Page 24 of The Devil's Deal

Each time he calls or forces me to see him for a business meeting, I want to pick up one of the large vases in his home and bash him on the head until every bit of oxygen leaves his lungs, until every ounce of blood flows out of his battered body.

I’m so grateful to whoever is after him, causing him to go into hiding. Who knows who he’s started a war with or how long it’ll last? It’s not the first time he’s done something to piss someone off, and I’m sure it won’t be the last. My father has a problem with anyone telling him what to do, which doesn’t always work out to his benefit.

Oh, well.

Maybe they’ll kill him and save me the trouble. There are so many times I’ve thought about doing it myself, but never had the guts to go through with it.

Whenever I show up to a meeting with him, I have my gun from work on me. Sometimes, while he’s talking, I imagine that split second of shock on his face before my bullet hits him right between the eyes.

I only ever had one parent. My mother. Mom was everything he wasn’t. And I still don’t know what happened to her.

I’m afraid of the ultimate truth: that she’s gone forever.

That he killed her.

But I do think he did.

He must have.

A rotting ache builds in the middle of my chest, stabbing the very core of me, engulfing me in the memory of the day he told me she was gone.

Eyes drifting to a close, I take deep breaths, quieting the pain. I need to be strong, even when it’s far more difficult to mask the pain. But living with it day in and day out is unbearable.

I’ve tried to dig into my mom’s disappearance, but it’s led nowhere. Any useful information he may have on where she may be is locked in his study, the one no one’s allowed to step foot in. The one he locks every time he isn’t home. I’ll find out what happened to her. I won’t rest until I do. Even if it means finding her remains.

When my mother disappeared, I told myself I’d eventually find a way to leave. I had no choice. I had no one in my corner anymore. It was just me and him in that house. Him and his cruelty, his need to control me in every aspect, including who I marry.

Yeah, that’s right. When I was sixteen, he told me he had picked a guy for me, someone a little older. A son of a boss in another family.

At twenty-one, I was to marry him. It didn’t matter whether I agreed, who this guy was, whether he’d treat me right. All my father cared about was uniting the two families to make himself stronger.

I knew then that it wasn’t happening. No one was going to tell me who to marry, especially my father.

I’d wanted to run away from home as soon as my mother was gone. So, from the time I was fourteen, I saved every penny I received from birthdays and side jobs, like working at his friend’s wife’s beauty salon.

By the time I was eighteen, I had over fifty thousand. Let’s just say my dad’s friends were extra generous at parties, and my father was too drunk when they handed me the envelopes. Luckily, he never looked under my mattress or in my closet. I slowly began to put the money into a secret bank account.

One day, I was ready to go. I had my plan all mapped out. My father was away on business, and I figured it was now or never. Except I didn’t realize that never was the only option I had.

When I arrived at the airport, he and a dozen of his men were waiting for me.

I thought he’d kill me—or worse, make me marry that man sooner. But he didn’t. He silently drove me home and locked me in my room for weeks, only coming in to give me food once a day.

I was slowly shattering into infinite fragments, but I didn’t show it, even when all I wanted was to be free for once in my life. I remained strong, keeping the agony within my heart where it always remained.

Then one day, after two weeks, he came and sat down on the bed beside me. He told me I could either marry Michael or get my degree and run his strip club.

Girls in my position don’t have many options. Our families are old-fashioned, expecting marriage at a young age and kids not long after. We’re supposed to be good, well-mannered Sicilian ladies, who do what Daddy tells us. Like marry a man we don’t love.

Michael is the son of the don of the Messina family. He’s handsome, sure, but I’ll never marry a man who’s part of the lifestyle I grew up in. Living with Michael would be everything I have spent my entire life trying to avoid.

So my father’s offer wasn’t much of an offer, and he knew it. I accepted his deal to run the club.

It’s not just any club, either. Tips & Tricks is one of the most lucrative strip clubs on the East Coast, about a one-hour drive from New York City. Celebrities and politicians frequent this place, and I do a hell of a job of making sure it’s run smoothly.

My father owns a few other businesses, but it’s all for show. He uses every single one as a means to launder money, including the one he put me in charge of.

I hired someone in secret who regularly checks the club, my car, and my home for bugs. He even scans the employees’ cars. Between the law and my own father, I can’t be too careful. He’s yet to find anything.

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