Page 1 of The Holy Ghost
Prologue
2013~
Thescene was a quietly violent one thatwould live in my mind until my mind could no longer holdmemories.
This was mychoice, though.
It was my choice to behere, doing this.
In aperfect world, I’d be at home in bedwith Frankie.
I was supposedto be the good boyfriend who chose her above everythingelse. But the world sure asfuck wasn’t perfect, and nothing was ever that simple.
Lifewasn’t thatsimple.
While the liesand the secrets were killingme, I knew if I told Frankie the truth, it would gut her. She hadplans for us, and they didn’t include the gun that my fingers werecurrently wrapped around.
Ciro was goodabout deflecting when she’d shoot those accusatory amber-colored eyes at us, but me? All Ihad was her addiction to my touch. I deflected by touching her,kissing her, or fucking her.
Tonight was thenight that would forever change the direction of my life.
And hers.
I tried toconvince myself that it would all beokay because her brother was standing next to me,but, deep down, I knew this would change everything.
Whileallof us neighborhood kidsgrew up together, as we’d grown older, we learned early on the triowe were becoming a part of. My family and I had lived a couple ofblocks over from the Mancinis, but the mutual friend Ciro and Ishared brought us together like nothing else could. That friend wasLuca Benetti, and everyone knew the Benetti Family ruled MorganCity.
Aswe grew older, Luca became the darkprince he was groomed to be, and it had gotten harder and harder toresist the temptation and lure. When you grow up lower middle-classand always struggling, money and power can make a remarkableimpression on the young male mind.
We wantedbetter.
Wewanted it all.
I stood in thecenter of the warehouse next to one of my bestfriends, and we both had gunsaimed at the two men strapped to the metal chairs before us. Lucaand his father, Giovanni Benetti, stood behind us, lookingon.
The roomheldabout ten men, includingthe two men who were gagged and tied to the chairs. The rest of themen stood, forming an arch behind us, waiting for our nextmove.
It didn’tmatter that these guys were pedophiles. It didn’t matter that wewere judging them in a way onlyThe Lord had the right to. It didn’t matter that every secondI stood here I was jeopardizing my relationship and future withFrankie.
Frankie-the girl I’vebeen in love with since we were seven-years-old; Ciro’ssister.
I glanced overat Ciro and, with theconviction of a thousand men, he looked back and gave me a tightlymeasured nod. I looked back at the men before us, raised my arm,aimed, and fired a hole clean through one man’s forehead while Cirodid the same to the other.
The room wassilent for a few secondsbefore we turned around and handed the guns back to two of thesentinels that had been standing by. We handed them back withoutwiping them clean of our fingerprints as a show of loyalty andtrust to Giovanni Benetti.
He steppedforward and shook both ourhands. His smile was evil and powerful and there was no goingback.
Lucawas the next to shake our hands andit had felt like a homecoming. He was our best friend, and we knewhe’d been doing this shit at a young age, but now we were more thanbest friends.
We were familyin a way no one outside theBenetti Family could understand.
There was noway I was going to be able to keep this from Frankie much longer.Not when I planned on marrying her as soon as shegraduated from college nextsemester. My only hope would be that she loved me enough to balancethe life she wanted with the life I would now lead.
Little did I knowthat she already knew.
Little did I knowthat she would shatter everything I believed we were.
Little did Iknow that I would lose my mindwhen the dust settled.
