Inferno (Blood for Blood #2) Page 21

  A muscle feathered in his jaw. He swallowed. ‘I’ll stare at you if I want to.’

  Why did I feel so hot all of a sudden? It was like my lungs weren’t filling up properly any more. ‘Did you get all the glass out?’ I asked, changing the subject.

  Luca dropped the cloth so I could see the scrape just below his cheek. It wasn’t deep but it was still bleeding a little. ‘I don’t know,’ he said softly. ‘I can’t see.’

  I rose to my tiptoes, and without really thinking or meaning to, I moved closer to him, teetering unsteadily as I tried to examine the wound. His aftershave rolled over me and I inhaled the scent.

  ‘Well?’ he asked, his voice suddenly husky. ‘Will I live?’

  ‘I’m not sure. Let me take a closer look.’ I bit back my smile and craned my neck but swayed on my toes, falling into him. I pressed my palms against his chest to steady myself and his hands shot up, covering mine. I could feel the unsteady thump of his heartbeat beneath my fingertips.

  I stared at our hands – my paleness beneath his smooth olive tan – his fingers dwarfing mine. My whole body faltered. I could sense him watching me, waiting for me to look into his eyes.

  I couldn’t step away from him. In fact, the closeness of him wasn’t nearly enough. Slowly I raised my gaze. Luca’s smile tugged softly at his lips.

  ‘Maybe I am looking at you,’ he whispered. ‘Maybe I always have been.’

  And then he kissed me.

  It was slow and gentle at first, our breathing unsteady, as he combed his fingers through my hair, pulling me closer. My lips parted, and I felt his tongue brush against mine, searching, wanting more. Desire made us braver, fiercer, and I fell into him as our kiss deepened. In that moment, with the warmth of his lips on mine and his heartbeat hammering against my fingertips, it felt like coming home.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  THE INTERRUPTION

  A knock on the door shocked us apart. We jumped away from each other, eyes wide, and panting.

  What the hell were we doing?

  This was weird. This was so weird.

  But it hadn’t felt weird.

  Nic charged into the room. ‘Luca, what the hell is taking you—’ He almost toppled me over. ‘Sophie … there you are … What are you doing in here?’ he asked, surprise warping his voice.

  ‘Me?’ I said, hearing the high-pitched squeal in my words. Oh, just betraying you. ‘I was checking the damage you did.’ I cleared my throat, wondering if my cheeks were still red, if my lips were swollen. ‘He’s OK, no thanks to you.’

  ‘It’s fine,’ said Luca. He was scrubbing a hand through his hair, trying to tame the unkempt strands. It was hard not to blanch at how uncomposed he sounded now, how flighty his breathing still was. ‘She took the glass out.’

  ‘Right,’ said Nic, eyes narrowed. ‘Sorry about that.’

  There was a very long, very deep silence, during which time I imagined Nic barging in five seconds earlier and decapitating Luca. What was I doing? What was I feeling? Everything. My whole body was pulsing with every possible emotion all at once, and it was making me forget myself, and the danger my family and I were still in.

  Stupid. I was being stupid.

  ‘Don’t worry about it,’ said Luca. He flicked his gaze to me. It was unreadable.

  It had been less than a minute since we were gasping between deep, lingering kisses, and now it felt like he barely knew who I was. Did he regret it? Did I? Was he freaking out too?

  ‘Let’s go,’ said Nic, standing between Luca and me, so that his brother left the room ahead of us. ‘Everyone’s waiting downstairs.’ He looked at me when he said, ‘You’re going to be fine. We won’t make you and your mother face the Marinos alone. You don’t have to look so worried.’

  ‘Worried’ was a colossal understatement.

  I had just kissed Nic’s brother.

  I was going to hell.

  I pressed a trembling hand to my heart. I was swirling in a pit of my own foolishness and trying to keep my mind from replaying the kiss that had swept me out of my world and made me forget my name.

  Holy crap.

  I had kissed Luca Falcone.

  Luca Falcone had kissed me.

  What …?

  We were on the second floor. When had we come down the stairs? Luca was still in front of us, his shoulders sloping away from me as he walked down another flight. ‘Where’s Valentino?’ he asked over his shoulder.

  ‘In his office,’ said Nic, with a shrug. ‘Something urgent came up.’

  Luca nodded without turning around, his feet falling quick and light on the steps as he hurried away from us. When we got to the bottom of the stairs, the foyer was swarming with mafiosi. I stalled with my hand clutched tightly to the banister. Old men with gnarled faces and engraved walking sticks milled beside younger counterparts with severe eyebrows and pursed lips. The level of attractiveness was definitely unnatural. There was an abundance of enviable olive skin and luscious dark hair.

  And all this for little old me.

  Before my life got sucky and dangerous, I barely answered my mother’s calls and I rarely checked my voicemails. The Falcones, on the other hand, seemed to be entirely reachable. They had come at once. Now they stood shaking hands and greeting one another in the foyer as the sound of their laughter echoed around them. It was hard to listen to what was being said – what greetings and stories were being exchanged – because most of the Falcones, especially the older ones, spoke in Italian. No one noticed me as I stood at the foot of the stairs. This was power and family rolled into one, and the strength of their bond seemed to fill the mansion up, reminding me of just how alone and vulnerable my mother and I truly were.

  Councils, Nic had told me, were a common occurrence, but Sanctuary was not. In the history of the Falcone dynasty he had heard of only one appeal for Sanctuary – a wealthy bootlegger back in Sicily who was in trouble with a rival mob and came seeking refuge for his young family from Luca’s great-grandfather. But I was a Gracewell, with no wealth to offer. I wasn’t even Sicilian. And the cherry on top of the murdery cake was my ever-present status as niece of the man who had likely stabbed Calvino Falcone and daughter of the man who had shot Angelo.

  Luca got lost in the crowds, shaking hands and kissing cheeks, widening that ever-growing space between us and leaving me wondering whether I had imagined our entire moment upstairs. Gino and Dom passed me by. Dom winked and I flipped him the middle finger.

  Felice appeared and started to usher everyone down a hallway. Luca was leading the pack, making niceties with an old man with white candyfloss hair, his arm offered to a stooped lady with leathery dark skin.

  Nic stuck by me and that only made it worse. I sent a quick update minus-the-kiss to Millie while guilt twisted like a knife in my gut. Still, there was so much distrust between Nic and me already that part of me rebelled at the idea that I should feel bad at all.

  I was shuffling after him, following the procession of Pantene hair and expensive suits, when someone called my name.

  I turned on my heel.

  Valentino was in the middle of the foyer.

  Nic lingered beside me until Valentino waved him away, and then he disappeared, dutifully, like the good soldier he was.

  Valentino’s gaze was hooded, his lips drawn tight; his mood wasn’t good. Felice had obviously delivered news of the Marino plot to take his family out.

  He was dressed well, in a dark suit and tie. He wore a thick gold ring on his right hand. I noticed it when he used his finger to beckon me towards him. I went, because he was the boss, and we both knew I needed something from him.

  ‘Hello,’ I offered, realizing he wasn’t going to break the silence first. I stood far enough away so we could look at each other straight on.

  ‘Hello?’ he repeated, his mouth twisting to a frown. ‘Is that all you have to say?’

  OK. He was mad.

  ‘Look, I didn’t realize my coming to you for help would cause all of this.’
I gestured behind me. ‘That really wasn’t my intention. I just had to try something. After what Donata—’

  ‘Sophie,’ Valentino cut in. ‘Did you really think I wouldn’t find out?’

  I brought my hand to my mouth and covered it. Were my lips still red and swollen? Had he seen somehow? Were there cameras in this place? ‘W-what?’ I stammered.

  ‘And you have the gall to sit in that room with the entire Falcone family and expect Nic to vote for your Sanctuary.’

  ‘I—I, no, I haven’t. Nic wants me to be safe, just like I want him to—’

  ‘You know, I suspected something,’ he said, cutting me off again. His voice was acidic. ‘But until just now, I didn’t know what it was.’

  ‘Look, I’m here for one reason only. I’ve given your family information, and I’d really like if we could keep the topic to that, and that alone.’ My chest was full of butterflies frantically beating against my ribcage.

  Valentino rose from his chair, stretching his back and cracking his neck. It clicked, the sound echoing in the silence. ‘I won’t keep this secret for you. Not in a thousand years.’

  Well, fine. He could tell Nic. I needed the damn Sanctuary, and that’s what mattered. ‘OK,’ I said. ‘I get it. You’re mad. The others will probably be mad too. But I’ve come here for my mother and me, and that’s what I’m focused on right now.’

  ‘Sei pazzo.’ He was looking at me like I had sprouted horns. He pointed behind me to where the others were waiting. ‘If you walk into that room, I can’t be responsible for what they’ll do to you.’

  OK, harsh much? Nic might be pissed when he found out, but I doubted a ton of the other Falcones would revolt. Did they really care that much about each other’s outside relationships? Or had I misread how deeply their codes ran? My mind flicked back to my mother, to how Donata had bent her over that sink with a gun to her throat.

  ‘I’ll take my chances.’

  ‘Felice might shoot you point-blank in the head.’ His response was so dramatic, I thought it was a joke but there wasn’t an ounce of amusement in his voice – it was musical and lilting, yet his words were ice cold. He was expressionless, studying my reaction as he added, ‘I won’t stop him.’

  ‘Felice?’ Alarm quickened my pulse. I was starting to get the feeling we were on different planes. ‘Why the hell would Felice care?’

  ‘Don’t be so ignorant, Sophie. You’ve insulted my intelligence enough already.’ Valentino’s sneer did ugly things to his face. Luca’s face. He was ruining Luca’s face. ‘Felice will care the most.’

  I knew I could never predict the temperature of Felice’s reactions – or his actions, for that matter but something definitely wasn’t adding up. The hostility in Valentino’s gaze was too strong, his words too severe. ‘Wait …’ I said, edging closer, watching him as he was watching me. ‘What are you talking about?’

  He didn’t miss a beat. He didn’t even blink. ‘You know what I’m talking about, Sophie.’

  Did I? Unease grumbled inside me. I steeled myself, determined, afraid, ready to get this over with. It was just one kiss. One stupid mistake. If he had something else to say then he could say it, but I wouldn’t play this game with him, not while my mother was at home waiting for me. ‘Just let me plead my case.’

  ‘You will have to, now that I have you.’ Valentino’s eyes narrowed as he came towards me, the wheels of his chair gliding soundlessly over the Falcone crest beneath us. ‘You’ve sealed your death sentence by coming here.’

  ‘Maybe,’ I said, turning to follow him and trying not to show my fear at his words. ‘Maybe it was sealed either way.’

  Without turning around, he said, ‘There’s blood on your face.’

  In the darkness of the long corridor, I furiously scrubbed my cheek with my fingers, removing the smudge of Luca’s blood that had imprinted on my skin during our kiss.

  At the very end of the hallway Valentino tapped once on the door. He dropped his voice, and in barely more than a whisper, he said, ‘For these last minutes, you have your secret and your life. Enjoy them while they last.’

  Goosebumps rippled along my arms as I shuffled into the room after him, and I wondered again, with rising panic, whether Valentino was really talking about the kiss at all.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  THE SECRET

  The meeting was held in a room at the very back of the house. A huge table made from varnished dark wood stretched the entire length of the room. The oil painting from the Priestly house in Cedar Hill – Valentino’s rendering of the avenging angel – hung in the middle of the room, and framed pictures of other Falcones, all dead, ranged along a shelf underneath. Calvino’s picture was nestled between Angelo’s and that of an old man with no hair – Rico Falcone, I guessed, since he was the most recent Falcone casualty.

  Valentino stopped at the head of the table, and one by one, like a domino effect, every single Falcone – women and men, elderly and teenaged – formed a procession leading towards him. He held his hand out, his lids falling lazily as they each bent low and kissed his ring, murmuring Italian greetings as they turned to take their seats again. I pressed my back against the wall.

  The Council was called to order. Felice sat on Valentino’s left, Luca on his right. He hadn’t looked in my direction once. He was facing forwards, the muscles in his jaw grinding. Nic winked at me before turning his attention to his oldest brother. I wished I could have shared his confidence.

  Valentino cleared his throat. ‘Welcome, everyone, to what promises to be a memorable meeting.’ He flicked his gaze to me. I looked into those azure eyes and saw my own hopelessness reflected back. ‘Today, we remember those who have given their blood to protect this family.’ He placed a hand on his chest and dipped his head. ‘We think of Calvino and Rico. Ora riposano in pace.’

  Quiet murmurings echoed along the table as the other Falcones pressed their hands to their hearts as Valentino had. ‘Ora riposano in pace.’

  Valentino snapped his head up and the tender moment was gone. He looked straight at me when he said, ‘We are here today to discuss a serious matter, which concerns Donata Marino and the Marino family.’

  There was a hiss from somewhere at the far end of the table. Elena pulled her lips back, her teeth bared, at the mention of her sister. Valentino pointed towards me. ‘For those who are not aware, I present to you Sophie Gracewell, daughter of Michael Gracewell.’

  Luca looked at me for the first time. His expression was shuttered.

  ‘She has come to us today seeking the order of Sanctuary, for the protection of her mother and herself,’ Valentino added with a sneer.

  A man with a heavy white beard seated part way down the table, said, ‘Such ceremony for small matters, Valentino. Of course we offer Sanctuary – it’s nothing for us.’

  ‘So it would appear,’ muttered Felice.

  Outside, the storm clouds were sinking lower and lower. The room was charged, and the hairs on my arm were standing up. The urgency of the situation licked at my consciousness.

  ‘It’s ludicrous,’ Elena cried. Her hands rose into the air, gesticulating above the heads around her. ‘These people are the family of the man who killed your father, Valentino. They certainly do not deserve Sanctuary.’

  A man with puffed-up white hair and a face creviced with wrinkles clapped his palm on the table. ‘We do not punish innocents,’ he said in a voice croaky with age. ‘Elena, you are letting your personal feelings override your duty to protect. That is the Falcone cause.’

  Her voice turned hard. ‘That has not been our cause for a long time, Tommaso.’

  I was watching Valentino. He and Felice had their heads bent together. His lips moved hurriedly, and every so often Felice’s eyes would grow very large. He glared at me, and I felt like there was a sniper rifle trained on my forehead. Luca sat apart from their huddle, his mouth set in a hard line as his twin angled his body towards Felice, continuing their hushed conversation.

  Dom was spe
aking at the other end of the table. ‘I say we send her back to Donata. We’ve got all the information we need. What Sophie does now shouldn’t concern us.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Elena in an exasperated voice. ‘At least one of my children sees sense.’

  I couldn’t place the look on Felice’s face, but it was utterly mirthless. He was staring so hard at me I felt the heat underneath my skin. I lifted my chin, determined not to break under his attempts to intimidate me.

  Someone slammed their fist on the table and I was startled back into the conversation. Gino’s glass of water had toppled over and spilt on to his lap. Luca was standing up, his palms pressed against the table. ‘I owe Sophie Gracewell my life. Is that really nothing, Mother? Con tutto il rispetto, si sbaglia.’

  ‘That doesn’t excuse her blood ties!’ shouted someone else, his voice joining with the heat of others. ‘We just buried Calvino. Are we all so quick to forget how and where he died? Are we all so quick to forget his death at the hands of Jack Gracewell?’

  ‘The girl is just a teenager. Una innocente,’ Paulie said, and my heart swelled with gratitude. ‘We must believe she is here to assist us. She brought news of Donata’s plotting.’

  ‘Unreliable news,’ said a young man with a shaved head and a severe nose. He fiddled with the gold chain around his neck. ‘Who knows if it was made up just to get us on side?’

  ‘Donata has Sophie in her sights,’ said Luca. ‘We don’t know what she plans to use her for. We don’t know if she plans to kill her.’

  Well, he mightn’t have been able to stomach looking at me properly after what had happened upstairs, but at least he was fighting for me. I exhaled a quiet sigh of relief. The word of the Falcone underboss would carry a lot of weight in this room.

  ‘Donata won’t have time to use anyone for anything,’ said Gino. ‘Because we’re going to kill that Marino bitch and mount her head above the fireplace.’