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

  But this is more akin to mediating in a frantic disco—projecting prisms shower the walls, prancing asses shake in tight gold lame, bubbling jubilation overflows in crystal stems, and white lines etch with the sharpest of cut. My mental topography hijacks my attention away from the intended purpose.

  I’ve got Post singing about the attire on his dick as the sun shines on the cobbled streets of Frosinone. The town is southeast of Rome, and it just so happens, Mass has an incredible villa on the outskirts.

  He isn’t here, but off in Palermo with Skeeter. Rowan is in Ireland, dealing with Kill Rat business. And Cruz…well, he is in my bed with my wife. Or he was when I left at seven.

  Damn beautiful day for a run.

  I’ve been Mr. Iris Nakamura for about a week.

  Holy crap, I don’t know shit.

  I thought I worked a lot. I thought I kept my crap organized, but it’s occurred to me that I’m not in the same league as my wife. She is nonstop on the phone with her brother, Masa, in Japan. Business meetings and conference calls from Southeast Asia to the Middle East and back again for a quick stop in Canada…damn.

  The new question is—how do we merge?

  Don’t say in the sheets. That’s easy enough. This shit is far more complicated and dynamic like a French croissant with boundless paper thin, fragile layers.

  She is the Lotus Queen, and I am just a gangster.

  The difference is like playing chess with marbled pieces versus a makeshift version of checkers with pebbles from the gutter. I understand the language of her business, but its assemblage is so far from anything I’ve ever done.

  She has a fleet of ships.

  What the fuck is that?

  Not one ship, but a fleet of ships is like a gaggle of geese, a kaleidoscope of butterflies, an army of mercs willing to lay down their lives on her call.

  I deal in crates.

  Cheap. Wooden. Pallets.

  I have three guys I trust.

  I work in the slaughterhouse she owns, swinging the butcher knife tucked in my smock. I’m covered in remnants of blood, tissue, and bone.

  I’ve become what I feared.

  And my most important job—the warehouse of our lives—is in keeping her safe. The Unholy is finally doing what The Chairman wanted, security detail. It would be a lot easier if my asset wasn’t a hot mess of hormones and expanding flesh by the minute. Don’t get me started on her figure.

  I won’t keep my pace with a boner from hell.

  Mama tits are a real thing.

  Holy. Fuck. Me. Jesus. They. Are. Good.

  Passing by the bakery, I wave at Ronaldo. He and his wife own the place, which feeds my wife’s ever-growing carb addictions. I am not stopping today. Today is all about me. I need to mentally clean up from the explosion of her entrance into my world.

  I knew she was a workaholic.

  I just didn’t know how bad her addiction was.

  My fondness of snow (among many fetishes) pales in comparison. So I refuse to stop for bread, desserts, or the napoleons she adores because I’ll get sidetracked with Ronaldo and a conversation over espresso, which will rapidly deteriorate into a time sink of eating a feast of meats and cheese from the place next door that his brother owns.

  Italy equals two things—food and sex.

  Anyone who denies it is lying.

  I’m not complaining.

  Mass would complain if he knew the stains I had to clean up at his place.

  I’m taking Iris and Deacon to France tomorrow via Norway. Yes, I know that’s out of the way. Lars and Hilda Hanson want to meet my royal wife because she’s a rare specimen, like Henney, the elusive white unicorn.

  We’re scheming with the Hansons, David “Marshall” Hope, and Yumi “Tai” Kim because I contracted them to do security at Les Pétales while I am off playing killer in the dungeon of some old Italian mission.

  Oh the irony.

  Between my trainers (Lars & Hilda), Kaci’s quasi-father (Marshall), and my inaugural sex parter (Tai), the trip will earn its name. And I’ll need to take a trip as soon as we’re done. It’s not that I don’t trust Deacon to watch after my busy (busty) wife. I do.

  But Iris is a motherfucking handful.

  The whole thing sends a wave of nausea up from my belly, burning my throat, and I stop in the alley near the bakery for a smoke. Don’t judge.

  Let’s just say, seeing the girl who took my virginity is weighing heavily on my shoulders. Two tons worth of boulders to be precise. This shouldn’t bother me. I am a twenty-nine-year-old man, and the event on my father’s conference room table happened thirteen years ago.

  Does it matter?

  Only because it will give one person insight that I’m not ready for, and it isn’t Iris. Arguably, Mr. Cruz knows me better than anyone and meeting Tai bridges a gap that exists between him and I. The connection back to Kaci.

  So off to Norway, we go.

  Tomorrow. Not today.

  Not today.

  Uncomfortable and awkward and too much past.

  Pulling out my earbuds, I cough and spit as my hands press against the old bricks in the tiny back alleyway.

  “Are you okay?” Ilaria asks from the back steps of the bakery. “You need some water?”

  I shake my head. “Nah, I’ll be fine.”

  “How long have you been out?”

  “Since seven,” I answer.

  She checks her watch and hands the towel hanging on her apron strings to me. “It is almost noon.”

  “… Is he here?”

  She smiles as my life stabilizer peers out the door with a coffee in one hand and a smoke in the other. “Did you think I wouldn’t come, Boston?”

  “I figured I could avoid you until tomorrow.”

  Dom moves out into the alley, and I take the cup from his hand as Ilaria disappears with a smile. “You aren’t doing this without me.”

  “Tell me you left Meg at home with Oki…”

  “She is with Finn, Romeo, Raine, and the darling present of a hostess you randomly sent to infiltrate my house and bed,” he giggles, stroking his chin. “Payback will be hell for that one, Raniero. Kade and Mae are with Serene.”

  I chuckle like the devil. I knew he wouldn’t keep out of Oki. I almost didn’t stay out of Oki. “Good.”

  “And everyone is safe in Texas at Scarlet House except for Jaid who refuses to leave Colorado. I sent her brother to help contain the wretched pre-teen that Merritt has become since Abel is playing ball.”

  “Blame Merritt’s father…and mother,” I mutter, backtracking. “Wait! You sent Nicky to the mountains?” I question. “Oh. Lord. Help. Us. All.”

  We moved them. All of them. Into Anna’s house. Juliet is now the encampment for wayward children of mafioso.

  Because my wife…

  How do I say this without being an asshole?

  My wife initiated a divisive strike against Cinco for their attack of The Dollhouse and their former “parent” company, Immortal, owned by Mexican cartel king, Juarez “Muerte” Herrera.

  Iris didn’t know that I had called Gabe Herrera and kindly requested they pull their funding on Cinco, and I didn’t know her plans of a midnight siege. By the end, over a dozen of Muerte’s men would be dead at the hands of one of my associates—Iris Nakamura.

  Twelve dead from Amber in the Sonoran Desert.

  Fourteen dead from Iris at the Immortal compound in Mexico.

  The God of the cartel is going to get pissed off soon.

  When he issues retribution, it won’t be on Amber—the contractor, or Iris—the Lotus Queen, but me. Muerte will be coming for the Raniero son because he will think I was responsible for initializing the attacks.

  No, just two, uncontrollable, crazy bitches I happen to know.

  Association is enough for a death sentence in the eyes of a ruler like Muerte.

  For our honeymoon, the lovely and brilliant—God, how I love her—Mrs. Raniero started a war between Lotus and Immortal. And…get th
is…she had the balls to invite Muerte over for a visit to Les Pétales. He’ll love the macarons and Cava. And I’ll be a quick stop along the way. He can pop me off and grab a plate of ratatouille Niçoise and spaghetti with my lovely Anglo-Asian wife.

  This is gonna be fun, a delightfully good time. I’m sarcastic and bitter—an angry motherfucker that any of this got started in the first place.

  Just call me Nero the Black.

  Or, he who cannot control his women.

  I’m going to spend the rest of my life cleaning up the corpses she leaves in her wake. I’ve become her janitor, and all the while, I’m running my own LSR business and playing niceties to Sanctum because I like their banker…fucking my ass—hard.

  Let’s clarify; I love Deacon Cruz fucking my ass hard.

  My stress level is no longer on any chart. It is exospheric, out there in the last recesses of atmospheric psych noise. We’re going to blow soon, a volcano worthy of Pele raising the dead and sending out liquid lava minions of epic proportion.

  So I run. Faster. Harder.

  Fuck my ass harder, Cruz. Fuck it. Fuck it good.

  Call me your bitch and slap my ass when you do it.

  I’m hoping for wisdom and praying for one minute of peace.

  I have had close to three hundred minutes of serenity as my feet strode along the broken cobblestone, but it isn’t enough. It will never be enough.

  Addict, much?

  I slam the remaining contents of Dom’s cup and steal his smoke as I walk back towards the bakery’s open door. “Where are you going?”

  “To have a chat…”

  “With?”

  “My priest,” I hastily snap.

  He grabs my elbow, and I spin back. His slender fingers pull the Bollé sunglasses from my face. “You look like shit.”

  Avoiding his gaze, I snicker, “Am I supposed to look good?” I veer my eyes back to his and hiss, “My wife is fucking insane!”

  “Your wife is protecting what is hers…”

  “The Dollhouse was never hers,” I argue as his fingers poke into my chest. My damp shirt clings to my skin, and the assertive move sends a skip to my heart trapped beneath the cage. It’s been a very long time since Master Dom disciplined any of my infractions. “You are hers. And she will do anything to protect you.”

  “I don’t need protection.”

  A slight smirk upturns on his lips. “If that were true, you wouldn’t have called your Daddy in the middle of the night, son.”

  My nostrils flare. “There are times when I hate you, you son of a bitch.”

  “Then we’re even.” His brows lift high as I shove the cup at him. He takes it and drops his hand to his side. If there were anything left, it would’ve poured out. I leave the cigarette dangling between my lips. “You aren’t going to win this one alone, Sally boy.”

  “I never planned on it,” I remark, agitated. “But I thought we’d have half a fucking second to catch our breath.”

  “Then you clearly didn’t get the message that you heisted the Lotus, married her on a drive-by, and narrowly escaped on a private jet. You ran.”

  Taking one final drag, I toss the butt down. “What else was I to do? Stay for the fallout?”

  He shrugs. “It doesn’t matter what you did. You didn’t start this one. They did. Someone in the Cinco or Immortal camp wants Iris dead. You married her to put Commission protection on her, but I am not sure it’s enough.”

  Neither am I.

  Which is why I brought in Lars, Hilda, Marshall, Tai, and Madeline Grace. She’s robbing Sibyl resources to keep one safe, and her exorbitant bill is ten times what I am paying Mass to watch over me.

  “You want me to put her in a fucking turret? Buy her a castle just to hear her scream?”

  “She bought her own castle,” he reminds. “And the walls won’t be to keep her in, but to keep you out.”

  “Gee…thanks.”

  “Do whatever the fuck you got to do to keep her safe. If she falls, you…and Cruz will fall apart. And then this rapidly becomes my fucking problem. You know that, and you are scared. That is why you called me, begging in the middle of the night—Help me, Master. Help me.”

  “This is bigger than I can handle.”

  “No,” he laughs. “It’s not. You’re letting your head junk get to you.”

  “This is the shit you’re made for, Sal.”

  I snarl. “Say that to the girl running her shit like a bullet train.”

  He lifts his hands. “Different methods, same destination.”

  Taking a deep breath, I watch a couple of young kids riding their bikes in the distance. To have that kind of innocence, to be that free, I have never known it. I was born watching my back with a switchblade in my diaper. And that morphed to a Glock in the harness beneath the sweat-wicking shirt, but it doesn’t change facts.

  I do not know freedom.

  Violence follows me like a dark shroud.

  While the money, houses, cars, women, drugs, and all seem like I run the show, life clips wings.

  Life hosts the game.

  “And if I fuck this up?”

  “Is that possible?”

  “There is always a first time, Sir.”

  “That’s my boy,” he praises with a spark in his eyes. “Never get cocky. Never show your cards. Never give them more than they deserve. And never forget who is on your side or that you call the shots. All you have to do is ask for help, and you’ll have a thousand people kneeling and ready to serve you. Run this bitch like you own it. The bitch does not run you.”

  “How do I run my wife?”

  He snorts. “Run that bitch like you own her.”

  I let the snark slide. “And when she revolts and causes a rebellion?”

  “Shut her down. You hold the strings. Not her. This isn’t Iris’ game. This is your game. Sal’s Game. We are all just lucky enough to play on your board. We’re thankful you share because you could shut it all down if you wanted to. Remember that.”

  I wipe the sweat from my face. “You sound an awful lot like Kaci sometimes. You know that?”

  “Could be because I taught her everything she knows.”

  I lean my back against the building and breathe. “I’m Kaci with a cock?”

  “No, you’re much better than she ever was,” he assesses with a solid stare. “You take the rules of old; bending, and twisting them into neo-rules. You break the mold. You are a creator, not an executioner.”

  Propping a foot on the wall, I chuckle. “Who is the executioner?”

  “One holy Saint follows the devout order.”

  “And provides the Dark Prince a lighted path to excellence through the repeated pummeling of his asshole?”

  “Not quite,” he snickers. “But close enough.”

  “… Use him to do my bidding?”

  “If you don’t, you’re foolish.”

  “And if it falls apart?”

  “I’ll glue you back together,” he promises, grabbing my hand. “And because I love you, I’ll glue Cruz back together too.”

  “What about Iris?”

  “Lotus, don’t break.”

  “No, they wilt and rot in the water,” I muse with a smirk. “Only to cycle back again.”

  “She has inherent forgiveness neither of you do. Wind and fire are quite destructive forces, Salvatore.”

  “So is water…hurricanes, tsunamis, blizzards, floods…”

  “Water is life,” he interrupts, patting my belly. Her belly. My baby, Baby Raniero. “Water is life.”

  “As is my Master.”

  6

  Steal Some Tarts

  The Master

  “What do you want to do?” Father Quinn asks in the backroom of the bakery as I repeatedly stroke the length of a cigarette. I’ve become the modern-day mafioso. We don’t meet in the dark of night at the deli, but in broad daylight amidst the smells of yeast, chocolate, and morning coffee.

  I pop the cigarette in my mouth and fire up th
e lighter. “Why are we discussing this now?”

  Fuck what anyone thinks they know; they don’t know shit.

  “The re-emergence of interest in Iris’ side project. We can shut down Etienne or sit back and quietly observe from a distance until their moves force our hand. Whatever we do, we need to act soon.”

  “… Is this decision necessary today?”

  “Salvatore, you’re going on a Norwegian holiday tomorrow, then dropping your lovers in France like a bomb, and returning to Italy to fight for anchoring in Sanctum. You aren’t going to have time to decide. I need a final verdict,” Quinn warns. “Not to mention, I am worried about Iris using Rowan to do her dirty deeds and getting Kill Rat back in her good graces. Rowan has a chip on her shoulder now.”

  “She always had an ax to grind with those who killed her father.”

  “Campanelli funded it,” Dom reminds. “By Serene’s instigation, I imagine.”

  “But why?” I ask, rocking in the chair. “It still doesn’t make sense.”

  “It may never make sense, Boston.”

  “Whatever her reasons, Father Byrne is no McPhail,” Quinn says. “The few connections he does have in the Middle East and Africa are dubious at best.”

  Quietly, I listen to the briefing on mafia news. Running my finger along the edge of the table, I inquire, “Who am I fighting, though?”

  “Yourself,” he counters. “You need to prove yourself worthy to you. No one else matters here.”

  “It’s just another job,” I scoff. “Another hit. Another body.”

  “No,” Dom mutters under his breath from across the room. The pallets of flour surround him on either side. It’d be the perfect place to kill someone. Not Dom. “It’s not.”

  I furrow my brow, and with an insulting tone, I quiz, “What do you know about it?”

  From his back pocket, he pulls out his wallet and flips the black fleur-de-lys on the table. My eyes dart up to meet his scrutiny. “… You?”

  “Do you think Massimiliano Vidal recruited you?”

  “Yes,” I succinctly answer. “I did.”

  Dom walks around the room and props on the table beside me. “I’m not just another pretty face.”

  “When did you join Nero?”