own to fight.
“And how would I do that?”I ask, my throat suddenly parched.I wish he’d offer us some of that whisky sitting in his tumbler, but he’s not.
“You’re close to the guy and I’m close to having the numbers I need to take him down.”
I glance at Nico who is looking at me with a very set expression on his face.I know exactly what he’s thinking because we look and think so much alike.The look on his face now is exactly what I see when I’m telling myselfI must not fuck this upin the mirror.I just wish he’d told me more about what I was getting myself into before we came here.But does it even matter?I need an army, and this guy is offering it.That’s all I really need to know.
“I’m in,” I say.“Tell me what you need from me.”
This time Angelo’s smirk extends all the way into a smile.It makes his eyes glow with even brighter insanity.Or is it just drive and not insanity?Just motivation to finally reach for and snatch the deepest desire of your heart?
“I need you to stay close to him and get him to trust you,” he says.“Then you’ll be perfectly placed to strike him down when the time comes.”
“I saved his daughter’s life twice now,” I say.“I think he’s well on his way to trusting me completely.”
I can understand Angelo’s burning desire; it’s the same type I wake up with each morning and go to sleep with each night.Get justice.Get revenge.Get it all back.
“That’s right, his cursed daughter is your best way in,” Angelo adds.
“Cursed?Which one?”I ask.
“Gianna,” he says.“The one he can’t marry off because every guy he gets her engaged to ends up dying soon after.”
Warning sirens are blaring in my head, my muscles tense up with the urge to run and keep running far away from here.But I nod.Why didn’t Nico tell me about this curse?Probably because I’m so obsessed with my own and didn’t want to add to it.
“She already has a thing for me,” I say.“It won’t be hard.”
That makes Angelo chuckle as he leans forward to clap me on the back.“You really are a gift sent from the angels… the city of angels, but still.”
Nico cracks a grin too.“I told you he was the asset we’ve been waiting for.”
An asset?I haven’t been called that in ages.
But the number one question going through my head is: Do two curses cancel each other out?Or will they combine and bring an even bigger tragedy than each would separately?
I’m cursed to always seek and find ruin.She’s cursed to kill every man who gets close to her.What happens when we collide?Is my death by her curse just an extension of my curse to find ruin?
Who the fuck cares?
I came here to get an army and this is the way I get it.
“I’m your guy,” I tell them.
Because the sooner this is done, the sooner I get to go back home.And watch Dante bleed to death at my feet like I watched my brother and father bleed at his hand.
Then the curse will be broken.Or the curse will take me.It won’t matter which of those happens.Because my work will be done.
