Page 22 of Rotten Men

“No. This visit should be rather short. I see no need for such pleasantries,” I interject harshly. My tone alone leaves no room for debate, making my housekeeper retreat in haste to complete her daily tasks.

But I don’t miss how she sneaks another glance at Selene, curiosity getting the best of her. Since I moved into this house, I have never once brought a woman to it, much less one as beautiful as Selene.

“I was under the assumption I had made my intentions quite clear last time you came around. I expected you to be miles away by now,” I tell her, my tone thin and to the point, without a hint of emotion behind it.

“I told you, I need your help,” she explains with the same detached tone, and I feel this chess game of ours has just begun in her mind. I have long surpassed any childish game she has planned, and have no desire to play it whatsoever.

“And I told you to leave my city.”

“Guess we’re both hard of hearing.” She shrugs unapologetically and moves over to the lit fireplace for warmth.

“Or stubborn,” I grunt below my breath.

She continues to look into the flames, mesmerized by the fire, with her back turned to me while I take this unguarded minute and allow myself to be captivated by her beauty. It’s the first time I let my eyes take stock of each little, changed detail. Apart from the dyed hair, she looks stronger in body, and maybe even in soul, if she still has one—which I highly doubt.

Wearing a simple black sweater, blue jeans, and black knee-high boots, she looks like what any othernormalmight. Nothing really screams ‘remarkable’ with her clothing choices. Still, the air of strength and sophistication hovers over her—a quality I’m positive she tried to shed in order to blend in with the crowd but was never fully successful in doing so. She was groomed to be an Outfit’sprincipessa, and even if she wore a garbage bag overtop her frame, she wouldn’t be able to hide who she really is—mafia-born royalty.

Old habits die hard, it seems.

“You didn’t let me finish last time I was here, but I truly do like the place you chose for yourself. I always assumed you’d live at the Romano estate when you became boss. Finding this place was a pleasant surprise,” she says, never once moving her green emeralds away from the burning blaze.

Show me your eyes, tesoro.

I stand up from my seat, and head over to my corner bar, no longer comfortable with the faint whispers of my frozen heart. I pour myself a glass of whiskey and down it in one go.

“Little early for hard liquor, don’t you think? It’s barely noon,” she reprimands, turning to face me as I pour myself another. Her scrutinizing gaze burns as hot as the lit fire behind her.

“I’m sure it’s happy hour somewhere,” I reply stoically, raising my glass in morbid celebration.

“You’re upset. You only drink when you’re upset,” she adds calmly, and it infuriates me that she is still so familiar with the inner workings of my psyche.

“I’m the head of the Chicago syndicate. If I drank every time someone upset me, then I’d be an alcoholic by now,” I rebuke, unfazed with her fabricated concern.

“Syndicate life never upsets you. Only family has that effect on you; having to grieve the lack of it, I mean.”

“And what do you know about grief?” I sneer, walking over to her, revolted she would go there.

“Don’t look at me like that, Vincent. You’re acting like you don’t even know me. Like you don’t seeme,” she wails, her well-placed guard tumbling down.

“All I see is a spoiled little girl who didn’t even have the decency to be at her mother’s bedside when she took her last breath,” I relent in disgust. Before I can stop her, the sting of her slap burns my cheek and rings in my ears like thunder.

“Fuck you, Vincent,” Selene bellows, with the same stifling, boiling anger I’m trying to contain. My cruel sneer comes to the forefront, as I relish the physical, dull ache she has caused, instead of the internal wound I’m desperate to avoid acknowledging.

“You mafia men and your bloated egos. Always thinking you’re all the smartest people in every room. Thinking you know everything when you haven’t got the vaguest clue. And when someone outsmarts you all, you scratch your heads, puzzled how such a thing could ever happen. Especially if the said feat was done by a woman. It’s pathetic,” she snarls, seething in venom. “Did you really think I would keep my mother in the dark about my whereabouts? My mother has known where I was all along. I’d never be capable of living with myself otherwise,” she spits, with true venom lacing those perfect, jeweled eyes.

How I wish I could burn the gorgeous image away from my heart, and replace it with the poison she insists on feeding me.

“That’s a lie,” I growl, infuriated she would try to deceive me by slandering her mother.

I bared witness to Anna Maria’s anguish. She suffered just like the rest of us with Selene’s disappearance. She was too honorable and too good of a woman to mislead us in such a way.

“You were never this foolish before, Vincent. Don’t disappoint me now. As soon as it was safe, I went down to Florida where she did her volunteer work with the nuns and toldMammàexactly where I was hiding. From then on out, my mother visited me at every chance she got.”

“That’s not possible.” I shake my head in denial.

“You’ve become just like them—cold, ruthless, and blind,” she quips back bitterly. I grab her shoulders and shake her lightly, wanting the whole distorted truth.

“If that were the truth, then why didn’t she just stay with you? Why not be free fromThe Butcherfor good, and live with you, happy on the run, instead of suffering one more day with that monster?” I growl resentfully.

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