Page 32 of Taken By the Mafia King
“It can’t be easy being alone up here all the time.” He shrugged and seemed oblivious to my ruffled state as I swung my legs out of bed. “There’s enough food for two. I haven’t eaten yet, so why not?”
“And how would your boss feel about you sharing a meal with one of his captives?” I poured myself a cup of coffee fromthe silver carafe on the lunch tray and shot him an accusatory look. Midday sunlight traveled over the silverware and shiny porcelain plates as I picked through the finger sandwiches and assorted fruit.
Tommaso picked up a sandwich and bit into it. “I think he’d be pleased to hear conversation from this room other than someone wallowing and screaming into their pillow.”
I flushed. I hadn’t realized anyone could hear me crying and carrying on up here. I took a small bite from my sandwich even though I wasn’t hungry.
“Olivia is kind of a piece of work but she’s trustworthy and fun.”
“Okay.” I leaned against the windowsill. “So?”
“So… maybe instead of brushing her off and pretending to sleep every time she comes into the room to make sure you’re alright, you talk to her instead.”
“I don’t have anything to say to anyone here,” I said, a little harsher than I meant to. “I don’t want to make friends. I don’t want to get comfortable. I don’t want…” I trailed off.
I don’t want to settle in here.
Tommaso pursed his lips and I could have sworn a brief flash of guilt darkened his eyes. He steeled his expression and met my eyes with a look I’d never seen from him before. For the first time, Killian’s boyish, somewhat aloof right hand looked like he truly belonged to the Mano Della Morte and his syndicate. His eyes darkened to the point they were nearly black as he warned, “Do not get on Killian’s bad side, Seraphina. You’re already a Bianchi, and that’s reason enough for most men to want you as their own—or want you dead.”
“Tommaso,” Killian said from the doorway. I yelped, dropping my coffee on the floor. I hadn’t seen or heard him come inside the room, but Tommaso didn’t seem surprised inthe slightest at his boss’s stealth. “Downstairs. There’s work to be done before tonight.”
Tonight? What was happening tonight?
Tommaso dropped his half-eaten sandwich on the tray and left without a word to me, but the air in the room was thick with tension as I slowly met Killian’s eyes.
“I want to be let out of this room,” I said, and it took all of my strength to muster enough courage to even speak to him. “Please, when can I leave? Even just to take a breath of fresh air?”
“Never.” He turned and slammed the door shut behind him.
What was his deal with me? What excuses did he really have to keep me up here, alive and trapped like a little doll?A plaything. I picked up my coffee cup and weighed it in my hands before I hurled it against the door, shattering it into a million pieces.
CHAPTER 26
KILLIAN
No one would assume anything about tonight was abnormal. My men moved between the crates stacked nearly to the ceiling while others mingled in small groups, the air thick with cigarette smoke.
I moved toward the open bay of the main warehouse. It sat on a property I owned across the city from my house. Not too close, not too far. Alonzo had been right. Giuseppe’s revenge for his father’s death at my hands would happen tonight, right here, any minute now.
I imagined his guys were already waiting somewhere in the tree line surrounding the trio of warehouses. I glanced up at the twinkling starlight and ripple of golden haze drifting up from Philadelphia in the distance before turning my back to the garage bay and walking toward the back of the warehouse, where Tommaso, Francesco, and Mikey were waiting.
“Tonight might be the night for you, Mikey,” I said with little warmth as I checked my watch. “Get one of these fuckers alone and gut them, and I’ll make you a caporegime.”
Mikey bit back the smile threatening to spread across his face, but Francesco and Tommaso remained grim and silent.
Francesco’s phone rang like a death knell. He raised the phone to his ear and I waited. Alonzo’s voice crackled with static, but his words were clear.
They’re coming in hot. Be ready.
I whistled long and sharp. It was all my men needed to hear to move into position, their bodies hidden behind the crates as the lights shut off and silence fell thick and heavy. The cigarette smoke danced over the concrete floor as I slipped behind a shipping container. Tommaso was poised and ready across from me, his gun clenched in his hand.
I slowly pulled my gun from its holster when I heard the first car roll into the gravel lot and skid to a stop. Raised voices and shouts of ruddy amusement were followed by three more vehicles arriving. Headlights illuminated the open bay where we waited in the dark.
“These fucking idiots left one of their bays open,” came an unfamiliar voice. “Ricci’s slipping.”
I smirked, catching Tommaso’s eyes through the dark.
“If he keeps his stash unguarded like this, you bet your ass he doesn’t even have dogs guarding that Bianchi whore, Boss,” came a second unfamiliar voice in the distance. My blood boiled as laughs shuddered through the darkness and several figures stepped into the warehouse.
