Alessio Falcone and Isabella Vitiello meet in the midst of chaos where the war between families leave marks and demons that haunt their nights, now with peace sealed between them and many unfinished business, they must try to resist the strong attra...
Blood on my shirt, rose in my hand You're lookin' at me like you don't know who I am — Teeth, 5SOS
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— Alessio Falcone
The marble never dried fast enough. That was the problem with beauty, the way it held stains, the way blood clung to the veins of the stone, refusing to disappear. The theater, stage of a recent carnage, had cost too much for whoever hired us, but for us, just a few hours and ammunition. Almost three in the morning, and the Falcone mansion still pulsed with a dark energy, half of us unable to sleep — the women's out of being too scared and the men out of dealing with the carnage.
The last few days had been a rope stretched to its limit, waiting for the snap that might never come. Luca Vitiello, his son Amo, and his consigliere Matteo had taken part in torture sessions. The last one with a fervor that surpassed the others. A week later, the task was still not finished.
I pushed the chair back and rose from the metal table, peeling off the latex gloves and tossing them into the corner. The man in front of me had stopped screaming thirty minutes ago and was gradually regaining consciousness, to his misfortune and our amusement.
I leaned against the wall letting out a heavy, tired sigh as I massaged the left side of my shoulder, stiff from the position I'd been holding, the weak light of the bulb burning overhead. My hands are still dirty. I washed them three times. The dried blood insists on staying in the cuticles, in the lines of my palms, under my nails. I don't know if it's the mercenaries' blood or mine. I don't know if it matters. Remo is in the next room, the door ajar. I can hear his voice cutting through the air like a blade. He's talking to my father about the Canadians we discovered are linked to Ward Markov, the Bratva is moving faster than they should be. The spy we had killed thanks to Aurora and Carlotta's help wasn't the only one, there were other infiltrated soldiers who had been responsible for the invasion.
The basement door burst open with a bang. Nevio came down the steps like a mad, frantic hurricane. The personification of the madness and instability that defined him, a blend of boredom and pleasure that most would mistake for pure insanity. Massimo came behind him, wiping the blade of his knife on the side of his pants as if he'd just been cutting fruit.
"How much longer?" Nevio asked, his eyes fixed on the bound man, then on me, with the expression of a butcher sizing up his next cut.
"I think this one's redundant," Massimo said simply, tossing the knife into the air and catching it by the handle.
"Not yet," I replied.
"Not yet?" Nevio repeated with a half smile, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. "You're going soft, cousin."
"Don't start, Nevio, not everything is an amusement park."
"They're the same thing when you take longer than necessary." He clicked his tongue and walked past me picking up the knife that was lying on the table.
