Page 3 of Deadly Alliance
I step into the bathroom and shut the heavy oak door, locking her out.
I turn on the shower, letting the scalding water blast the grime and the chill from my skin. I lean my forearms against the wet tile, bowing my head as the steam fills the glass enclosure.
Tomorrow. Tomorrow, I walk into the lion's den with Don Salvatore and the rest of the Commission. I know they are going to push for a truce. I know Orlando Genovese is going to demand concessions, demanding I bow to his seniority.
My lip curls into a vicious snarl under the spray of the water.
Let them try. Let the old men talk about peace while the city burns. Because if Orlando Genovese thinks he can cage a wolf, he’s going to lose his fucking arm.
2
Noemi
The Genovese estate feels less like a home and more like a mausoleum these days. A cold, sprawling tomb built of white marble, imported mahogany, and the suffocating weight of my father’s paranoia.
I stand at the top of the grand staircase, my hand resting on the polished wrought-iron banister, watching the chaos swirling in the foyer below. It’s past midnight, but the house teems with made men. Soldiers in dark suits pace across the checkered floors, their jacket sleeves pushed back to reveal the heavy, threatening bulges of shoulder holsters. The metallic clack-clack of a slide being racked echoes from the hallway leading to the kitchen. Voices are hushed but tinged with a frantic, bitter edge.
We are at war. A cold war, my father calls it, because the Capo dei Capi hasn’t explicitly given the green light for the streets to run red. But tell that to the widows. Tell that to the men bleeding out in back alleys over hijacked shipments and burned-out warehouses.
Cassio Vellutini is tearing our territory apart piece by piece, and my father is bleeding us dry trying to hold the line. Just the thought of the name tastes like bile on the back of my tongue. He’s the new Don of the Vellutini family, a twenty-eight-year-old mad dog who inherited a throne he didn’t earn, only to instantly set the entire fucking kingdom on fire. My father, with his old-school rules and outdated tactics, is playing chess. Cassio is playing with a flamethrower.
"Miss Noemi."
I blink, tearing my gaze away from the armed guards below. Enzo, one of my father’s oldest Capos, is standing at the bottom of the stairs, looking up at me. His face is lined with exhaustion, his grey hair is thinning, and a lit cigarette is pinched between his calloused fingers despite my mother’s strict rules about smoking in the house. I guess tonight, the rules don't matter.
"Your father wants you in his study," Enzo rasp. He doesn't look at me with respect. In this world, respect is reserved for men with guns and women with wombs who know how to keep their mouths shut and their heads bowed. I only possess the former, and fail spectacularly at the other two.
"I'm going to bed, Enzo. Tell him it can wait until morning."
"He said now, Noemi." Enzo doesn't add 'please'. A Capo doesn't beg a spinster daughter for compliance.
I bite the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste copper, swallowing the vitriol that wants to spill past my lips. Defying Enzo is one thing, defying the Don of the Genovese family in front of his soldiers is a death wish, even if you share his blood.
I descend the stairs slowly, my silk nightgown brushing against my bare calves, a thick cashmere robe is tied tightly around my waist. I keep my chin high, my expression blank, an icy mask perfected over twenty-four years of surviving this misogynistic hellscape. The men in the foyer part for me, but their eyes linger. Not with lust because I’m too old for the young ones and too terrifying for the old ones, but with a kind of pitying disdain. The unwed daughter.The burden.
My father’s study is at the end of the east wing. The heavy oak doors are slightly ajar, leaking the stench of stale scotch and expensive Cuban cigars into the hallway. I push the door open without knocking and step inside.
Don Orlando Genovese is seated behind his massive mahogany desk, looking every bit the aging tyrant he is. His silver hair is slicked back, his bespoke suit is wrinkled, the collar of his shirt is undone. His face is flushed, a permanent state of rage etching deep grooves around his mouth and eyes.
"Close the door," he barks, not even looking up from the spread of ledgers and territorial maps littering his desk.
I push the heavy door shut until the latch clicks, sealing us in. The room is stifling, a monument to a dying era. Leather-bound books that have never been read line the walls, and the mounted head of a stag stares blankly from above the roaring fireplace.
"You sent for me," I state, keeping my voice perfectly level. I don't step closer to the desk. I stand my ground near the Persian rug, crossing my arms over my chest.
My father finally looks up, the same eyes I see in the mirror every morning narrow into venomous slits. "Sit down."
"I prefer to stand."
He slams his open palm against the desk. The crystal tumbler of scotch rattles violently. "I said, sit your fucking ass down, Noemi."
The command hits like a whip, but I don't flinch. I slowly move to one of the leather armchairs opposite his desk and lower myself into it, crossing one leg over the other. I stare at him, refusing to drop my gaze. It’s the ultimate sin in our world, a woman looking a Don in the eye with anything other than submission.
"What is it?" I ask, my tone comes out bored, even though my heart is hammering a frantic rhythm against my ribs.
He grabs his tumbler and drains the amber liquid, slamming the glass back down. "I just got off the phone with the Bianchis. Youinsulted their oldest son at the gathering last week. Lorenzo. You embarrassed him in front of his own Capos."
I let out a harsh, bitter laugh before I can stop myself. "Lorenzo Bianchi is fifty-two years old, Papa. He smells like rotting garlic, and he tried to grab my ass in the coatroom while his third wife was in the bathroom. I didn't insult him. I told him if he touched me again, I’d take a cigar cutter to his fucking fingers."
