Page 40 of Taken By the Mob Boss

I unlock the phone and dial the number. The lady tells me to wait and punch numbers, I nearly jab my finger through the fucking screen. My heart is hammering and suddenly wearing a fucking speedo has me freezing. My heart is shrinking. I hold the phone up to my ear.

My father never leaves messages.

So why now?

For a while it’s odd sounds, rhythmic. Then I realize it’s just heavy breathing.Heavy breathing…The terrace goes dim. I’m staring at the sky line and the birds that have just burst from the forest with a call into the night winds. The heavy breathing increases. There’s a throat cleared. The phone fumbles in someone’s hands …

The birds caw and I can hear that they’re ravens. Ravens? This far out in the Everglades?

“Lucas,” my father says, his voice weak. “Lucas …” He’s swallowing, and I know he’s swallowing blood. It’s too thick for anything else. I’ve seen men die. “Lucas, I’ve been—” he coughs. “The rat—” He chokes his way through his words. “The Manetti rat is—”

The line dies and the message ends. The lady is back asking me if I want to listen to it again.

I’m numb. I’m blinking in confusion, I’ve got a sludge bag for a brain and my thoughts are slowing to a steady stop. I replay the message. I listen to my father dying again. I listen to the sounds of where he is again. I listen and try to understand this rage building in me. I listen and try not to hold back the tears. I listen and want to crush this confusion in me but am unable.

The ravens pass over me and I hang up the phone.

I scream up at the moon, unable to think that anyone else other than Tommy Russo is responsible for this.

Chapter 17

Sophie

Forthesecondtimetoday I’m being torn from darkness. Luca pulls me awake and is shaking my body.

“C’mon. Up,” he says, calmly and yet forcefully.

I open my eyes and all I see is the rage of the man he was on the jet ski, except it’s contained now. His eyes are like tigers. His teeth look as if they could rip me apart, but instead of doing so he’s pacing back and forth. “Out of bed, now.” He points to the floor like I’m some kind of dog.

“Luca? What’s going on—”

“Why?” he says calmly. His eyes are dangerous. He picks up the bowl from the bedside table and goes to smash it, but doesn’t. His body is shaking with anger and I can see he’s trying his hardest to contain it. “Why did you have him killed?”

“What?” A trickle of fear tickles the back of my head. “What are you—I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say. I creep across the bed and try to hold him but he steps back.

“Don’t touch me,” he says flatly. Like a slap. “Why’d you have my father killed?” he says, finally revealing what’s enraged him.

My eyes go wide and my heart sinks. “Luca! When did this happen? I don’t—”

But Luca bats my touch away again. I can see his face growing red, but he keeps his calm. He goes to speak, but then doesn’t. He paces away and then back, his hand raised and shaking. A pointing finger at me. I can see him fighting to not break down. All I want to do is hold him…

“I just—I’ve gotta know Sophie, why’d you have him killed?”

“I didn’t have him killed!” I shout, then cover my mouth in shock. The surprise of it has made my heart race. “We’ve just been here together? Like, when could I do this?”

But Luca is still pacing, shaking his head. The whole thing feels obscenely bizarre with him still in his speedo. “Luca, please put on some pants—”

“You can’t tell me what to do!” he hisses. He growls and opens his phone, pressing it towards me with the loudspeaker on. “Listen to it,” he says. He comes to the bed and presses it into my hands. “Listen!”

“I will,” I cry, as tears come quickly and my heart races. I can’t believe he’s saying this. “I just don’t understand—”

“Neither do I,” he says. “But trouble seems to follow me when you’re around Sophie.”

The phone starts playing its message. It’s really eerie and there’s some heavy breathing I can’t really make out. I’m watching Luca as I listen, the color drains from his face and it’s like a knife is twisting in his heart. “We don’t have to listen,” I plead.

“We must,” he utters.

The phone is being fumbled with by someone and I hear Luca’s father talk. He’s saying Luca’s name and something else… Then he goes away. It comes back briefly then goes away, finally it comes back. He sounds like he’s got no energy. He’s trying to tell us something… the rat? The rat what?

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