Page 36 of Revenge

I started to sift through the papers and photographs from the file as Nico took a call on his phone.

Closing the file on Quinn I plucked another off the pile. It contained details of Dante Messina’s organisation; the man I needed to keep sweet.

Around a decade ago, my father entered a business relationship with Messina’s Cartel. They resided in Bari, Italy, a dockside location perfect for moving product, and were ambitious. Although young for a don, Messina had a team of soldiers to support him (Made Men) a wife and a child at the time.

The union allowed the Kinlan’s and Messina’s people to infiltrate parts of the USA outside of Vegas as partners. Las Vegas was a patch that was already heavily dominated by the Mexican Cartel. A bunch of bloodthirsty animals that made my father’s and Messina’s outfits look like churchgoers.

When I had left Blackwood Academy and my father sent me to train with our allies from Italy in the States, he had been clear that we did not do business with the Mexicans.

“Messina has received news about your engagement. I made sure the message wasn’t made directly. An off-the-cuff comment so he believes it to be a genuine match and not an attempt by you to impress him.”

“Good.”

I would conform to what the Italians wanted of me to stay in their good graces and force them to take me seriously. And Ava was key to that as she would act as my bride; giving me a year of her life. I had worked out that it would take around a year to get what I wanted from the Italians before I went my own way. Then I would let Ava go. She could then have the life that she had always strived for. One which was nowhere near organised crime. Christ, it was a life I too wanted for myself one day. To go legit, fully. But all in good time.

Nico had kicked off when I’d told him about my intentions towards Ava. He’d pointed out that I could have any woman I wanted to play that role and he was right. But with other women came feelings and then attachments. And that was something I could do without.

Ava now hated me that much was clear which meant our arrangement could be purely business without any unnecessary emotions clogging shit up.

I pushed back into my chair. Ava hadjustarrived and I needed time to prepare her. If I rushed, it would only blow up in my face. She needed to be ready.

“Contact Dante’s second. Set up a meeting to discuss our last shipment from the USA. I may drop in a joyful comment about my engagement. To strengthen the whisperings about my intention to take a wife.”

Nico nodded his understanding and moved away to make the call.

Messina was only five years my senior and he had already lost a wife and child. He had been a family man when he’d been promoted through the ranks and his position had led to the deaths of those closest to him. It was a risk you took, that’s why I had decided that I would never fall in love. Love made you weak in my world but as I said, in the eyes of the Italian, family waseverything.

Did I blame Messina for putting me in a position of shackling myself to a woman (if only for a year), no, not really. My father’s associates who had become mine when he’d been incarcerated didn’t know me, not really. Those few men I had worked with during my time in the States were no longer part of their organisation so there was no one to vouch for my loyalty or expertise.

They had little to no faith in me. I was young and unattached, not serious about business. I had no family apart from my soldiers. A ‘vapid existence’ I had been told. Under normal circumstances, I would have forced the man who said those words to do so to my face with my Glock at their temple, but my hands were tied.Fools rush in!

Irrespective that I had built up my own business when I’d first returned from America, I still didn’t cut the mustard for them. So, I would become the Mr to Ava’s Mrs.

But that’s not all I was. I was myself a Made Man without my father’s connections.

I was the owner of Titan Events and Promotions and ran one of the largest casinos in Greater London. I had irons in many fires which mainly included setting up gambling syndicates and off-the-record investments in boxing and horse racing (fixing matches and shit like that) and I trafficked product. The legit stuff I had created, the criminal side of things I inherited from my father.

After Gerard went down, I closed several of his businesses, took the fines on the chin for those that I could not protect and combined his cocaine with my supply of sporting enhancement drugs.

All of which turned a healthy profit which I cleaned through my legitimate business. I could launder money faster than any of the other gangs in London. In my view, I hadmorethan fucking proved myself! I was also gradually cleaning shit up, reducing the illegal stuff to one day become fully legal.

Yet, the Italians still doubted me. And why? Because I was a bachelor and under thirty with no wife and kids?

More issues had arisen when I’d allowed my accountant Michael Langston to fuck me up the arse. He’d been cooking the books under my very nose; something which had gone unnoticed. The fact that the money he had taken belonged to my Italian associates, was another reason their trust in my abilities had dwindled.

Needless to say; I’d put a bullet in Langston’s head with Messina on Livestream to prove I took care of men who fucked us over.

And now I knew I needed to create an image; one they would accept, that I was a family man; settled and not a flight risk.

Ava Cawthorne would become Ava Kinlan within a few short months.

You do realise that during her current state of mind, she wouldn’t marry you if you were the last man on earth?

But I had an offer to put on the table. I knew how much Ava wanted out. To be free of the mafia and I would allow that but first, she had a debt to pay. And if my offer wasn’t enough, well; that’s where her little friend, Anton Quinn came in.

If he was involved in my father’s downfall which I suspected he was, I would have to kill him, if not only to send a message to those who would do us damage.

But if Ava didn’t accept my proposal and terms, I could always use his life as a bargaining chip. Underhand I know but hopefully it wouldn’t come to that.

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