Page 30 of Mafia Don's Secret Baby

Matteo spoke down to the man as if he was having a polite conversation with a stranger on the street. No rage, no disappointment. He didn’t seem at all fazed, and that seemed to scare the man the most.

“I have questions. You answer, or I shoot another hole in you. I have twenty-four shots, and I’d be thrilled to use each one. Lilianna, I imagine you have some, too?”

I hadn’t taken the gun off my person since the night of the break-in.

I shouldn’t have partaken in this. I’d never been an advocate for torture, but…

They’d brought weapons into the room where my son had been sleeping.

“I do,” I said.

“I did it, okay? I gave them information in exchange for my life. They had me captured, man. I—”

Matteo shot him in the other knee. “You won’t call me ‘man’. You can refer to me as Don, boss, or Mr. Costello.”

He stared at the sky as he sobbed in pain. “Yes, sir. I mean—” he cut himself off and shook his head. “Yes, Don.”

“What do you know about the Petrov’s plans?”

“He wants Lilianna alive. There was a turf war three months after she bailed on the wedding alliance, and Vlad’s son Jeremy was killed. Aelita convinced her father to take Lilianna alive as revenge. They blame her, and they want her to pay.” He looked at me. “I’m sorry, Lilianna. I—”

Matteo fired another shot, and I didn’t watch where it landed. “You won’t address her. You address me.”

“Fuck,” he shouted, leaning back onto the vehicle.

My heart raced as the words registered. Because of me, Jeremy had been killed. If I had stayed and married Vlad’s son, there would have been peace between our people. It suddenly made sense why Vlad and Aelita wanted vengeance. Hell, I wanted vengeance for my family’s deaths. I hadn’t intended to kill anybody, but my actions had consequences.

If I would have stayed, both my family and theirs would still be complete.

Guilt ripped through me, but I pushed it back. There would be a time and a place to consider this. Now was not the time.

“Who else is involved?”

He hesitated, and I expected Matteo to shoot again, but he waited. “I knew the code to the security system, and that’s how they disabled it. Two of the guys who guarded your penthouse in the past knew the rotations. If I give their names. Will you let me live?”

“I don’t let traitors live, but I’ll make it quick.”

When the Don gave his word, it was law.

Tears flowed from the man’s face, and he nodded quickly. “I have a family.”

Matteo showed no mercy as he shook his head. “I need the names.”

He rattled off two names, and I watched as Matteo shot him between the eyes and exhaled deeply, almost as if he didn’t want to be responsible for this man’s death. Matteo had never seemed to enjoy the lives he took, but it was his job.

I should have shied away from the death and brutality of the scene, but I didn’t even flinch as I looked down on it.

Maybe I was more of a mafia princess than I wanted to admit.

“We have work to do,” Matteo said, leading me out of the alleyway.

Chapter Eleven

Matteo Costello

“We’re putting all non-essentials on hold,” I told Anthony. “Run through the week with me.”

Anthony nodded and took out a tablet. “Do you want to go through everything on the schedule for the next two weeks, just to be safe?” I nodded. “We have two meetings with the Genoveses to buy out some of the recovered weapons. Those are important, both to keep up our relationship with them, and gain more weapons.”

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