Page 2 of The Devil's Secret

We’ll avenge my baby brother and father.

And we’ll kill anyone who dares to stop us.

I ready to enter Tips and Tricks, parking my white Bugatti Divo in the lot. Dante’s already inside, chatting up Carlito, one of the soldiers in the Palermo family. He’s the man who’s been chosen to marry Chiara’s cousin, Raquel, the woman Dante’s been tailing, the one he plans to marry himself.

The scheme is solid, really. Raquel will do anything not to marry that asshole. Dante will offer her a way out, except he doesn’t plan to let her go.

I kinda feel sorry for the girl. She didn’t do shit to us, except carry the unfortunate luck of being Salvatore’s daughter, the consigliere, a.k.a. the adviser to the don.

But Dante wants this. He wants her father to know that the son of the family they thought so low of back then now has his precious daughter, and there’s nothing he could do to stop Dante.

Raquel will be his.

A bouncer tips his chin up in greeting, parting the door as I step inside, the blaring music jumping off the walls as I continue down a short, dimly lit corridor leading into the club.

I immediately spot Dante at a table in between the second and third stage. He leans back into the black leather sofa, Carlito talking while my brother forces a smile, nodding as he glances around.

A snicker slips from me, knowing how much Dante hates the man and how hard this is for him. But Carlito likes to talk when he’s been drinking, and we’re hoping he lets something about Raquel or the Bianchis slip. That’s the only reason Dante forces himself to show up.

“Yo, yo.” I approach, clasping my brother’s palm while he clenches his jaw. I instantly know he’s pissed at me for taking so long to get here. Me being around makes this more tolerable for him.

“Sorry, man, I got caught up with Candy. She’s got a big appetite to feed.” I wink.

His eyes lock with a glare, but I just grin. I love fucking with him. But Candy does have a big appetite and well—so do I.

Carlito’s sitting next to Dante with a beautiful blonde stripper on his lap, his hands on her hips. I watch her, trying not to stare but doing a shit job of it. Her jaw is sharp and angled high as she gyrates on his thighs, swaying her head to the side.

Her eyes, though, they’re vacant, like she doesn’t want to be here at all, like her body is there, but her mind, it’s somewhere else entirely. Who could blame her, though? I wouldn’t want to be anywhere near Carlito either if I were a chick.

I focus on her for far too long, fascinated by her, akin to the distance in her gaze. I feel like that sometimes, my mind and body aren’t in sync, like I was meant to be someone else. But here I am, Enzo Cavaleri, a man with too much hate in his heart. A heart that will kill, a heart that’s coursing with more venom than I want to taste, the acid already dripping down my throat, poisoning my thoughts.

I hate it all. But normalcy ain’t in the cards. Not for me. Not for any of us. Not yet anyway. The women and liquor are how I manage to get through it all. Sometimes it works. I don’t feel anything else when I’m fucking, when I’m drinking.

But after it’s over—shit. That’s the worst. That’s when it all comes crashing down—the loneliness, the self-hatred, the need for violence, to murder the ones who ruined us.

It’ll end soon. When we kill our enemies. When we let their blood rain on this city. We won’t stop until the Bianchi brothers are all dead.

So this girl? I understand her. I get it. We may be different, but we’re also the same. Doing things we wish we didn’t have to do. Wanting something else, but knowing we’ll never have it.

She pivots her head toward me, her serious gaze caught with mine as though realizing I’m thinking about her. Her brows furrow for a split second before her lips wind into a sultry smile, one I return willingly, hiding behind it. If I didn’t know any better, I’d guess her smile is as fabricated as mine. Though it probably doesn’t seem like that to the shitheads here, too drunk to notice or give a fuck that the girl taking off her clothes for their pleasure is sad as hell.

“Hey, the brother is here,” Carlito slurs, leaning toward me over Dante, and I reluctantly stop staring at the woman, too gorgeous to be anywhere near him.

“Hey, man,” I reply, glancing at the bastard, clasping his sweaty, outstretched palm, wanting to rip it off his body for merely touching her. “Patrick.” I use my alias, a name Tomás set up for each of us. Dante goes by Chris here. We couldn’t use our real names in case this idiot talked to the Bianchis about us. We don’t want them to know we’re among their people, gathering intel before the attack comes.

“I remember,” Carlito yells over. But I wouldn’t be surprised if he had forgotten my name. He’s usually drunk off his ass by the time I show up. I only join in for my brother’s sake.

Dante can be a little short fused, particularly with the likes of Carlito. He’s damn close to losing his temper, especially when Carlito talks shit about Raquel. I have bets on Dante slitting his throat by the end of tonight. I’d pay to see that.

“You want a dance too?” Carlito continues, his smile displaying a set of yellow teeth. “I can share.” He slaps the woman on her ass, and for a mere second, her cheeks hollow with the grit of her teeth, before she sways her hips on his thighs again. “Your brother is buying.” Carlito’s shoulders roll with a laugh. “You may as well take advantage.”

My stomach stirs with revulsion at the way he just said that, like she’s a damn piece of meat he’s offering me a taste of. I rip my attention from him, my eyes drifting back to the woman, and instantly, hers fall to mine, and our connection—that intangible, unrelenting link—it’s there. I can feel it. Among all these people, I can hear her talking with a mere look in her eyes, winding the power of her gaze through mine. The crowd. The noise. It all falls to a whisper, as though she had magically turned the volume down.

And the only thought going through my mind is that I need to know her. Her name. Her favorite fucking color. Why she works here with these assholes? I want to know everything.

“I’m good right now,” I tell Carlito, unable to tear my gaze away from her, and she sure as hell isn’t looking away either. Carlito is too drunk to notice or care.

Dante usually pays for everything. It’s his way of buttering up the prick, and Carlito’s more than willing to take advantage.

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