Those two words made La’Nova pause. Her chest tightened along with her throat burning. Soon as she looked up, Serenitywas gone. La’Nova sat with a heavy heart. She stared at the door for a long time then released the breath she was holding. She hadn’t been told that she was loved since her parents…
An eerie feeling took hold of her as she pushed the fan closer to her face to cool herself off.
Break The Pattern or the loop will repeat until broken…
Chapter 3
You. Will. Be. My Wife
The fifth floor was quiet enough to raise suspicion of the unknown. Luca stood near the window, tall and still, shoulders squared with the stench of jail still glued to him. He eyed the walls that were dressed in soft ivory then looked out the floor to ceiling windows overlooking the city. He ignored the way his stomach growled as his eyes landed on the camper still parked out in the back of the parking lot.
He quickly forced the lingering question in his head of who was inside of it out of his mind. For reasons he couldn’t explain to himself, the name La’Nova Reign stood out and kept popping up inside of his head. He wanted to lay eyes on the woman that was in his mind responsible for the bloody scratches on Kentrell’s face and neck.
La’Nova seemed like a powerful woman that wasn’t afraid to go toe to toe with a man like Kentrell. He wondered if Kentrell beat her badly and if she was still in the camper hurting or possibly dead. Kentrell was a coward to Luca. It didn’t surprise him that his brother had fought a woman because he killed plenty of them just for turning him down. Kentrell didn’t accept rejection well.Anybody rejecting or bruising his ego became a problem that he would end permanently.
Behind Luca, the door opened softly.
He heard her but simply wasn’t ready to acknowledge Lucille. He inhaled the soft floral scent that introduced her presence. It was the same scent he recognized from a little boy. He allowed that scent to comfort him, he missed the other scent that always was near her floral one, his father...
Lucille crossed the room without hesitation and wrapped her arms around her son like she was afraid he might vanish again if she didn’t. Her hands couldn’t fold in front of him as he turned slowly in her hold. Lucille pressed her cheek to his chest; her hands gripped his shirt as tears pooled in her eyes instantly.
Lucille was a feared and well-respected polished woman with high intelligence to everyone she crossed paths with. Right here, inside of her office, all of her reservations crumbled. She let her guard down so her son could feel how much she missed and loved him. She stood on her tiptoes and reached up to gently pull his dreads back from his face. Some locs stubbornly fell back forward as Lucille tucked those thick long matted pieces of hair behind his ears.
She pulled back and lifted her hands again and spoke fluent sign language to him. A lot of the times, it was hard to detect Luca’s mood. Even during his time in prison, he hardly spoke more than a sentence to her.
“I missed you every day and night, son… I hoped that you come back to me whole.”Her hands moved as fast as her beating heart.
Luca didn’t move. Didn’t lift his arms to sign back to her, nor did he lean in or pull away from Lucille. He stood frozen, eyes locked on hers. His breathing became shallow as something old and painful crawled up his spine. Lucille and anyone who cared deeply enough about Luca accommodated his lack of speech. They learned his language and communicated with him in order to get a response. This was declared by Dontrell, his father; he made everyone learn the second language, not wanting his son to feel like an outsider.
The pain that Luca felt thumping throughout him was almost unbearable. It didn’t come in waves either, it sat in him like a blade lodged in his chest that never stopped twisting. Losing his father wasn’t just a loss. It was amputation. The kind of amputation that made your body still reach for what was gone because it didn’t know how to exist without the missing part. He wanted to break down in his mother’s embrace but knew deep down he couldn’t. Most men could be vulnerable with their mothers and hard around their fathers. In the Bonetti family, it was the total opposite.
Lucille was always ready to correct and harden her boys as much as she could and whenever she could. To her it was tough love. The Bonetti Mafia meant everything to her, and she stood ten toes behind it and wanted her boys to do the same. She never questioned the way Dontrell fathered the boys. She watched how attentive and easy he was on them and backed it with toughness.
Luca was ready to move like he had nothing to lose. Underneath his fury was a grief so deep it scared him. His throat never stopped burning and his chest remained tight. Each breath he took felt forced. He desperately wanted to break and release since learning that his father had been murdered.
“Son, you know you don’t have to ever walk in my shoes, right? We got so much money save and buried for generations to come. I done went so hard, so you and your brother don’t have to feel pressured into shit like I was...”
His father’s words echoed in his brain. Although Luca didn’t mind stepping up, those words still meant a lot to him now that he was grown. Luca had a choice, Kentrell did too. Dontrell wanted nothing but the best for his boys and encouraged them heavily when they was in school. Little did Dontrell know, Luca’s once pure heart turned dark the moment that blade sunk into his throat.
At this moment in Luca’s life, he felt like nobody truly understood him except his father. He couldn’t blame folks for viewing him as nothing more than a cold-blooded killer. Even Lucille was cautious around him. It hurt him when he first acknowledged the fact that his own mom feared him whenever he showed the emotion of anger. It was no secret what all Luca was doing before he was forced to sit down inside of the penitentiary to think about his actions.
Luca taught himself as a teenager that power didn’t need to announce itself, it waited, watched, and struck when no one was ready. As his father’s quiet apprentice, he moved like a ghost behind Dontrell. He studied men in meetings with his father. If they blinked wrong or made the wrong expression, it said enough for Luca to decide their existent or nonexistent future.
If they crossed the Don, Luca made them answer before Dontrell’s men could seek revenge for their Don. He was his father’s shadow, while carving his own legend within himself. He blamed himself but would never admit it. Luca felt that if he contained his temper better and conducted cleaner kills, he would have never went to jail, and away from Dontrell. Luca feltif he had his freedom then the Don’s death would have been avoided.
So many nights Luca wanted to fall down to his knees and cry until there was nothing left inside of him to release. Dontrell had been everything. His teacher, shield, and compass. He showed Luca what strength really was. It wasn’t about taking power how his mother preached about. It was about responsibility and loyalty.
Dontrell stood on principle, even when the shit cost him. His father raised him with discipline but also love. He taught him how to be a man and keep his word. How to look a man in the eyes without wavering and feeling secure and confident in each word he spoke. Dontrell was patient with Luca, which in return taught him patience to a certain degree.
“You can be feared by your enemy’s, son, but make sure the men that stand beside you respect you, always.”He could still hear the deep ruggedness of his father’s words.
It’s been months since his death and Luca spent the first month wanting to end his own life. It crossed his mind so many times just to make the pain stop. But he didn’t. To him, dying would’ve been selfish. His father didn’t raise a man who quit. He also couldn’t see himself ending his life when his father’s blood in that hotel hadn’t been answered for yet.
He forced himself to stay alive out of purpose, not hope. Out of vengeance, not healing. Avenging his father became the focal point that kept him breathing. Stepping in as Don to keep the legacy alive came second. Deep down he knew Lucille wished she could be a man just to take the throne. In their world no queen was fit to rule without a king leading first.
Lucille searched his face, desperate for a sign, any sign. She wanted to see a little bit of emotion from Luca, just for this moment alone but got none. She continued to sign to him in order to get some kind of response.
“I’m sorry…I didn’t want them to lock you up. I know losing your dad behind those bars was hard…I hope with time being served, your temper is under better control.”She signed again, faster with her emotions breaking through her control.
