Page 56 of Rotten Men

Vincent nods stiffly.

“You have my life in your hands, Dominic. Take care of her,” he replies before following Gio out the door.

I let out a strangled breath and check how my girl is doing. Overwhelmed by either stress or shock, her ability to stay awake has been obliterated; thankfully she’s asleep. I stay with her for a few hours, hoping she feels my protection even in her slumber. But soon my joints ache from being in the same position, so I get up from the bed, get dressed, and trail downstairs to the two brothers that must be beside themselves.

I walk into Vincent’s office, and there I find two menacingcaposready to unleash hell.

“So what do we know so far?” I ask, knowing by now they should have some info.

“James is dead. I sent my Bratva informant from Knoxville to check their home out, and he called, not ten minutes ago, telling us James took one in the gut and bled to death,” Gio explains, running his fingers through his curly hair, showing signs of exasperation.

“We think this isThe Butcher’shandiwork?” I question.

“No. If Bianchi had found Selene, she would have never made it to us alive,” Vincent announces, leaning against his desk, looking like a perfectly carved-out statue. “Jude was nowhere in sight either, so we can assume whoever killed James, must have him, too.”

“Am I the only one who is completely clueless to what the fuck is going on? If it wasn’t Selene’s piece of shit father, then who the hell has our kid?” Gio hollers frantically.

“Ciro,” Selene interrupts, making us all turn around to face her. “Ciro kidnapped Jude. He’s the one who has our boy,” she continues.

“Red?” I rush over to her, but she raises her hand to stop me in my tracks.

“I’m fine, Dom. Right now my only concern is getting my son back. I can have a meltdown after this is finally resolved,” she exclaims, resolute and determined—a stark contrast with the frail state in which she arrived at this house.

“Why does Ciro have our son?” Vincent asks, breaking his statuesque form to be closer to our girl.

Red picks up his hand and walks him to the leather couch to take a seat. I stand vigilant in the center of the room, while Gio sits on the couch’s armrest beside them.

“I used to think we four were the unluckiest bunch that ever existed. We were all born with so many burdens put on us, long before we even knew they existed. We grew up knowing our lives were never our own, but as long as we had each other, then maybe, just maybe, we could survive all the chaos that landed at our feet,” she begins, looking each one of us in the eye, while her own showcase the evidence of the rotten lot we had to overcome. “I was a fool to think I could outrun our fate. I was such a stupid, arrogant fool. And now I’m paying the price,” she mumbles under her breath.

“Tesoro—”

“Let me finish, Vincent. I might not have the chance ever again.”

He takes her hand and places a small, tender kiss on her palm. “Continue,vita mia.”

“I doubt I’ll be yourvitawhen I tell you everything I have kept hidden from you,” she chokes out nervously. She then shakes her head and straightens her spine, finding the courage to tell us whatever she so adamantly wants to confess.

“It was my father who ordered the hit on your uncle all those years ago. It was because of him that your mother and your father died so horribly in that car explosion.”

“What?” Gio bellows, but Selene just keeps on going with the sordid secrets of the past.

“He admitted it to me. It’s true. But unfortunately, the day I found out that piece of information, I also discovered that Ciro was blackmailing him. Somehow he discovered that my father was behind the unsuccessful assassination attempt on Salvatore’s life, and wielded it over his head to get what he wanted.” She shuts her eyes and takes a long intake of breath, before continuing on. “When Ciro came back to Chicago, it was never to play nice. Because he has been robbed of his legacy, he thinks that he alone, as the eldest Romano—bastardoor not—should lead the Outfit. And I think this was his main reason for killing Pietro, too.”

The stunned silence around the room is deafening. I watch as Gio takes all this information in, placing the pieces of the puzzle neatly in his mind, while Vincent just takes each confessed word as the revelation he had been haunted to obtain—who was at fault for his parents’ murder and who killed his beloved cousin. Red knew it all, yet never let on she was privy to all this ugly truth.

“Why did you leave us?” Vincent asks out of the blue, but somehow he doesn’t seem clueless anymore to what our girl’s answer will be.

She is about to say something but hesitates, apprehension finally sinking in.

“Principessa, don’t turn back now. We need to know,” Gio insists with a non-judgmental tone, letting our Red know she is blameless in regards to all this shit she’s telling us now.

“Ciro not only wants the crown, but he wants the queen, too,” she confesses, and with that one statement, a spark of enlightenment illuminates every memory I have of my underboss.

The way he volunteered to search for Selene with Vincent and me all those years ago. How, two years later, he called Big Sal every name in the book when we were ordered to return back to Chicago empty-handed. How sometimes he would ask me about my youth, growing up with Selene, and what her life underThe Butcher’srule must have been like. How he despised Bianchi, but never let on to his full hatred when amongst othermade men. It was always there. His interest in the woman who I gave my heart to, and too blinded by love, I didn’t see it.

“Cazzo,” I bark out unintentionally.

“I told you both how I thought that fucker was bad news. Well, here it is boys. Ciro LaSpina wants our girl, has our kid, and holds all the fucking cards in the deck,” Gio bellows, beside himself with rage.

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