Page 24 of Alliance

I shouldn’t be bothered by the threat; I don’t even know Naz.

But I am.

I don’t want him to be hurt simply because Davis wants to control me. I lower my gaze and Davis chuckles, taking it as a sign that he’s won this conversation.

He wipes his hand across his mouth and straightens out his jacket. “I think I’ll pass on dinner tonight,” he says in his perfected politician voice. “I think you have some shit to handle here.”

He spins on the heel of his loafer and leaves before any of us can respond. The second the door closes, I’m met with the two angry faces of my parents, and for the last time today, I’m reminded how alone I am.

That the only people who cared about me are dead.

Chapter Twelve

I SUCK IN A BREATHwhen I enter Ma’s house, letting myself in as normal. “I’m here,” I yell out, not that the house is large enough to yell.

“In here,” she calls back, her voice coming from the kitchen. I’d argue that my mother’s favorite room is the kitchen, every time I visit she’s standing over the stove stirring a pot of something or the other.

My heart races as I head for the closed-in room behind the main living space. Ma’s house is old, never to have the open floor plan that newer houses boast. I’ve offered to fund a renovation, but Ma’s already pissy about taking my money to cover living expenses, she has no interest in using it to spoil herself. Even when I try to phrase it as an investment, something to make the house worth more whenever she wants to sell it, she dismisses me with a wave of her hand.

She’ll use the money to keep the lights on, but she won’t pretend to like what I do.

We’ve reached a kind of stalemate, where neither of us talk about my chosen profession. Instead, I drop the cash on the table. She takes it, and neither of us talk about what I did to get it.

My chest tightens as I enter the kitchen, anxiety rolling through my stomach. It’s been a week since I fucked Lana, since her family beat the shit out of me in Marcus’ warehouse. I avoided my family as well as I could, claiming I had the stomach flu and hiding in my apartment. Elly dropped soup off at my door, finally leaving it on the mat after I didn’t answer her fifteen minutes of pounding.

I couldn’t let them see me like that. Even now, my stomach clenches at the thought of my ma seeing the faded bruises and half-healed cuts.

This is what she’s been afraid of, and seeing me like this will only make that fear real.

I can’t blame her. I can’t shrug off her fear and pretend that it will never happen, something I’ve done in the past. She’s fifty-five years old and lived in New Orleans her entire life. Each of her friends has a story aboutLa Cosa Nostra, handfuls of them have lost their sons to this organization. There was a time when she went to funeral after funeral to mourn the men that had been killed for doing exactly what I’m doing.

Because it’s not the Costellos who get buried six feet under when something goes wrong on the streets. When another organization creeps their way in or when the siblings fight.

It’s us.

The soldiers.

The kids who grew up on these streets begging for scraps. We get sucked into the life with the promise of cash and spit back out with bullet holes riddling our bodies.

“I brought you flowers,” I say, my words sound meek and scared. I’ve reverted back to being a kid who fears his mother.

She’s in front of the stove, steam rising from the boiling pot and rolling over her face. When she turns, she pulls the fogged glasses from her face, wiping them on her shirt before she finally slides them back up her nose and sees me. Immediately, her irises widen, the pupils huge as they skate over my face, lingering on each of the many healing cuts.

The rings on Damien’s fingers left gashes on my skull. Head wounds bleed like a bitch and by the time Sam had gotten me back to my apartment, I was woozy. What she can’t see is the green and yellow bruises that cover my stomach. Even after a week, I wince when I sit and stand. Too much movement leaves me feeling sore and useless.

I’ve spent the past seven days laying on my back while my head recounted the moments that had gotten me there.

As my new boss, Sam told me to take a week to rest and let things calm down before he would put me to work. I was thankful for the break, but also anxious. Every second I sat alone in my apartment, my cut-up face looking back at me, was a second I wanted to run. Get the hell out of NOLA and never look back.

But then what?

Do you just run away from the mob? If Sam isn’t protecting me, will Marcus or Davis come after me? Davis doesn’t love Lana, I’m sure of it, but he sees her as a possession and the look on his face made it clear to me that he didn’t want anyone else to touch what he deemed his.

And then Lana.

I couldn’t get her hazel eyes out of my head. She danced through my thoughts like a fucking ballerina, making me crazy. Would I be thinking of her like this if she wasn’t off-limits? Was it the thrill of being with her I was addicted to? Or was it her?

“What happened?” Ma asks, her voice stern but fearful.

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