Romeo stood there staring at me, confused as shit.
“DON’T YOU SEE WHAT THIS FUCKIN’ MEANS?!” I yelled at him joyfully, bunching up his fancy suit jacket in my bloody hands.
“…you’rein charge now,” he realized.
“FUCKIN’-ARIGHTI AM!” I howled, then turned and punched the dead bookie’s head a few times with my bare fists.
It was like I’d snorted a line of cocaine, I felt so good.
Once I was finished, I wiped off my bloody fists with a towel.
“Things are gonna fuckin’ change around here,” I growled, mostly to myself. “Things are gonnatotallyfuckin’ change.”
I had Romeo drive me back to the family compound.
As soon as we pulled up, I stormed into the main hallway of the mansion and yelled at the guy keeping watch downstairs, “Where’s my sister?!”
“Up in her bedroom, boss.”
I ran up the stairs like a kid on Christmas morning, sprinted down the hall, and burst into Lucrezia’s room.
She jerked around in fright, then got a pissed-off look when she saw it was me. “Jesus, don’t you fucking knock?”
She was sitting at the desk beside her unmade bed, looking at a fashion magazine. It was almost noon, but she was still dressed in a black negligee.
She had on her Chanel sunglasses like she always did, even inside the house. They had flaps on the side so you couldn’t see her eyes at all.
She never went anywhere without them on – not after what I’d done to her when she was 17 and caught her cheating on me.
I went a hell of a lot easier on her than I did on the guy, though.
He hadn’t had a face after I was finished with him.
“Is thatyourblood?” she asked in alarm when she saw my red-stained wifebeater.
“Nope.”
“What do you want?” she asked grumpily as she turned back to her magazine.
“Papa’s dead,” I said, unable to keep the glee out of my voice.
She froze with her back to me, then slowly turned around.
I couldn’t see her eyes because of the sunglasses, but her expression was pure shock.
“…no,” she whispered.
“Yes! Prison riot at San Vittore. Somebody slit his fuckin’ throat.”
She stood up like she was sleepwalking –
Then started laughing insanely, just like I had back in the meat-packing plant.
“OH MY GOD!” she cried out.
“I KNOW!” I yelled with a huge grin on my face.
She ran towards me –
