“Romero and Cesare are always with us,” I told him as I shook his hand before he turned to my brother and congratulated him. We all stepped into the entrance hall. Loud music and voices were coming from the living area. I stripped off my gun and knife holders and dropped them on the sideboard as was expected. Matteo, Romero, and Cesare did the same before we followed my cousin toward the party. I knew most of the men only distantly since they were friends of Junior and his brother Angelo from Washington.
“How come you’re here?” I asked, as I headed for the array of alcoholic beverages while several half-naked girls danced around us. Junior had even set up poles for them.
“I needed a few days off. Business has been soul-sucking.”
I nodded. The Bratva had given us all trouble recently.
Junior smiled widely. “Now, let’s have fun!”
A couple of hours later, we were all trashed. Matteo and I danced with a group of four girls. It would be a long night. One of the whores started twerking right in front of us, her ass cheeks glittery, her thong a thin strip of nothing. Romero had disappeared with another whore in a backroom. Maybe he’d finally get fucked. Cesare slouched in his seat, eyes half-closed as a woman rode him like a pro.
Matteo clapped the dancer’s ass and she squealed, then whirled around and ground against his groin. More girls swarmed around us. I plopped down on one of the armchairs, the alcohol taking its toll, and one of the girls sank down in front of me, massaging my cock through my pants. A second came up behind me and ran her hands down my chest. I was about to snarl at her for being at my back when she fell forward, her cut throat spilling blood down my shirt. “Fuck!”
The whore massaging my cock looked up with wide eyes. I shoved myself out of the armchair and turned at the same time, bringing my arm up just when Junior brought his knife down. The blade grazed my forearm, cutting it open. The whores began screaming around us. Where was Matteo?
Junior slashed the knife at me again and I rammed my shoulder into his chest, then grabbed his throat and shoved him into the wall. Grunts and screams rang out around us. Then, the first shot sounded.
I was focused only on Junior. I was going to crush him to fucking dust. I wrapped my second hand around his throat as well then squeezed as hard as I could. “You fucking traitor,” I snarled. Did he think he could kill me?
His eyes began bulging, and I squeezed even harder until the veins in his fucking eyeballs began to pop and his bones crumpled under the force of my grip. He jerked one last time, and I dropped him to the ground. My fingers were covered in his blood.
Slowly, I turned to find Matteo atop another attacker about to cut his throat. “No,” I ordered, but it was too late. Matteo had sliced open the fucker.
Breathing harshly, I took in the mess around us. Cesare leaned against a wall, looking slightly dazed. He had a cut on the side of his neck and was staring down at the dead body in front of him. Romero was breathing harshly, only in his boxer shorts and a gun in his hand. Two whores were dead, and the others were crying and staring at me like I was the devil.
I walked past them toward Romero and Cesare. Romero was bleeding from a wound in his shoulder. Matteo staggered to his feet, eyes wide, almost feverish. It was the thrill of the kill I knew only too well. “You crushed his fucking throat with your bare hands!”
“Father won’t be happy,” I said, then glanced down at my hands. I’d killed so many, but this felt different. It had been more personal, fucking thrilling. Feeling the life drain out of him, feeling his bones break under my palms…Fuck, I’d loved it.
Cesare regarded my face. “You all right?”
My mouth curled. Did he think crushing my cousin’s throat had bothered me? “Call my father.” I turned to Romero, who looked a bit shaken. “How bad is it?”
He shrugged. “It’s nothing. The bullet went straight through. One of Junior’s friends got his guns the same time I did.”
I nodded, but my mind kept replaying my cousin’s death. My eyes were drawn to the uninjured whores, wondering if any of them had been involved in this.
Matteo stepped up to me. “Fuck. I can’t believe our own cousin tried to kill us.”
“You had your knife,” I said.
“You know I never go anywhere without it,” Matteo said with an unsettling grin.
“I won’t put my fucking guns down ever again.”
Romero came closer, looking a little shaky. “Do you think your uncle and your other cousin were involved?”
“Probably,” I muttered. I doubted that Junior had come up with the plan by himself. It fit Gottardo’s character that he’d talk one of his sons into this instead of risking his own fucking life. Coward.
“Why did he risk it? Even if he’d managed to kill us, there would still be your father, and he’d avenge you,” Romero said.
“No,” I gritted out. “If Matteo and I had been stupid enough to get us killed by Junior, Father would have considered us weak links. He would have allowed Nina to have a child, and then he’d have had a new heir. End of story.”
Matteo grimaced because it was the truth. We both knew it.
“I need a fucking drink,” I growled in the direction of one of the whores. She rushed toward the bar and poured me a whisky before she brought it to me. I regarded her closely as I took a sip, and she lowered her eyes. “Did you know?”
She shook her head jerkily. “No. We were told this was a birthday party and we were supposed to dance. That’s all.”
I walked over to one of the armchairs with my drink and sank down. The whore whose throat Junior had cut lay beside it in a puddle of blood. Eventually, Matteo, Cesare, and Romero sat down across from me as we waited for Father and his men. There was nothing else to do. We’d killed Junior and his friends, so we couldn’t question them, and Gottardo and Angelo were all the way in Washington. I caught the looks Romero and Cesare gave me, a mixture of respect and shock.
Matteo shook his head. “Fuck. That’s not how I wanted to spend this day.”
Father, his Consigliere Bardoni, and several soldiers arrived about one hour later.
Father barely glanced our way before he headed for my cousin. “You crushed his throat?” he asked, inspecting what remained of Gottardo Junior. I caught the hint of pride in his voice. I didn’t want his fucking approval.
I nodded. “I didn’t have any weapons because I assumed I was among family and not a fucking traitor. He choked on his traitorous blood.”
“Like a Vise,” Matteo commented.
“Luca, the Vise,” Father said with a strange smile.
It had been a long fucking day, long fucking weeks, one ordeal followed by another. I wanted to kill every single one of my uncles. “I’m so over them treating me like a fucking kid,” I said as Matteo and I headed for the entrance of the Sphere.
Matteo grinned and ran his hand through his hair for what seemed like the hundredth time. One day I was going to knock him out and shave his fucking hair off to stop his annoying preening. “You’re seventeen, Luca. Not yet a man.” He imitated Uncle Gottardo’s voice in annoying perfection, including the nasal undertone that made me want to rip his vocal chords out of his throat.
I had seen the fear in his eyes—the same fear I saw in many people’s eyes since I’d crushed Junior’s throat. Gottardo was only able to spew this bullshit because he thought himself safe as my uncle. I couldn’t believe my father had believed him and Angelo…Or maybe he didn’t and enjoyed their groveling. He’d definitely upped his security and guards since that day, so he knew there were still traitors among us.