Page 99 of Secret Baby for the Italian Mafia Don

Marcel smiles, as if he’s just patiently waiting for me to finish wasting my breath.

“This isn’t about the family, Nico. This is about Ava. For me, it’s always been about Ava. I told you to leave her alone, and you didn’t. You went and made her a part of this, wrapped her up in all your bullshit. Iwarnedyou, and you didn’t listen.”

The silence stretches as we regard each other. I try to think my way out of this.

Marcel’s mouth quirks.

He presses the gun up between my eyes, putting me right back where we were in Contessa Mori’s living room, except now there’s no nice antique velvet sofa and Persian rug to spill my blood all over, and no woman to sweep in and talk him down. We’re alone in a shitty trap house, and Marcel’s emotions are volcanic—a fast current running wild and deadly under that cold, stony exterior, no hint of the danger until the moment it erupts, but now the smoke is pouring into the sky, and the danger is clear as day.

I try to remember the last thing I said to Ava.

Good girl.

It should have been something else. Something worthwhile. I’ve told her that all along, just a part of the little game between us. But it’s not just a game anymore. Fuck, there was a lot that I didn’t tell her. I guess as far as regrets go, that’s about all I’ve got.

“Ava made her own choices. You can shoot me if you want, Marcel. But you better pray somebody like me comes along for her again.”

The muzzle of the gun bites into my skin, and I lean into it, glaring him down, eye to eye. I’m not fucking afraid of the bullet in that gun; I don’t give a damn about anything or nothing that comes after it.

“Because you’re such a good, stand-up guy. If you were a good man, Nico, you wouldn’t have even landed on her radar. My sister issick,and you sensed it, and you took advantage of it. Unlike her, I can see you clearly.”

“You can see whatever the fuck you want,” I say, “but if I’m gone, then what happens to your little sister, Marcel? Who’s going to take care of her? You gave up when it got too difficult—” My mouth and my anger run away with me, even at gunpoint.

“I never gave up on her,” Marcel interjects softly.

“—and now you’re going to walk her down the aisle and shove all her baggage off onto Thaddeus, that worthless fuck, when you can see plain as day that all he wants is to get close to the top of the food chain!”

“That’s rich, coming from the man gunning for that position himself,” Marcel says, as if I’m just some worthless hypocrite, angry that someone else is playing my own game better than me. Christ, Iwishthat was all this was, but it never was. From the very beginning, the fact that Ava was Marcel’s sister—that wasn’t an angle, it wasn’t an asset. It was just a fucking tragedy.

I’m veering off the ledge now, furious at just how fucking wrong he is, that I’m going to die because he can’t see the worth of his own sister that he claims to love so goddamn much. As if I could spend all that time with her and not fall for her.

“If somebody tried to sell off my little sister like she was a piece of fucking livestock,nobodycould stop me from getting in between that! Not you, not Sal. I wouldn’t let a man do that to her!”

“It wasAva’schoice!”

The metal body of the pistol hits hard across my face, snapping against my jawbone as Marcel pistol whips me. It barely staggers me, but it gives me an opportunity. A single second. I try to getmy hands around the loaded gun, to try to twist it out of his grip. We struggle, the gun wavering between us, his teeth white and bared in a snarl as that violence inside him finally flashes to the surface.

The knife in my grip snaps open, and with one motion, I plunge the blade up into Marcel’s stomach.

The man makes a sound. Something I’ve never heard from him before, somewhere between pain and shock. He staggers back, eyes staring forward, as if he’s trying to get away from something unseen. His back hits the wall. He closes one hand around the knife buried in his stomach, then gazes down at it, the handle buried down to his gut. His legs give out. He slides down the wall. His throat works, no words coming out as he works through the pain.

“You stupid fuck!” I snap at him, furious, kicking the gun away from his grip. He doesn’t even try to pull the gun on me. My hands are empty, my expression numb as I stare him down. My anger is bleeding out with him, cold clarity suddenly creeping into the corners of my vision as I finally look down and see Ava’s brother on the ground.

Fuck.Oh, fuck.

“You stupid, stupid bastard,” I snap at him, tempted to punch an already dying man, his breathing elevated with pain. “You killed us both. You killed us both, for nothing! Do you get that? I love your sister! I’m not using her, I fucking love her!”

“I know,” Marcel rasps, his stare piercing—coherent and sharp suddenly,calculating, even with a knife stuck in his belly. “I’m counting on it.” He’s gotten a grip on the pain now and has comeback around to his senses. There’s no shock or confusion in his eyes as we stare at each other, his mouth curved into a small, knowing smile. “You love Ava, which is why you’re not going to let me die.”

Marcel pulls the knife free. Dark blood comes in a gush, instantly coloring the bottom of his shirt in a dark, seeping stain.

I stand frozen over the scene, staring down at him, his smug certainty even as he starts freely bleeding out. I’m piecing it together slowly, like a fish that just felt the first tug of the hook. Marcel clamps his hand over the gushing wound.

“You better hurry, Nico,” he gasps. “Clock’s ticking for us.”

I walk to the gun on the ground. I can tell just from the weight of it—it’sempty.

Marcel never came here to kill me.

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