Page 10 of Caesar DeLuca
He has to be the stubbornest man on planet Earth…
“Who…” he grits out. “Who are you?”
“Never mind that. Are you going to cooperate?”
“Are you with Carisi? You’ve brought me here ’til they show up?”
“What?” I ask. My insides chill over at the accusation. And the name drop. I shake my head side to side. “No… of course not…”
“You betray me,” he grunts, “I’ll kill you.”
The casualness with which he makes his death threat sends another tremor of terror through me. Even if he’s in no shape to make that threat a reality—for the moment—it’s scary enough considering he’s in the mafia.
“Please,” I say. “I don’t want any trouble. Can’t you see I’m trying to help you?”
His brows are drawn tightly together. The coldness in his dark eyes seems never ending.
Until he studies my face another moment. He glares up at me some more as though in deep thought, then a flicker of change comes.
It’s so subtle I’d almost miss it—his creased brows ease up, his hard stare softens, if only slightly. He gives the stiffest nod I’ve ever seen.
I breathe a sigh of relief. “Okay, I’m going to take you back upstairs. But you have to help me. Deal?”
“Who are you?”
“We do things my way,” I say, firming up my tone. “Deal?”
He grits his teeth again. “Deal.”
“Good. Let’s get you to bed.” We spend an awkward few seconds clambering to our feet, his arm slung over my shoulders and me sagging under his tall, heavy form. “You’re in for more pain, you know that, right? You’ve made it so much worse.”
A bitter smile twists onto his chapped lips. “Story of my life.”
6
CAESAR
I’m out for hours. Almost a whole day.
The next time I open my eyes, it’s dark out again. Thick flecks of snow fall outside the bedroom window. The wind howls in the silence.
I lay buried under several layers of woolly blankets. The room itself feels like a fucking furnace—the heat blasting to offset the freezing cold.
It’s a setup most would find nice and cozy. Most would probably roll over onto their side and doze off all over again.
I’m not most people.
I’m Caesar DeLuca, the capo in charge of our Atlantic City outfit. I have almost fifty men under me who would bark like dogs on command if I told them to. I’ve got millions in the bank and millions in assets and property. I’m a dangerous, deadly man who wouldn’t think twice of blowing somebody’s head off. Then feeding that head to some alligators for dinner.
You don’t want to fuck with me.
But Carisi has decided to do just that; he’s decided to fuck around, and soon he’ll find out what a grave mistake he’s made.
I plot and scheme in the dark.
The effects of whatever medicine I’ve been given leave me drowsy and sluggish, but I fight through the fog to continue mapping out my strategy.
If it’s true what the woman who brought me here says—she found me on the side of the road—she’s not affiliated with Alfredo Carisi or that treacherous piece of shit Rocky.
