Kiss Of Death: A Dark Mafia Romance

Nero

The second she hangs up the phone, I’m fighting back blinding rage. I try to call her back, but the line has been disconnected. How could she do this? I launch the phone across the room with a roar. Gio is standing silently beside the door, arms folded over his chest and a frown pinching his features. Jackson is sitting on the couch. I called him in because I don’t want Gio’s rational, diplomatic advice right now. I want blood. I want fucking war and Jackson will give it to me.

“She’s only twenty miles from the base,” Gio places an iPad on the coffee table. A small red dot blinks in and out on a map. When we first caught Una in Paris, we knocked her out and I had the doctor place a tracker in the back of her neck. She’d never notice it, and I’m hoping the Russians won’t be looking for trackers on her. “Even if we could get to her, Nicholai will have ground forces that close to the base. It would be a suicide rescue mission.”

I’m completely helpless and I can’t stand it. I tell myself this isn’t over, that we can still fight, but damn it, she surrendered without even telling me. And she went behind my back, so I have no plan, no way of getting to her. She cut me out and now I’m left standing on the outside while she takes my child into an impregnable base with a guy she’s openly admitted is crazy.

“Find a way of contacting Sasha,” I tell Gio. He’s good with computers and hacking shit. I’m sure he can find a way to get a message to the guy. He may well be our only way of contacting Una now. Gio nods and leaves the room.

Jackson glances at me. “What are you thinking?”

“Get your guys together and contact Devon. I want them ready to go tomorrow morning. We’re going to burn everything Russian to the ground. You want a fucking rat, you smoke him out.” Devon is my other New York capo, loyal and lethal. None of the guys will need asking twice when it comes to fucking up the Russians.

“On it.” Jackson gets up. I pour out a glass of whiskey and he hesitates in the doorway. “We’ll get her back, boss.” Then he leaves.

I hope he’s right, or I’ll bring the bratva to its fucking knees with my wrath. After all, without her, without my child, what do I have to lose?

I stand in front of the inconspicuous looking brick building on the Lower East Side, settled between two restaurant chains. A passerby wouldn’t look twice, but I know better. Leaning against the hood of my car, I lift a cigarette to my lips, inhaling a thick cloud of smoke. My mind constantly drifts to Una, wondering what he’s doing to her. It’s those thoughts that feed my rage, like constantly pumping oxygen onto a blazing inferno.

Jackson comes around the corner of the block and casually strolls over to me. “Might want to step back,” he says with a wicked smile. We round my car and duck down behind it. A couple of his guys use the car parked behind mine to take cover. Jackson hands me the primitive looking cell phone. I hold down the one for several seconds, and then, the street behind us erupts. The bang is so loud it makes my ears ring. Windows blow out on the nearby buildings, and heat weashes over me

Jackson throws his head back, laughing manically. “Roasted Russian anyone?”

I push to my feet and watch the inferno of flames engulf the small brick building. The fire spreads, reaching for the restaurants on either side. People run down the street screaming while others stagger out of the restaurants. No one leaves the Russian club, and that’s because Jackson rigged it with enough explosives to bring down a building twice its size. Low and behold, the roof suddenly caves, sagging inward before collapsing in a flaming pile. A secondary explosion makes the ground tremble. I round my car, climbing into the driver’s side. The window is smashed from the explosion, but I don’t care. This is just one of twelve different attacks happening all over the city. Nicholai thought he could just take what’s mine, that there would be no consequences, well, this is the consequence. I do not care for repercussions. What more can he do to me? He has taken everything, and I will see that Russian fuck bleed out all over the New York concrete, even if it’s not his blood.

I call Cesare as soon as we’re a few streets away from the blast. “Nero,” he says when he picks up, his voice coming over the car speakers. Jackson stares out the window, deliberately trying to look as though he isn’t paying attention.

“Nicholai has Una.” My voice sounds far calmer than the white-hot rage that’s burning me from the inside out. “This is a courtesy call. Perhaps now would be a good time to call your Russian contacts.”

“What are you going to do?” he asks carefully.

“I’ve already made a start, but I’m going to burn everything the Russians have to the ground. You tell them that for every-fucking-day my woman and my child are not with me, I will kill a Russian woman and child.”

“No. You go too far. She is Russian! She is Elite.”

“I never told you about what Nicholai has planned for my child, did I?” Silence. “He’s going to turn it into the ultimate soldier, raised from birth to be a weapon for the bratva.”

He clears his throat and I know that as much as he hates Una, he hates the idea of a child of Italian blood- his blood- fighting for the enemy. “Let me call Dimitri. I can reason with him.” Dimitri Svelta, high up in the bratva with links in the Russian government. He’s as corrupt as they come, but corrupt I can deal with. Nicholai’s outright insanity cannot be reasoned with.

“The bratva have allowed Nicholai to do this for years. He has built them an army.”

“I can speak to them about the child, but she is Russian, Nero,” he says, as though she belongs to Nicholai, a piece of property to be bought and sold.

“She is mine. That baby is mine. And I wasn’t asking permission. This is what I will do. Stand against me and I will unleash your secrets, old man. Try to stop me and you will make yourself the enemy. Pass the message along to Dimitri.” I hang up and lean back in my seat, slamming my foot over the accelerator.

“So we’re at war?” Jackson asks.

I nod. “A war the likes of which the Russians have never witnessed.” I glance at him. “I ask you to walk into a bloodbath. Are you with me?”

“As if you even have to ask. I’m the only fucker who might almost be as sick as you.” He snorts. “We’ll get Una back. You’re a damn site more manageable when she’s around. I mean, I’m down with the blood and bodies, but Cesare is probably shitting on himself right now.” He laughs and I shake my head.

Cesare had better pull through, because right now, I’d take his fucking head without blinking.