It was not my place to question the Don. The fact he’d come all the way to the city at such an ungodly hour… No, I should keep my mouth shut…But why was he here?
Why did he smell so strongly of wood smoke?
“So...” I pulled my father’s wandering attention to thematter at hand. “Shall I assume you are here to discuss Enzo DiRavello’s death?” Then added, “I am sorryIl Ducais gone. I respected the male, and I know you and he were once friends, Don.”
“Once,” my father agreed, his gaze sharpening, “Yes, once we were friends. When we were very young. But that was a long time ago.”
All I knew of their rift was some ancient history involving an agreement gone bad. Their feud had nearly destroyed the entire Dynasty before they had retreated to their fortified palazzos on opposite ends of Venice.
As far as I was concerned, that was all I needed to know.
“They held the funeral pyre tonight on Isola Rocca Nera.” My sire’s expression was devoid of emotion, but there was a dark, hollow edge to his voice I’d seldom heard before. “Burned all night, I heard.”
That explained the smoke smell. I leaned back in my chair, silent, until he lifted his head and met my stare. “Did you go to the island, Don?” I asked out of pure curiosity, the kind of question that would have gotten me killed fifty years ago, but tonight… only earned me a tired nod.
So, the DiRavello girl hadn’t been lying, after all.
Shehadtracked someone here, but not one of our soldiers or a spy.
She’d followed my father.
Good gods, I needed to put an extra security patrol on him.
“Call me an old fool, but I felt compelled to say goodbye.” My sire ran a veined hand through his hair, white as snow at his temples. “Enzo deserved better than having his throat slit in his own home, betrayed by someone close to him, no doubt. The son, Luca, will take over. He is no Enzo, but the boy is fiercely loyal to the Dynasty, I am told.”
The boy was just that… a boy, but I kept my mouth shut.
“Now the girl… the girl is a different story.”
Curiosity had my ears perking up.
“It’s come to my attention she’s been under Giovanni’s tutelage since she turned five.” He drummed his fingers on the edge of my desk. “A clever male, Giovanni, but too arrogant for his own good. Once, he believed he was in line to become Don himself, did you know?”
“Yes, I’m well aware.” I tamped down my impatience at my father’s foray into the past.
These…episodeswere happening more and more often, and his fingers trembled where they rested on the edge of the desk, age spots marking the tops of his veiny hands.
“This is old news, Don. And this girl… she’s aDiRavello.That bloodline has always been our weakest link. In my opinion, they are nothing but a necessary evil.” I shook my head. “Filled with lies, charm, and pointless wealth, and while they wield tremendous diplomatic influence, they lack any real strength.”
Breeding. Banking. Connections.Politics.
That wasallthey brought to the table. But I needed to lock up this shit with Enzo’s murder before his daughter got herself killed.
“So far, Enzo’s assassination has not tipped the power balance,” I pointed out, hoping to pull him back to current events. “Even so, I’m working around the clock to get this incident wrapped up.”
“I remember the day the bad blood started between Enzo and me,” my father explained, his voice rasping like dry sandpaper. “Once, we were as loyal as brothers, but after Giovanni…” His eyes turned unfocused, his lips trembling. “Jealousy is a dark poison that eats away at you, a little at a time,Erede, until there is nothing left but bitterness.”
His face was slack, and those drumming fingers keptpace with the cadence of his voice, heavily accented and shaky, a far cry from the strength of just a few weeks ago.I should call in the healers, I decided.Have them give him a thorough physical.
“You were saying something about the DiRavello daughter, Father?” I prompted, recalling the hate blazing from those dark eyes.
Those two minutes in a dark hallway had been the closest I’d ever been to the girl. Yes, she was beautiful to a fault, petite and dark-haired, younger than me by at least two decades, but I hadn’t anticipated the sheerforceof her personality.
I’d expected someone prim. Proper.Controllable.
Not a fierce little monster who flashed her fangs at me in challenge.
For fucks sake, her entire life was fancy dinner parties and weekends spent gambling in Monaco, while mine was managing the gritty underbelly of this city, the criminals, the black market, and the bribery that made Venice this city run like a well-oiled machine.
