BLOODY MAFIA #1: Connected by Honor

Chapter 1

3 YEAR EARLIER

ARIA

I was curled up on the sofa in our library, reading, when a knock sounded. Liliana my youngest baby sister's  head rested in my lap and she didn't even stir when the dark wooden door opened and our mother stepped in, her dark blond hair pulled back tightly and fasted in a bun at the back of her head. Mother was pale, her face drawn with worry. 

"Did something happen?" I asked. 

She smiled, but it was her fake smile. "Your father wants to talk to youin his office." 

I carefully moved out from under Lily's head and put it down on the pillow. She drew her legs up against her body. She was small for an elevenyear old, but I wasn't exactly tall either with five foot four. None of thewomen in our family were. Mother avoided my eyes as I walked toward her. 

"Am I in trouble?" I didn't know what I could have done wrong. 

Usually Lily and I were the obedient ones; Gianna my most rebellious baby sister she is elder than Lily was the one who alwaysbroke the rules and got punished. 

"Hurry. Don't let your father wait," Mother said simply. 

My stomach was in knots when I arrived in front of Father's office.After a moment to stifle my nerves, I knocked. 

"Come in." 

I entered, forcing my face to be carefully guarded. Father sat behind hismahogany desk in a wide black leather armchair; behind him rose themahogany shelves filled with books that Father had never read, but actually the shelves hid asecret entrance to the basement and a corridor leading off the premises.

He looked up from a pile of sheets, grey hair slicked back. "Sit." 

I sat down on one of the chairs across from his desk and folded myhands in my lap, trying not to bite on my lower lip. Father hated that. Iwaited for him to start talking. 

He had a strange expression on his face as helooked at me. "The Russian Bratva and the Taiwanese Triad are trying to claim our territories.They are getting bolder by the day. We're luckier than the Las Vegas familiawho also has to deal with the Mexicans but we can't ignore the threat theRussians and the Taiwanese pose any longer." 

Confusion filled me. Father never talked about business to us. Girlsdidn't need to know about the finer details of the Mafia world, that's what we'r taught, we'r just assets to our father, the kind of asset he can use whenever he want to tie with any other familia person to streghten the bond that's it. 

"We have to join our hands and make peace with the New York Familia to rest andcombine forces if we want to fight back the Bratva and the Triad." 

Peace withthe Familia? Father and every other member of the Chicago Outfit hated the New York Familia. They had been killing each other for decades and only recentlydecided on ignoring each other in favor of killing off the members of othercrime organizations, like the Bratva and the Triad. 

"There is no stronger bondthan blood. At least the Familia got that right." He continued and I frowned."Born in blood. Sworn in blood. That's their motto."I nodded but my confusion only grew."I met with Salvatore Vitiello yesterday." 

Father met with the Capo deiCapi, the head of the New York Familia? A meeting between New York andChicago hadn't taken place in a decade and the last time hadn't ended well. Itwas still referred to as the Bloody Thursday. And My Father wasn't even theBoss. He was only the Consigliere, the adviser to Fiore Cavallaro who ruledour the Outfit