Page 1 of Empire of Temptation

Chapter One

Luca

Sant’Onofrio

Provincia di Vibo Valentia, Calabria

The car door opened and a man slid into the back seat beside me. “We have a serious problem, Don Benetti,” Don Rossi said, slamming the door. “The GDF is planning to arrest you.”

Rossi was the current head of the ’Ndrangheta in our region, but he was fond of hyperbole. No chance was I about to be arrested.

The Guardia di Finanza oversaw financial crimes in Italy. They were regular pains in our asses, but most of us found ways to keep them at bay. Only stupid and lazy bosses went to prison—and I was neither.

“Cazzata,” I said calmly. “I pay them to make sure they don’t.”

“That was before you fucked Colonnello Palmieri’s wife.”

Palmieri? Why was this coming up now? I slept with Signora Palmieri a year ago when she approached me at a restaurant. I didn’tusually fuck strange, albeit beautiful women, but she’d pressed hard. The encounter had been fun, though not very memorable. “I didn’t know who she was at the time. I had no idea she was married.”

“It doesn’t matter. She knows who you are and has rubbed the encounter in Palmieri’s face. To get even, he’s been targeting you, quietly putting a case together.”

“This is the first I’m hearing of it. He can’t have anything substantial.”

“But he will. Your cousin Niccolò was arrested in Lucerne on a delivery run. He’s being brought back to Roma and Palmieri plans to use it to his advantage. They want him to turn on you.”

Merda! I was going to murder my GDF contact for not warning me of all this—right after I murdered my cousin. “I’ll handle it.”

“Yes, you will. But it may not be necessary. Palmieri is throwing you a lifeline.”

I stared through the window, thinking. Palmieri may have amassed information on me, but I knew about him, too. I researched all of my enemies. After I learned it was Palmieri’s wife who got me into bed I tried to figure out why. I still didn’t know but I’d familiarized myself with every other aspect of the colonel’s life. There were two things he didn’t bend on: his hatred of the Italian mafia and his unwillingness to accept a bribe.

So I didn’t understand this offer to help me. “Why?”

Don Rossi frowned fiercely, the lines around his mouth deepening. “Does it fucking matter? It could keep all of us out of trouble.”

“It matters to me. I don’t trust him. What does he want me to do?”

“He wants you to find Flavio Segreto and bring him to Roma.”

This was even more confusing. A legend in Southern Italy, Flavio Segreto had been a ruthless underboss at one time, but he disappeared ten years ago after stealing money from several of the’ndrine. We’ve been looking for him ever since. “Why Segreto?”

“Remember when Palmieri’s daughter was murdered two years ago?”

“Of course.” The seven-year-old girl had been blown up in a car bomb on her way to school. It was big news at the time. Palmieri was obsessed with the case, using every spare moment to investigate, and all signs indicated that he blamed it on the mafia. “And?”

“Segreto carried out the hit.”

“Che cazzo? This can’t be possible. Why would Segreto come out of hiding to kill Palmieri’s daughter?”

“I couldn’t say, but Palmieri says he has proof it was Segreto,” Rossi said.

“Impossible. I would know if Segreto had resurfaced.”

“Yes, your informants are legendary. But we are not in a position to argue with the GDF. Let’s give him Segreto in exchange for Niccolò, then wash our hands of it. Because if Niccolò talks, you go to prison and we are all at risk. This is bad for business.”

My brain turned all this over, looking at the options from all sides. I was not a man who acted rashly. I planned and plotted and used logic. This was one of the things that made me successful as the head of a powerful criminal family. Emotions were dangerous, and I’d been raised to have none.

In the silence, Rossi asked, “Do you know where Segreto is?”

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