Page 42 of Brando

He suggested we concentrate on trying to turn the tables on Falcone by finding the sisters then extracting Mia from him. His plan was sound, even though it seemed to me like it required a lot of time. Time which I wasn’t willing to spare. But it was when Seattle called to check in on us and they seconded Scar’s plan that I knew I was outnumbered and had to play this out their way, for the sake of diplomacy, if nothing else.

“You don’t have to do this, Mia. We’ll find another way.” If I have to run on fumes 24/7 to find them, then that’s what I’ll do if that’s what it takes.

“I can’t risk it, Brando. I can’t risk never seeing them again.”

Her eyes plead with me, haunted by the terror of loss. Light spills from the mansion where the gala goes on, as though this interruption is just a silent yawn in time, casting shadows over her face and making her fear palpable. My heart clenches at the sight. I respect her courage, admire her resolve, but the very thought of her walking away with him into the night twists my insides with dread.

“I won't let anything happen to you,” I reassure her, my voice low and insistent, trying to bridge the gap of her doubts with my conviction. “But I can’t protect you from him if you’re not with me.” She’s placed herself squarely in the jaws of the whale.

Mia shakes her head, blonde waves cascading over her shoulders. “It's not your battle, Brando. Frank…he’s assembling an army. He wants to destroy you. You need to concentrate on that; let me handle my sisters.”

My jaw tightens. I’ve always known there was more to Frank Falcone’s hatred towards me, I just never knew why. I stilldon’t know why. “It became my battle when he threatened you.” Mia’s resilience stirs something deep within me—a fierce need to protect, a desire so intense it borders on possession.

I reach out, fingers brushing against hers briefly before she pulls away. “I won’t let him have you,” I insist.

Scar appears in the doorway, his presence commanding. He looks from me to Mia, his jaw set, before he speaks. “Time to go,” he says grimly.

Mia swings her eyes towards my brother, indecision warring with necessity. I almost hear her heart pause on the decision to leave with me, before she straightens and looks back at me with a small, tight smile that does nothing to reassure me. I move forward, stepping into her, even as Scar turns away to give us this final private moment. My hand goes to her hair, brushing against it, memorizing the color and the texture and the way the light filters across the strands.

“I had you first,” I tell her. “Before him. Before now. You were mine even before you were born. We were written in the stars, Mia.”

22

MIA

Iwatch as Frank's fingers dance across the keyboard of his laptop, a glaring interruption against the silence. He stops, a smirk curling at the edge of his lips—and the blood in my veins runs cold. He’s promised to give me my sisters; I’ve been standing here, as he requested, for more than half an hour watching him as he punches key after key and stroke after stroke.

At one point in time, a long time ago, I had considered Frank handsome. That, I can honestly say now in hindsight, was his only redeeming feature. With his dark hair and dark eyes, he was the epitome of every young girl’s dream guy, and I just so happened to be with him by some whacky stroke of luck. Hechoseme, I liked to remind myself.

Now, many years later, I know better. I knew better then, after everything was said and done and he destroyed my world. But I believe it now with every fibre of my being, the same way that I believe he targeted me. He sought me out. Specifically, to make Brando’s life a living hell. There was always something so callous about him. Something cunning, dark and disturbing. And I never really understood his need to go up against Brando,to challenge him in every single way he could possibly find, but it had seemed like he made it his life’s mission to destroy everything precious in Brando’s life.

“Still clinging to him, aren't you, mia cara?” he whispers, his voice filling the room. He lifts his eyes momentarily from his laptop to look at me, but he doesn’t stop typing. There is so much anger and so much rage swimming through the room, most of it mine. But I won’t lie and say he’s not fuming; with a few choice words at the Gala tonight, Scar Gatti cut Frank down at the knees and fed him to the sharks. Everyone who’s anyone knows that when Don Gatti doesn’t give you an audience, it means you’re not worthy of one. Frank’s humiliation at being shunned, disregarded, has put him on the knife’s edge. He cursed and fumed all the way back to the compound, his anger swirling through the car like a poisonous gas until he let out a deep, belly clenching scream that pierced through the night, almost killing us when the driver lost his focus and ran off the road.

I had never really given Brando’s surname much thought – it was a name in passing when we were growing up, and it was beyond my limited knowledge of this world we live in that he is a major player in one of the most powerful families in the country. He’s literally one rung under the Don, so the power he has is immeasurable. Frank Falcone is small fish in comparison to the Gattis; they are Mafia royalty, and that was never more evident than tonight when they walked into the Gala and the crowds parted for them. You could sense the respect for them in the room, smell it even. It was in the awe on people’s faces, in the way attendees scrambled for five seconds in their presence, trying to make an impression on them.

When Frank finally stops typing and leans back with a satisfied grin on his face, the leather chair creaks in protest. His dead eyes fall on me with predatory focus.

“You wanted to see your sisters,” he mutters, turning the laptop around so it faces me.

The monitor is split into dual screens, each playing an alternate feed. He presses a few more keys and the image zooms in until I’m standing watching my sisters before me. Maxine is pacing around a small, dark room which contains a bed in one corner and not much else. Sophia appears to be in a similar room, although she’s tied to a chair, tape muffling her protests, her wide eyes frozen in fear. My heart rumbles as my blood freezes. I can’t take my eyes off my sisters, for fear they’ll disappear. But I lift them, horrified at what I see, until I’m focused only on the man sitting in front of me.

“You bastard! You said you wouldn’t hurt them!”

“I did,” he admits. “And you agreed to a deal where you wouldn’t have any contact with Brando Gatti.”

“And I haven’t!” I stammer.

“You put me on show tonight,” he murmurs, his voice sharp. “You and he both.”

“I told you we should leave!” I argue with him.

I don’t know what he’s expecting when he insists on taking me out in public. He must know there’s always the possibility that we would run into Brando. He must have expected that somehow, Brando would find me.

He leans back in the chair, ever the cocky bastard. I just want to rip his throat out and shove it down his mouth again. Then do it again. I want to inflict the most excruciating pain against him for what he’s doing to my sisters.

“I didn’t make contact with him,” I challenge him. “Hefoundme. At a placeyoudecided to take me! There’s a difference.”

“Not from where I’m sitting. The deal was no contact.”

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