Page 1 of Cassio (Belles & Mobsters 3)

PROLOGUE

Cassio - Nine years ago

“Where the fuck is she, Cassio?”

Luca, my brother, was weary. I couldn’t blame him. We didn’t do favors for the Irish regularly. But this one seemed important to Callahan and the fact that he came to me begging for the favor spoke volumes. Let’s just say that having the head of the Irish owe me would be priceless. And my brother and I would need the favor returned any day. We needed alliances if we were to become stronger, and this seemed like a good place to start.

Our father, Benito King, could decide at a moment’s notice, he no longer needed us. I was under no illusion that he’d eliminate us without a second thought. After all, it wouldn’t be the first time he tried.

Keep your friends close. But keep your enemies even closer.My nonno’s favorite saying. It was only thanks to him that Luca and I survived. Luca was still a kid the first time my father attempted to have us killed. The greedy bastard thought Nonno would give him a free pass to his resources in Italy.

He didn’t count on Nico Morrelli killing his scout and helping me kill the rest of the men he sent after me. It was the year things started to turn for me. I forged friendships with men that became lifelong friends. Luciano Vitale and I grew up together, but Nico Morrelli and Alessio Russo made us even stronger. Raphael Santos and Alexei Nikolaev fit right in with our mission. One day, we’d burn this motherfucking flesh trading business to the ground and my father right along with it. In order to succeed though, we’d have to make alliances with Bratva, Irish, Italians, cartel… all of them. Unknowingly, Callahan opened up an opportunity. As long as we all stood against trading women like cattle.

“Are you sure this is not a set up?” Luca hissed. I couldn’t blame him for being paranoid. Having Benito for a father would do that to you.

“Yes,” I deadpanned; though truth be told, I had nothing to base it on. Except my gut feeling. But I couldn’t say that to Luca. He’d blow a gasket.

Luca was only five years younger than me and patience wasn’t a virtue he held at all. And gut feeling wasn’t something he relied on. At twenty-five, Luca was almost as tall and strong as me. We were both hired killers, usually sent to eliminate people. This mission, unlike most previous ones, was to rescue, not to kill. It made him antsy.

Time was running out on us. Our helicopter wouldn’t wait forever. This was supposed to be an in and out job. The elevated terrain made it hard to land on the Armenian Highlands mountain chain, Mt. Ararat being part of it. It was the reason we couldn’t ambush these bastards and had to come in loud and clear via helicopter.

This territory of Turkey, almost on the border of Armenia, was pretty much lawless. It was used as a transportation hub between Asia, Africa, and Europe for smuggling girls. I’d know; my father participated in that shit.

Luca’s eyes darted around, expecting an ambush. We heard shouting outside, our guys keeping them distracted so we could sneak in. It was mid-May and as hot as Hades here, and the heat amplified this place’s stench tenfold.

The sounds of crying and screaming traveled down the tunnels; disgust and rage boiled in my blood. There was no mistaking those were all sounds of trapped women. All of us in the underworld were sinners, but it took a special kind of low to delve into human trafficking. That my own family participated in that kind of shit made me feel a special kind of low too.

“This place makes me sick,” Luca gritted.Ditto,I thought silently.

Luca didn’t question me when I told him I took this assignment, but I knew he thought it was stupid to work with the Irish. I didn’t think so. The old man, Callahan, was too shaken up when he asked for help. I wasn’t even sure what possessed me to agree to it. It wasn’t as if the Callahans were our friends. There was a reluctant truce between his family and ours, and they hated all the King family members, regardless if we worked with or against Benito. It was risky to do this, but the leverage it would give us was worth it.

Truthfully, it piqued my curiosity to know why a man like him would give a damn about some girl that was kidnapped. He didn’t give me much. It couldn’t be a member of his family. He had no children of his own. His nephews didn’t have any children, and he said the girl was around fourteen but that would mean that his niece was too old, at sixteen, to fit the bill. The description he provided didn’t resemble Margaret Callahan at all.

I’ll find out soon enough,I thought to myself.

Callahan was so desperate to save her, he promised me a debt of my choosing… one to be paid whenever I decided. Whoever this girl was, she was valuable to him.

Women’s whimpers came from the end of the tunnel, and it took all I had not to follow it so I could handle it. But we had a mission, rescue the girl and get her back safely. Once that happened, Luca and I would be back. No questions asked. We couldn’t just pretend we did our part and move on as if there weren’t women left behind here.

“Is this the cell?” Luca asked, bringing my focus to this situation. I scanned the area with my eyes and glanced at the map. Yes, this was it. Our intel indicated she’d be in this cell and there was nobody here. Leaving without her, dead or alive, wasn’t an option. Callahan was clear… he would pay the debt only if we brought the girl back home. Regardless of what shape she was in.

A young boy, about fifteen, came around the corner, and both Luca and I pointed our guns at him.

“You look for the girl? Fire in her hair?” he asked in broken English. “English?”

Interesting description, I thought. Callahan gave a basic description, fourteen-year-old girl, red hair, blue eyes, and a birthmark on her upper left shoulder. A birthmark in the shape of a butterfly.

“Where is she?” Luca spat. “You better speak, before I blow your fucking brains out.”

“Easy, Luca,” I calmed my brother. He was just a kid, although he had a shotgun hung over his shoulder. This world was different from ours. “Can you show us where the girl is… the one with fire in her hair?”

He eyed us warily and I kept my eyes firmly on him. Danger came in all shapes and sizes. We couldn’t afford to lower our guard, but we wouldn’t be trigger happy either.

“Follow,” he replied and turned to go down the left corridor.

“It could be a trap,” Luca stated the obvious under his breath.

We had two choices. Either leave empty handed or follow the lead. Something was nudging me to follow through, find the girl. I wasn’t sure what it was, but it almost felt like my life depended on it. I scoffed at that. It was more that I wanted to reap the benefits by cornering Callahan into an open-ended debt.

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