Scorned Obsession (Scorned Fate)

Two days passed after the club fire. Everyone was on edge. I saw Sandro for a few hours yesterday and he hadn’t come home overnight. I hadn’t seen Divina since then either. If Tommy turned on Sandro, Divina would, too. If that happened, Gian would become boss.

There was nothing else for me to do. I could only organize the kitchen so much. We had enough groceries. The house was clean. I didn’t feel like walking the property. I could feel Sandro’s men were split about blaming me for the club fire. At least Sticks kept them in check, and Miller still smiled at me.

It was midmorning, and I was moping over coffee. What freaking timing. Everyone was turning against him just when I was coming around to being married to him. And if staying married to him meant he had to remain boss, then I wanted him to succeed. He didn’t spell it out to me, but it was the only way.

The pressure would be off Tommy. That would make Divina happy, but would Tommy be fine with it?

The sound of car doors slamming reached my ears. It was faint, but I also heard voices. Sandro? My heart raced and I rushed to the foyer. It rattled against my rib cage when Raffa and Griselda walked in.

Again?

The same men in suits who were with him the other evening flanked Raffa’s sides. An older gentleman in spectacles, wearing a button-down shirt and khakis, was with them. The fact that he looked nervous fueled my swelling anxiety. I recognized him as the mob doctor who tended to Renz.

But what worried me was the absence of Sticks and Miller.

With difficulty, I pushed the words out of my mouth. “Is Sandro okay?” Was he hurt and they were bringing him here to be treated? My secondary concern was if they were coming to pick me up because he was dead. Please, oh please, let Sandro be all right.

“Sandro is fine,” Raffa said.

I glared at Griselda. “You can’t be here without my invitation, remember?”

Her malicious smile made my throat tighten. “Where’s Sticks?”

One of Raffa’s guards grinned, revealing a gold tooth. He also had a scar across his right eye. “He’s takin’ a nap.”

“What did you do to him?” I shrieked. Fear compounded with anger propelled me forward. “What is this all about?”

“I think I’m getting the wrong end of the bargain. Sandro’s not close to fulfilling the requirements of your marriage.”

“Is this about consummating the marriage again?” I snapped, but I was glaring at Griselda because, for whatever reason, she appointed herself as my tormentor. She was the instigator who started this whole drama. “Well, I’m sorry to inform you I’m not a virgin and we don’t have a bloody sheet to prove it to you!”

Raffa sneered. “Such a shame, really. I didn’t think about that when I agreed to Sandro’s terms.”

“He’s trying hard to help this family survive. And if you’re going to blame him for the club fire, then blame Gian for starting this clusterfuck.”

“You were the one who gatecrashed the Rossi gathering,” Griselda snapped.

I glared at the gold-toothed soldier who prevented me from shoving Griselda out the door. “Get out of my way. I don’t know what you did⁠—”

I never finished my sentence. Gold Tooth and another soldier grabbed hold of my arms and started hauling me farther into the house.

“Are you nuts?” I struggled, stumbled, and slammed into the console table. The vase of sunflowers crashed onto the marble floor. This time, their merry faces did nothing to quell the insidious dread inside me.

And as my feet dragged across the floor, I watched Griselda crush their beautiful blooms under her heels.

“Get your hands off me!” I screamed again. The desire to claw at Griselda’s smug face warred with my worry about Sandro and his men.

Gold Tooth stopped and whispered in my ear, “It gives me great pleasure to have my hands on you. I want to do more, just like what your husband did to my eye.”

“I don’t know what the hell is going on?!” I punctuated my yelling with profanities. I fought them even when my arms felt like they were getting yanked out of their sockets. “Sandro won’t stand for this!”

They wrestled me into the study where Gold Tooth shoved me into a chair, took out his gun, and pointed it at me.

“What’s going on, Raffa?” I hated how my voice sounded thin and thready.

“You think I don’t know that Sandro was going to shoot me the other day?”

I narrowed my eyes at Griselda. I fucking hated her. She didn’t say a word, but the gloating on her face told me everything. I had to do damage control.

“Listen to me, Raffa. Whatever Griselda saw, it wasn’t Sandro’s intent. He admitted this to me after I questioned him about why he drew his gun. You know him better than this. Otherwise, the Rossis wouldn’t trust him with important jobs.”

“And has he told you of these important jobs?”

“No. But he has a reputation,” I retorted, trying to regain bravado. “So, what’s this visit about? Are you all afraid to ask Sandro about his intentions that night?”

“This here is our mob doctor.” Raffa made a vague wave and the man in spectacles stepped forward. In his hand was a briefcase.

Confused, but with a sense of growing terror, I said, “I’m not sick.”

“No, you’re not, but he’s going to check if you’ve had sexual intercourse in the past few days.”

“What? And how? Sandro and I used a condom.”

Then I realized my mistake when a cruel smile slashed across Raffa’s face. “Then Sandro is in violation of our agreement because the agreement is to make you pregnant. To breed an heir and join our families. And if there’s no effort toward that goal, then your marriage will be annulled. You will marry Gian and you can forget when you’ll see your family.”

“It may take more than three weeks to get pregnant!” I was on the pill and obviously I hadn’t taken it since captivity.

“But it’s not helping if you use a condom, right?” Griselda put in, while checking her nails. While pretending that what they were doing was not beyond unhinged. She turned to Raffa. “I told you Sandro won’t touch her. He thinks of her like a sister. And that’s why he’s protective of her.”

“Sandro wasn’t honest about our deal, was he?” Raffa asked.

“The three weeks? He was. Including the agreement to make me pregnant.”

“Three weeks was what he told you, but I can extend it depending on my satisfaction at seeing your father suffer.”

“You sick son of a bitch.”

He leaned in the direction of the mob doc who seemed uncomfortable with the situation. “Maybe you should wash her mouth after this.”

“You know who my father is?” I yelled at the doc. “You touch me against my will, not only will you lose your license, but he will destroy you.”

“Don’t listen to her,” Gold Tooth said, pointing the gun at the doc. “Get it done.”

“You guys are beyond barbaric!” I was still yelling and trying to get out of the chair, but more men were holding me down. There were three of them now. “I already told you we used a condom.”

“I’ll give you a taste of what to expect until you give me proof Sandro is breeding you,” Raffa said.

“You’re insane!” I screamed, and I continued screaming like a wild animal in the fight of its life.

“Remove her pants,” Gold Tooth told one of his soldiers, then leered at me. “Maybe I can have a taste, eh?”

Angry tears finally spilled down my cheeks. This was a nightmare. I flashed backed to when I lost my virginity to Warren. It was nothing compared to this. That time I wanted to lose it and backtracked, but this time I was being touched without consent. Bile rose in my throat.

Hands grabbed at my sweatpants.

“Noooo!” I kicked Gold Tooth and almost got him in the groin. Angered, he drew back to pistol-whip me.

Until half of his head exploded.

Sandro

I moved through a mist of red and systematically dispatched the three soldiers holding my men at gunpoint. Sticks was lying on the ground, but he was slowly regaining consciousness. Raffa’s men should have kept a checkpoint at the entrance of the driveway.

They watched our Expedition approach complacently because I had Gian drive with Arnie beside him.

Arnie got out first to obscure my movements. I exited the SUV, gripping two silenced nine-millimeters with a semi-auto shotgun slung across my chest. I quickly got off three rounds and dispatched those motherfuckers.

I rushed into the house, shooting the guard in the foyer and the one standing right in front of the study. I tried not to read too much into the forbidding omen of the ruined sunflowers. That I wasn’t too late.

What greeted me when I stepped into the room turned the red haze into a bloodbath.

I ejected the magazines from my nine-millimeters and shot two soldiers with the chambered rounds. Then I tossed those guns and went for my Benelli M4 shotgun.

The people in the room were only noticing my entrance. The asshole in front of Bianca was about to strike her with his gun, not realizing he had lost his men. That was the advantage of suppressed gunfire.

But I needed this finale to quench my thirst for blood.

The shotgun boomed, and his head exploded like a watermelon.

I stepped into the room, pointing the barrel at the doctor. I spared him. For now.

I spared Raffa and Griselda. For now. Training in military-type kill houses honed my skill to identify and separate immediate threats from civilians.

I had half a mind to shoot Raffa and end his miserable existence, but my wife was in shock.

Blood and brain matter had splattered over Bianca.

“Did he touch you?” I nodded to the doctor.

“I didn’t. I didn’t,” the doctor cried.

Bianca sprung out from the chair and dove into me with a choked sob. With my arm around her, I aimed my gun at the doctor’s head. “Did. He. Touch. You?”

“No,” she mumbled.

“Get out of here.” I motioned to the doctor with my shotgun. He didn’t waste time scrambling out of the room.

I turned my gun on Raffa. “All your men are dead.”

That was when I noticed Arnie. He stepped forward, “Boss…”

I ignored him, my finger tightening on the trigger. “Tell me why I should let you live.”

“Go ahead,” Raffa sneered. “You were going to shoot me, anyway.”

“I wasn’t going to kill you. So you throw a tantrum? Well, that tantrum has cost you all the men you brought with you.”

“Sandro!” Griselda gasped. “They are our family!”

“And Bianca,” I enunciated, “is my wife. Two of them were here when I gave the warning that no one disrespects her. It’s an insult to me. This goes beyond disrespect.”

“So, what are you waiting for? Shoot me,” Raffa said. “Then you can do whatever you please.”

Bianca touched my side. “Don’t give Raffa further ammunition to mess with our lives.”

“He’ll be in his grave.”

“And he’ll have the last laugh and mock you from his grave.” Goddammit. Why did she have to make sense?

“You already took out eight of our soldiers,” Arnie tried to be the voice of reason. “You take out the Blind Don too and the Rossis won’t come back from this. The commission will get involved and morale will sink further.”

“I’m within my rights⁠—”

“As I was within mine!” Raffa shouted. “You threatened me. You coward. You threatened a blind man.”

“Then come after me and not my wife!”

“Then you’re even, Sandro,” Arnie said. “Bianca’s not hurt. They didn’t touch her.”

“She has bruises on her,” I roared. Red welts in the form of fingers circled her wrists. Bloodlust was still a riptide inside me. Killing eight men wasn’t enough. “She’s covered in blood!”

“I’m fine.” Bianca’s soothing voice washed over me and she tightened her hold around my torso. “Help me get rid of it.” She paused. “You all better leave.”

Griselda, who wouldn’t look at me until then, glared at Bianca. “You ruin everything!” she screamed. “You’re like a cat who always lands on her feet!”

“Griselda…” I warned. I was at the root end of my patience. If I were inclined to kill women, she would be at the top of my list.

I heard a growl of fury, before I realized Bianca had shoved away from me.

“You fucking bitch,” my wife snarled before launching herself at Griselda.