Page 61 of The Mafia's Broken Vows

His words are laced with panic and a terror that chills me to the bone. But beneath it all, I see something else in his eyes. It’s not anger. It’s terror. For me. He wouldn’t be this afraid if it weren’t for me.

My heart aches for him, at the raw pain on his face. He looks like a wounded animal, trapped and desperate.

“Red Wine,” Dante says to the man holding him, his words clipped and strained. “She goes off-grid effective immediately, do you understand me?”

Just as he’s about to leave, Dante pulls him back and looks into his eyes. “She’s in your hands, fratellino.”

“I understand, Dante.”

And without another word, without a backward glance, Dante turns his back on the chaos and strides toward the club, leaving me standing there with a hollow ache in my chest.

The smell of smoke stings my nostrils, but it’s the sight of Dante’s retreating form that truly burns.

Chapter Seventeen

Adele

I’m still frozen in shock when Dante’s man ushers me into the back of another SUV, frozen until the door slams shut with a finality that makes me flinch, the sound echoing loudly in the confined space.

For a moment, all I can hear is my own ragged breathing and the pounding of my heart against my ribcage. Each beat is a painful reminder that I’m alive while Hulky . . . isn’t.

I squeeze my eyes shut, but it doesn’t help. Dante’s face haunts me—the anguish etched into his chiseled features, the tears glistening in his stormy gray eyes and the raw grief and rage radiating from his body. And Pietro, reduced to scattered pieces on the pavement.

All because of me.

The SUV’s interior suddenly feels suffocating. I press my palm against the window, feeling the cool glass against my skin. Outside, the city lights blur as we drive.

We’re moving at a speed that should terrify me, the force pressing me back into the seat. But I’m too numb to care. Dante’s man is a wall of barely contained emotion. In the moonlight filtering through the tinted windows, I see the rigid set of his shoulders, the white-knuckled grip he has on the steering wheel, and his jaw so tight a muscle ticks reflexively.

The silence is charged with unspoken accusations. This man and Hulky worked together. Maybe they were even friends. The memory of the glint of gold on Pietro’s finger flashes in my mind. Hulky had a wife. Did he have children too?

Guilt claws at me, threatening to choke me. I need to say something, anything, to break this suffocating silence.

“Red Wine,” I murmur, the phrase foreign and heavy on my tongue. I’ve heard Dante and his men use that phrase more than once, so it must mean something to them. Or maybe it’s just a foolish, desperate attempt to get a reaction from this man who must surely hate me.

His dark, haunted eyes meet mine in the rearview mirror, widening slightly in surprise. For a moment, neither of us speaks.

“I’m so sorry,” I finally choke out past the lump in my throat. “I’m so terribly sorry.”

The man’s expression softens almost imperceptibly. “It’s Sal,” he says, his voice gentler than I expected.

“What?”

“My name is Salvatore. You can call me Sal.”

I nod, grateful he’s talking to me.

His eyes flicker back to the road before meeting mine again in the mirror. “And Red Wine is the code name Don and Dante call you.”

His words sink in slowly, each one a pebble dropping into the still pond of my shock. Dante and the Don have a code name for me. They talk about me. That sends a mix of fear and something else down my spine.

But the guilt is quick to follow, a bitter reminder of the price of my presence in Dante’s life. What would the Don think of me now, the woman who caused the death of one of his loyal soldiers?

My lids slide shut, spilling out hot, salty tears. If only I had listened to Daddy—Benjamin. If only I’d never left Boston like he warned, none of this would have happened.

He was telling the truth. Someone is really out to get me.

The fact makes me double over in pain, my forehead almost touching my knees, arms wrapped tightly around my midsection as if I could hold myself together through sheer force of will.

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