Bastiano Romano: A Standalone Mafia Romance Novel (The Five Syndicates Book 4) by Parker S. Huntington (36)

After a slew of other funeral events—some several months long of traditional death rites activities, I’d been told—the highest level Made Men convened at L’Oscurità, which had shut down for the night.

The staff was still there, and I’d agreed to bartend for the night. I’d barely seen Bastian since this morning. I wanted to check up on him, but at least he looked better than he had last week.

Bastian sat in a corner booth with Niccolaio and Asher as I tried to keep up with the mountain of orders.

The woman who’d left with Damian earlier took a seat in front of me. Tessie had called her Renata.

She glanced at Frankie, Gio, and Eli Romano before returning her amber eyes to me. “I’ll take a whiskey neat. Single malt Scotch.” She slid her sweater down her arms, hooked it on the hook beneath the customer side of the bar top, and met my eyes with her eerie amber ones. “Macallan if you have it, please.”

“I have a 35-year-old in the back…”

“That’ll do.”

I slipped into the cellar and leaned against the wall, giving myself time for a breather. Bastian met me within seconds, like he’d been watching me all night, waiting for a moment when I’d be alone.

“You okay?”

I glanced up at him. “I should be asking you that.”

I felt like I had no place in the bureau’s world. After being surrounded by Made Men all day, some who shared the same blood or last name as me, I was starting to realize I had no place in this world. I needed to find myself—to discover who I was without all these outside forces. I’d always been good at following my duties, but in all of that mess, I’d lost my sense of my duty to myself.

He took a step closer, his tailored suit making him appear lethal. “I’ll be fine. We’re supposed to be celebrating Vince’s life tonight, so I’m trying to force out everything negative.” He took the place next to me against the wall. “Fuck, it’s hard.”

“I don’t think it’ll ever be okay.”

He shot me a look. “Thanks.”

“I think you’ll learn to live in a world without him, and it will be your new normal, but when you stop to think of everything you’re missing without him, it’ll never feel okay.” I turned to him and stepped between his legs. “But that’s okay. It’s part of the grieving process.”

He placed a hand on my lower back, just above my ass. “What about you? Have you grieved your mom?”

The answer came instantly. “No. It’s why I want you to grieve Vince because torturing yourself like I do… it rips something from your soul.” I didn’t want the pain I felt for Bastian. I sighed when I remembered the drink I had to get Renata. “I’m supposed to be grabbing the Macallan.”

Bastian pressed a kiss to my lips before releasing me. I dug through the bottles for the Macallan, and by the time I found it, he was gone. I took it up to the bar, poured Renata a glass, and slid it to her. She tipped me six one-hundred-dollar bills, then wandered down the bar as Damian walked in.

I forced my breaths to level as he approached me, settling in the gap between a bulky enforcer and an overly made up mafia wife.

“Ms. De Luca. Penny for your thoughts?”

Hearing him say our last name so casually had me coiled for a fight. Goosebumps dotted my skin. The hair on the back of my neck might have been raised. My limbs had tensed to the point where it was difficult to move.

I ran a rag across the bar top then poured him a beer on tap, though he hadn’t ordered. I just needed something to do to expend my nerves. “I like to think they’re worth more than that.”

“A barter it is.” His voice dipped lower. “I’ve had one hell of a month or two. Giovanni Romano has been asking about a girl poking around his territory. Imagine my surprise when my last name slipped past his lips.”

Gio had been asking about me?

I dug my heels into the ground, doing my best to force my anxiety out of me. “It’s just a last name.”

“Cut the shit, De Luca.” He had a hard glint to his eyes, one that didn’t surprise me in a man who’d dethroned his own father. “You share my last name, yet I’ve never heard of you. Why is that?”

I worked my mind for a way to deflect. He’d basically just warned me Gio had asked around about me, so I latched onto it.

“Why would you give me a heads up about Giovanni?”

“Answer the question, or I’ll answer it for you, and you won’t like my answer.”

The enforcer to Damian’s left shifted, and Damian turned to glance at him. Renata and Damian made eye contact past the enforcer. I shifted my eyes between the two of them, knowing this was my opportunity to slip away to the other end of the bar.

My eyes caught Monica at the door as she waved at Dana’s oblivious replacement. I couldn’t catch a fucking break. Bastian stared at me from his booth, so I bit back my curse and smiled at him. He studied me for a moment longer before turning back to answer something Asher had said.

I racked my mind for a way to play damage control as Monica strode right to Lucy’s table. She sat in the center with her best friend Aimee and Niccolaio’s girlfriend Minka. I couldn’t hear what she said from here, but Monica waved her hands in wild gestures, her angry eyes squinting and her blonde hair falling from her top bun.

This would escalate before anyone even noticed she was here. Instinct made the decision for me. I slid out from behind the bar and sped my way to them. Monica was raising her hand, and I caught it just before she slapped Lucy.

The silence descending on the bar unnerved me as I released Monica’s wrist. We had everyone’s attention. Every dangerous mafia caporegime. Every enforcer. Every wealthy businessman and politician. Everyone.

I tried to pass Monica off to security as quickly as I could while Bastian took long strides from the corner booth to meet me.

“You always surprise me, De Luca.” His eyes skated over my body, cataloging it for damage. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.” I remembered I wasn’t supposed to know who Monica was. “That chick is nuts.”

Would I ever be able to tell the truth with him? I longed for the day it’d be just us. No lies, no pain, no guilt between us.

“That’s an understatement.”

He pinched the fabric of my dress at the hip and tugged me closer. I wasn’t sure if it was intentional, but up until now, every intimate interaction we’d had had been done in secret. I felt the eyes on us as he pressed a kiss to my forehead, and the grime of the lies slid off me with just one kiss. He could bottle it up and cure death with his kisses.

I took a step back. “You should go back to your table.”

“Why?”

“For one, everyone is staring, and this night isn’t supposed to be about drama or me. It’s about Vincent.”

He stepped back and stared at me. “You’re different.”

“Than?”

“Than what I’d thought you’d be.”

Than Elsa.

I saw the thought in his eyes. She’d damaged him, and I wanted to press my hands on him and put the pieces back together in a way that would fit mine.

“I’d hope so. You hated me when you met me.”

In the corner of my eye, I caught the security guards talking to Monica at the door. She was three seconds from getting kicked out, so I urged Bastian back to his table. I needed to follow Monica. It blew my mind that no one else in the bureau thought releasing her was a huge risk. The woman was insane.

I skimmed my eyes across the bar, making sure no one noticed me before following Monica as she fled through the front door. My flat boots kept my footsteps silent, but I shook in the cold, my little black dress not covering enough skin.

These shoes were not made for following. I dodged a puddle, and my shoes made a small skid noise. Monica tensed and swerved into the nearest alleyway. Dumb move. She’d only blocked herself, and for the first time in a while, I was geared for a fight.

I followed her into the alleyway, picking up my speed because she knew I was behind her anyway. The moon barely lit us both as she swiveled around to face me.

“Stop following me!” She had wide, frantic eyes. Crazed.

I tried to call her down. “Monica—”

“How do you know my name?!” God, she sounded terrified. Recognition dawned on her face as I took another step closer, the moonlight hitting me from a different angle. “You’re from the bar. You’re one of them.”

When I took another step closer, she yanked a gun from her waistband. A gun. I knew she was a risk to release. Her hands shook as she pointed it at me. She looked like she’d never held a weapon before.

The small gun wavered in her hand. “Don’t move.”

Less than a foot separated us. I considered the distance between us. I could latch onto the gun, twist it down and away from me until her finger broke in the trigger, and grab her gun. It would hurt her, but it’d likely save us both.

I did that, satisfied by my swift movements and training. Seconds later, I had the gun pointed to her face.

“Calm down, Monica. I’m with the FBI.”

Someone broke past the shadows with a Smith & Wesson pointed at Monica just as the words slipped past my lips. I spun the weapon to him, freezing when I caught sight of Bastian’s face.

He hid it well, but he was thunderstruck. Bastian had been burned before, but I had a feeling I’d just eviscerated him. I opened my mouth to explain, but there wasn’t coming back from this. I’d always be the girl he let into his heart against his every instinct only to betray him on the day of his uncle’s funeral.

We were destined to fail from the start, but it didn’t hurt any less.

Damian chose that moment to stride into the light with his gun drawn on Bastian. I shifted my gun to him, trusting him less than I’d trust myself. Yet another weapon brushed the back of my head, and my pulse quickened as fear and borderline exasperation filled my throat.

I shifted a little, considering my options.

A light tut stopped me. “Don’t bother.” Renata Vitali. I recognized her voice. “Don’t bother. I’ll shoot you, then your boyfriend.”

There are things you see when your life flashes before your eyes. I saw the empty one-bedroom apartment that wasn’t even mine. I saw my cleared-out cubicle at the local FBI field office. I saw my funeral, the five or so people who still knew I existed scattered around the graveyard grass, not a tear in sight.

What I didn’t see was any of my family’s faces. I saw Tessie’s, tears streaming down her chubby cheeks, screaming my name. And I saw Bastian, his eyes thunderstruck and the breath stolen from his lungs, whether at my betrayal or the impending loss of my life, I didn’t know.

And that struck me the most.

Why did that sting so bad?

Damian lowered his weapon, the trust in that movement shocking me. “Ren…”

Monica fled as soon as Damian’s weapon lowered, and Bastian started after her, but I shook my head. “Don’t. She has an ankle bracelet. What she knows, I can… I can figure out a way to explain to my boss.”

Bastian stopped. He stayed. Which meant, to some degree, he still trusted me. It should have felt good, but it only hurt more.

Renata cocked her gun behind my head. “Your boss. And who would that be?”

Damian took a step forward. “Renata—” He sounded like he wanted to stop her. Like he wanted to protect me.

He wouldn’t hurt you.

Gio’s words from the night of Asher’s wedding filtered into my head.

“Didn’t you hear her? She’s in the FBI.” Renata’s cold voice dripped disdain, and I considered, for the first time, that Damian wasn’t the threat. She was. “This can be a Vitali matter if I make it one. Choose your words wisely.”

Bastian dropped his gun to his side. I stared at him until he secured it in his holster, wondering why he was risking himself to save me.

“What do you want?” He cocked his head, then shook it. “What’s the Vitali position here?”

The Vitali policed all mafia syndicates across the globe. I didn’t know much about them. They kept themselves in the shadows, but that only made them more formidable.

I felt the gun lower behind me, and I was tempted to make my move, but Bastian shifted his head. A slight no. I listened to him.

“We’ll be watching from afar, so long as you can deal with this internally.”

Bastian took a step closer. “What’s the catch?”

“There will be consequences should you mishandle this.”

He nodded his head at her words and jerked his head toward the entrance of the alley. My eyes stayed on him, not even glancing at my half-brother as I brushed past him and followed Bastian.

The adrenaline had worn off. Exhausted weighed me down as Bastian led me to his car, and I was speechless as I took a seat in the passenger seat beside him.

“You’re a liar.”

“I am.”

“Elsa’s a liar.”

“Please, don’t compare me to her.”

God, this hurt. I had no flesh left in me with the way the pain clawed beneath my skin, kicking, scratching, forcing its way through my body. He’d compared me to Elsa. He hated Elsa.

He hates you.

Bastian had been driving back to his place, but he swung his sports car to the side of the road and stopped. I held my breath as he turned to face me.

“The truth. Now.”

“I-I—”

“Faster. My patience is extremely thin right now, and I don’t have the time to sit through your fumbling incompetence.”

Jesus.

He hated me.

He has every reason to.

The words stumbled past my lips, as fast as I could speak them. “Damian is my half-brother. My mom had an affair with Angelo De Luca. She ran away before he found out. My aunt said it was to keep me away from this life. My mom died giving birth to me. My aunt raised me, and she died of cancer a few years back. I’m a… I’m a…”

“Spit it the fuck out.”

“I’m an undercover FBI agent. My boss sent me to find intel on your family, and Vince—”

“You don’t get to say his name.”

I gathered the nerve to look at him. “He knew who I was and what I am, Bastian. I… I saw him before he went missing. He came to me and told me to open myself to you. He said I’m the Jupiter to your Ganymede.”

Pain. Confusion. Anger.

They all flashed across his face. I’d hurt him. I’d hurt the only man I’d ever loved—the only person I’d ever truly loved in my life. I’d stabbed him in the back, but it felt like I was the one who’d gotten stabbed.

“You’re not Jupiter. You are a snake.” His eyes became slits, and when he spoke, his voice was cold. Detached. “I’ve learned my lesson in the past. Second chances are for fools. I’ll take care of the Vitali and your brother because I clean up my messes, and you’d be an embarrassment for my family. Then I’ll wipe my hands of you. I’ll wipe you from my memory, and I’ll wipe you from my future. I don’t want to see you again.” A sob tore through my throat as he pressed a button, and the butterfly door swung up. “Don’t let the door hit you on your way out.”