The soldier’s response is another shove. The door is closed and locked behind me and I find myself standing in the middle of a large bedroom. There’s a king-size bed in the center with a sheet over the mattress, a single flat pillow, a thin, worn blanket on top. The dresser is empty, as are the nightstand drawers. No lamps even, only the overhead. On the bureau beneath the window is a small vase with a bunch of wilted dandelions inside it.
My stomach turns.
Looking away from it, I walk to the bathroom and close the door behind me grateful for the small push-button lock. It’s beautiful, all white, gold-veined marble with a claw-footed tub against the far wall and a walk-in shower big enough for two. The house is old, but the bathroom has been refurbished, the fittings modern although designed to look like they’re original. The cabinets here are bare too. Only a toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste. A used bar of soap in the dish.
I wash my hands with that soap then cup them to drink some water. I pick up a towel and straighten to take in my reflection in the ornate, antique mirror. My hair is half in, half out of its chignon with strands sticking out where he pulled my hat off. It had been pinned into place. A streak of mascara smears my cheek, and my lipstick has worn clean off. On the side of my chin is a splatter of dark red which I wet the corner of the towel to wipe off.
Blood.
I wonder whose it is.
I keep my gaze on my reflection as I pull the rest of the pins out of my hair and drop them along the marble counter, long blond hair caught in some. I think about the scene at the church. Think about where our men went during the attack. My brother had sent a dozen guards at least, but no one lifted a finger against the intruders.
It feels better to have the pins out of my hair, but the headache wasn’t from the tight chignon. It’s everything else that’s happened. And as I finger-comb my rebellious hair, I wonder what I’ll do. How I’m going to get out of this. Get back to Emma.
It's with her in mind that I return to the bedroom, where I try not to look at the dandelions. I close my eyes against the vision that comes. The same one that had my knees buckle at the church.
I try the windows, both of which are locked, along with the doors that lead out to the balcony. I’m on the backside of the house, and the view from here is something else. Blue ocean as far as the eye can see. Blue sky meeting it. Not a single cloud. I bet the stars shine bright here at night.
I walk back into the room, to the bed, and slip off my shoes to stand in stockings that have ripped in the chaos of the day. I slide my hand along my thigh beneath the dress to the small dagger strapped there. It was a birthday gift a few years ago. A pretty, small, opal-handled dagger. An antique, according to my father. Whenever I go out, I take a small pistol in my purse and strap the dagger to my thigh. In the car, when the man with the scarred face had grabbed my leg, I’d been grateful it was the one without the dagger or I’m sure he’d have taken it. I haven’t ever had to use either weapon. I’ve always had guards around me. But a lot of good they did me today.
Taking the dagger out of its sheath, I lie down on the bed and tuck it under the pillow. I keep my hand wrapped around it, pull the ratty blanket over myself, and close my eyes while I wait for my captor to return. I’m sure he’ll look through my clutch and find the pistol. He won’t be expecting another weapon. I wonder if he’d think me too squeamish to use a dagger. I hope he tests me.
4
Amadeo
The sun has turned the sky a deep, fiery orange as it sets, the blue ocean swallowing it whole. It’s so beautiful here. I don’t know how my parents could have left it. Although beauty is a thing enjoyed by the wealthy. Men like my father wouldn’t have lived where I live now, and life is very different depending on how deep your pockets are. My mother’s reason for leaving is a different story.
I bought this house a few months ago. Only a handful of people know about this location. For all intents and purposes, I live in the Naples house of my family. My mother’s family, that is. Nora Del Campo was once Nora Maria Caballero, eldest daughter of Humberto Caballero, the leading mafia family in Naples, Italy. My mother’s secret marriage to my father, an American-born nobody who served as a foot soldier for my grandfather, caused him to disown her. Even when the trouble with Russo came about, my grandfather wouldn’t have anything to do with it or her. He’d washed his hands of his daughter.
It was when my father began his final decline into an alcoholic stupor he would never recover from that I sought out my grandfather, and my brother and I swore fealty to him.
He took Bastian and me in, but we were punished for our mother’s transgression. We worked as the lowest of the low within the family for years. But I was the same age as Angelo, his beloved grandson, and Angelo and I became best friends. Angelo would have done well following in his grandfather’s footsteps. He was brave and fair. As good as anyone in this business can be. But he died. We were twenty-five when he and I were ambushed. I took a bullet to save him, but in the end, I didn’t save him at all. I survived. He did not. I may have the scar to show for it, but that hardly matters.
Although it did for Humberto.
Humberto had two children. My mother and her younger brother, Sonny. I gathered quickly upon my return that Sonny was a disappointment. His son, Angelo, however, was not. Angelo would be the one to rule once Humberto stepped down. Angelo would displace his own father.
I’m not sure how much love there can be, truly, in a mafia family, when fathers can disown daughters and set sons aside, but my grandfather was not an easy man.
After Angelo’s death and much to Sonny Caballero’s dislike, I became the beloved grandson, the golden boy who was not only born into the family but had proven himself by taking a bullet for Angelo. I took Angelo’s place as Humberto’s successor. I even took my grandfather’s last name, adding it to my father’s. It was important to be accepted by the family. I became Amadeo Del Campo Caballero. Bastian did the same.
Not to say I came with the best of intentions because I have had one goal in mind for as long as I can remember.
Vengeance.
Make the Russo family pay.
And I knew the way to do that was through my grandfather, even if it meant becoming the man my mother did not want me to be.
But Sonny had support within the family, and my brother and I were American-born usurpers. When Humberto named me his successor, Sonny was not happy. He still isn’t. Although, that’s his problem as far as I’m concerned.
As the driver comes to a stop at the front entrance of the villa, I see it again. The glances I sometimes get. I don’t care. Let any one of them stand against me if they dare. I have made examples of people, and I will again. My hands are bloody, as are Bastian’s.
I glance over to Bastian as we step out of the SUV and climb the wide stone stairs toward the 18th-century door. It was taken from a church in Pescara Del Tronto, an ancient village devastated by an earthquake. I brush my fingers over the wood, thinking about all the men and women who have passed through it over the years. All those forgotten souls.
“Where is our mother?” Bastian asks one of the soldiers as we walk into the house.
“In the kitchen, sir.”
“The girl?”