A Dark Place (a Tomb of Ashen Tears Book 5) Read online

  She cries. “Juliet…”

  “Yes,” I mutter. “It’s time.”

  “Is Mass coming home with him?”

  I nod. “It’s already been decided. The school will close.”

  “Jesus! No! Deacon!”

  “He doesn’t want it without you,” I painfully confide. “It was all for you, and things are so fucked up right now. He isn’t expecting you to come back to him. And I can’t blame you if you don’t. Not after the punches you two have thrown at one another.”

  “I’m just as much to blame as he is,” she acknowledges. My brows lift high as their reconciliation seems more like an uphill battle in a blizzard than a happy reunion in the making. “He cannot close the school.”

  “Then, I guess I take you home to Texas for a meeting with a madman.”

  She carefully sits on the floor of the shower. “I want to curl into a ball, but that is physically impossible.” Goblin’s burgeoning curve sends a clear message that this baby is coming, whether she is ready or not. “Can I have Lani deliver? Assuming he didn’t kill her…”

  My eyes flick to hers. “You can have whatever you want, including Lani.”

  “Who called the hit off?”

  “Things happened, Iris,” I mutter, leaning against the wall. “And they don’t matter. The only thing that matters is getting you out of here.”

  “There is going to be hell to pay with Sal.”

  “You will get through it all,” I say like it is just another day at the office trying to keep two mafia bosses in love and not killing one another. “He did shit wrong. You did shit wrong. But if you two don’t talk, there is no way to get from here to Eden.”

  “Does he still love me?”

  “… How could he not?”

  She rolls her eyes. “Because this whole thing started with one little lie.”

  “Yeah, that one little lie fucked things up, but you can recover from this,” I claim with the hope I am not sure even I possess. Lie to cover the lie. “You just have to want this love enough to fight for it.”

  “I’ve proven that I’ll fight for Sal,” she whispers. “This is about surviving him.”

  “Not fight for Sal,” I reprimand, putting my hand on her belly. “Love enough to fight for the whole package—you, Sal, and the baby.”

  “After almost thirty-two years, you want me to start loving myself?”

  “If you don’t start soon, this ain’t ever gonna work.”

  Quiet tears fall over her cheeks as she tilts her head back to the wall. “And if I can’t?”

  “Then you let two Masters love you more.”

  “You should say three.”

  I smirk. “Fair enough.”

  His Butterfly

  We leave the Montesino mansion, and I spot the vans. I close my eyes as Deacon grabs my hand. They’re moving bodies, cleaning up my mess, and making the crime scene nothing more than a memory.

  Janitors of the underworld.

  Gotta love ’em.

  In the back of a limousine, we travel down the mountain for the long ride to Rio, where we’ll spend the night and take a commercial flight out in the morning.

  My Dear Husband made plans.

  I end up sleeping most of the trip to the lavish hotel until I hear Deacon on the phone. I keep my eyes shut. I don’t move.

  “I’ve got her,” he quietly says. “You need to calm the fuck down.”

  I take a breath, praying to slow my racing heart. He is talking with Sal, and I long to yank the phone from his fingers to give the bastard a piece of my mind.

  But why?

  It won’t do any good.

  He is who he is.

  And I am who I am.

  “She’s beautiful,” he boasts. “And her belly is growing with life.”

  I try not to smile at how proud Deacon sounds. He shouldn’t be. No one should be proud of the things I’ve done.

  No one considered how arranging a marriage between a Raniero and a Nakamura didn’t necessarily equate to a peacekeeping treaty. And just because love existed didn’t mean it could thrive in the harsh climate of our respective tragedies.

  The Dark Prince was broken.

  The Lotus was broken.

  A happy life with the white picket fence was a pipe dream smoked up by some quacks in a backroom filled with layered clouds of nicotine and guns strapped to their sides.

  The reality is grim and far darker than their deals in the early dawn.

  Sal is by all accounts, a Capo, serving The Commission and their tidy band of thugs, Nero. The mafia funds Sanctum, who appoints priests for positions for a steep stipend. Their treasurer happens to be rubbing my fingers while talking to his boyfriend—my Dear Husband—in the most intimate of tones.

  “I am taking her home to Texas tomorrow,” he claims. “She’ll be safe there.”

  I imagine scavengers hovering low on the horizon, waiting to pick apart what remains of my innards. Safe is such an elusive concept. By whose standard? Certainly not mine. In the last four months, I have managed to piss everyone off.

  Kill Rat, Allegiance, Reckless Rebellion (or at least Trudy), The Brethren, Cinco, La Morte, Sibyl, Je Suis, the investors of Etienne are all at odds with my opinion, and that doesn’t even touch on the houses of Herrera, Montesino, Cristos, Boudreaux, Campanelli, and Raniero.

  Ahh, yes…there he is again, Salvatore Raniero.

  I peek my eyes open to catch a glimpse of the rock on my finger.

  Iris Nakamura Raniero.

  Mrs. Salvatore Raniero.

  I dreamed of marrying the man on the other end of the phone for so many years. I dreamed of being with him and having children with him and living a pleasant life together.

  Keywords: being with him and together.

  I have not seriously talked to Sal in four months.

  I disappeared, changed my phone number, and cut myself off from the man I love. I left out of necessity and couldn’t return because of circumstances beyond our control.

  And I can’t go back.

  It’s such a short time, and yet, everything we thought we knew…everything we thought we believed in…every fear turned into regret…and every love turned into a lie.

  “I love you too,” he says, too simply. Why can I not have that with Sal? He’s my fucking husband. How quickly I forget, he is Deacon’s too. “I’ll be there soon, baby.”

  Oh. Fuck. You. Both.

  3

  A Not So Innocent Saint

  His Butterfly

  With elaborate geometric patterns reminiscent of the sixties, the modern hotel proves to be everything I expect and more. The quaint boutique atmosphere dulls the spastic degradation of the last twenty-four hours.

  Expectations are fickle things when you’re the boss of one of the most powerful crime syndicates in the world. People continuously pander, saying, and doing things they would never do, because they exist in fear. I scare people.

  And they should be—terrified.

  Deacon opens the curtains to the beautiful dusk. I spot the Corcovado—Christ the Redeemer—statue in the distance as my hand lays on my belly. I move closer in his silence, and my fingers press against the glass. For the first time in what seems a long time, I miss him.

  I wonder if we can ever find redemption in our corruption…

  Or will we wander until caught off-guard?

  There is always a bigger fish, a better shark, a faster sailfish, but the goal ultimately remains the same—to keep playing the game. Whether the match offers serene seas or choppy currents of a raging hurricane, we must strategize those obstacles.

  Foresight provides strength, tenacity, and drive.

  Anticipating the inevitable.

  Predicting our opponent’s moves.

  From behind, Deacon gathers my hair and tosses it over my shoulder before wrapping his arms around me. His hand lays on top of mine, but I quickly move to put his palm against my belly. He nuzzles my neck. “Are you okay, pretty girl? Do you need anyt
hing? Anything at all?”

  I desperately want to say that I need my husband, but I cannot say those words. I’ve lost the right to ask for my lover. He isn’t doing well, and the last thing he needs is my additional stress. Better to hide from the fact that I have no fucking clue what I am doing than ask for help and admit defeat.

  “Is he…okay?”

  “He is Sal,” he replies. “This hasn’t been easy on him. None of it.”

  “Will he recover?”

  “I won’t allow anything less,” he maintains. “I’m taking him back to Texas to straighten his ass out. He served his initial time for Nero. He owes The Commission and Sanctum nothing, if anything they owe him. He is no longer in the red.”

  Pulling my hand away from his, I lift it to the window too. “Because he chose to be covered in blood.”

  “The blood of men who deserved their fate.”

  “You can believe that,” I whisper, bracing my hands on the glass with my fingers widely spread apart. With tears in my eyes, I stare at the statue in the distance. “But he is still a killer.”

  “He was always a killer.” He kisses my cheek. “And so are you.”

  “What right do I have to be raising a child, Deacon?” I plead, needing his guidance to overcome the mental dilemma. “You’re a Saint, so explain it to me.”

  He snickers. “I am the Saint of a Devil, sweetheart. I’m no angel.”

  “You’re not a demon either,” I argue, arching forward and pressing my ass into him. “You’re better behaved than we are.”

  “Meh,” he mutters, guiding his hands to my hips. “That is debatable. I like my fists.”

  “And your crowbar,” I remind, slowly rocking against him. “Are you going to raise the baby as your own?”

  “He is mine, Iris.”

  I hold back the emotion of loss. I don’t want to share Deacon Cruz with anyone. Sometimes not even his lover. But I do because I am still madly in love with a boy I met in a barn. I am jealous—of a baby—and it is ludicrous.

  I spin to face him. “And what of his mother?”

  He steps closer, breathing on my lip. “Stop worrying,” he soothes, sensing my instability. “I will love you forever.”

  Our lips meet with a greedy lust as his hands smooth over my cheeks. His warm tongue slides into my mouth and my fingers grip his hair. I don’t know what we’re doing. We’ve managed to avoid this for months. But on the cusp of life-altering choices, we need one another like never before.

  Hungry savages caught in the wrath of rapture.

  We frantically move as my hands pull off his shirt, and my fingers skim over scars and ink. “I will never get over this…with you.”

  “Then don’t.”

  In his arms, I laugh, “Is it that simple?”

  “It’s that fucking simple,” he declares, taking my hands and kissing each finger. “But I won’t pick you up and take you to pound town against the window.”

  “Because it’s not your place?”

  “Nah,” he simmers with a snarl. “Because you are almost eight months pregnant.”

  I smile and offer, “So take me to bed.”

  “Things are already a mess without getting busy.”

  Leading the way, I pull the strings on my dress. It falls to the floor, and I crawl onto the bed before rolling over and spreading my thighs. “So make it messier.”

  “Jesus, fuck…Iris.”

  Dampening my fingers in my mouth, I dip them into my slit and display the purchase. “Mr. Cruz, your vessel is waiting.”

  “You’re such a fucking cock tease.”

  I fall onto my back and stare at the ceiling. “Just as I was years ago.” The snap of his belt sends an unexpected shiver through my spine. “God, I want to be spanked…whipped…fucked into next year.”

  “Soon,” he says, setting his palms on my knees. “But you should be careful what you wish for lil girl.”

  His hands ease underneath my bottom, and he pulls my ass to the edge of the bed. He secures my feet to his shoulders and rapidly thrusts his thick, swollen cock inside my wetness. My lack of sexual activity with this man lends to his feeling even more pronounced than I remember. I writhe and moan, “I am getting fucked by a God.”

  “With Jesus watching on…” he counters with a grin. “Are you walking to the holy land to pray?”

  “I’m no pilgrim, Deacon.”

  “Then I’m fucking a golden Goddess,” he snarls, deep within my womb. “Give me grace.”

  My eyes blink to him. “Have you done something that would require grace?”

  He stops pumping, and his blue eyes summon my attention. “… I exist.”

  I gulp down his words, understanding the depth of his anguish. “Are you going to tell him?”

  “It’s not my job to confess your sins,” he growls. “That is on you.”

  “He won’t get mad at you, though.”

  “He isn’t going to be mad at you for this.” He slows to a languid pace, slicking every inch of his cock in my dew. “He is angry at you for lying.”

  A defiant giggle erupts from my lungs. “What else was I supposed to do?”

  “Oh, gee, I don’t know,” he mocks, irritated. “Tell him the fucking truth for once?”

  With snobbish regard, I sass, “Are we having hate sex?”

  “Not yet, but we could be.” He cascades his fingers over my legs. “This is me loving my lover’s wife because he told me to.”

  “You motherfucker,” I snap through gritted teeth. “I hate you!”

  He snorts. “Damn right. I am your biggest weakness, and he’ll play that card—me—on you every fucking time.”

  I turn away and close my eyes as he continues pillaging my body. I don’t stop him; he feels too good. But it doesn’t mean I must acknowledge their swindling plot to get my ass home. His fingers clasp beneath my chin, forcing my face to his, and I hiss, “Don’t pretend to be a Saint.”

  “I never said I was,” he gently replies. “I said I was his. And I will always be his. Just as you are his.”

  “You flew thousands of miles to do his dirty work. Keep his holiness’ hands pristine. You are nothing more than his grifter,” I scathe. “He should be here, but he isn’t…So, where is he?”

  “He had work to do.”

  “Bullshit, Cruz,” I call him out. “The Capo is fucking terrified of seeing me.”

  He smirks. “You’ll see him soon.”

  “Not soon enough.”

  “Just pretend I am him,” he suggests, nipping at my calf. “And everything will be fine.”

  I am so full of rage as I spitefully say the words to sink into his heart. “Too late for that, I already am.”

  I don’t expect the swat to my bottom or the clench of his fingers in my ass. “Stop it and behave. You have been a very naughty Lotus for months.”

  “… And you are issuing the punishment for him?”

  “I am just the opening act.”

  Deacon Cruz, you are anything but.

  His Master

  “I don’t think you understand, Dom,” Deacon mutters on the phone. “Iris doesn’t believe they can repair the damage.”

  “Where is she?”

  “Sleeping.”

  From the chair in my study, I rhythmically rock, gazing out at the night sky with stars sprinkling through the old oaks. The house is quiet, the kids are asleep, and Megan went to take a bubble bath with Oki. She calls it girl time. I call it having fun with Iris’ half-sister.

  I stroke my chin, trying to come up with a reasonable solution for the marriage that should not have happened. At least, not the way it did. We needed time to make preparations and anticipate the unimaginable. Not a fly by night, rush to the chapel and get hitched ceremony.

  Nakamura. Raniero.

  A nightmare merger.

  While the piece of legal documentation may not seem like much, the opposite is true. The marriage represents a scheming, powerful dynamic duo, pairing together to divide and conq
uer the criminal underworld. Everyone fears the next fifty years will belong to the Nakamura and Raniero show.

  If I have my way, they aren’t far off.

  Always bet on Nero.

  “… Can you get Boston home?”

  “Yeah, I’ll get him home, but I can’t promise what happens after that.”

  “I know, he may need a hard reset,” I say, spotting the lights from the car pulling up in my driveway. “I got company.”

  “You okay, Junior?”

  “I’ll be fine, Baby Saint,” I assure, expecting the visit. “Call me when you land in Texas. I’ll swing by for a chat.”

  He pauses as I stand up and peek between the slats of the blinds. “Should I be concerned about this chat?”

  “Just some intel I’ve come across,” I inform. “I need you to decide how we want to deliver the news to Sal.”

  He snickers, surprised. “You’re letting me decide?”

  “You know more about what he has been through in the last few months than I do.”

  “That means a lot to me.”

  “My deference?”

  “Your respect,” he replies. “Thank you.”

  “Bye, son, I love you.”

  I end the call before he can respond and rush outside to greet my visitor. “You aren’t going to be happy,” Rachel says, exiting the vehicle. “This one is a doozie.”

  I hired the private investigative team of Rachel Jackson & Associates to dig into some suspicions I had concerning the future of Juliet.

  With Anna stepping down on January 1, 2020, she appointed her poster boy to oversee her life’s work. Sal will be the interim executive director, but he doesn’t really want it, especially now, with all he has going on. But there isn’t much alternative either.

  “Were you careful?”

  “Exceedingly,” she says with conviction. “I worked this case personally. No one has any knowledge of what is in this case file, so I beg of you to be cautious about who you share it with.”

  “The only two people who are going to know are Deacon and Sal.”

  “You’re going to trust Cruz after playing for the opposing team for months?”