Total pages in book: 53
Estimated words: 49562 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 248(@200wpm)___ 198(@250wpm)___ 165(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 49562 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 248(@200wpm)___ 198(@250wpm)___ 165(@300wpm)
Having the last piece of the puzzle, Lucca was just as tired as his father of waiting. “I’ve heard everything I want to hear.” Vinny had confessed to his disloyalty, and it was time for him to earn his penitence. “Enzo is to discuss with you how much he appreciated his son’s stay in the hospital.”
Drago lifted Vinny using the back of his suit, jerking him to face the man who was supposed to be one of his best friends.
Taking his hat off, Enzo was able to show his own hatred before his fist reared back to strike Vinny.
Crazy laughter poured out of Vinny’s mouth instead of a pain-filled scream. The sound had Enzo looking at Dante instead of hitting Vinny again.
Lucca had just placed a cigarette to his lips when Vinny spat out blood at his and Dante’s feet before the next words out of his mouth sent chills up everyone’s spines.
“I made sure Melissa saw me pull the trigger.”
Dante swayed, his words barely audible. “You’re lying.”
“Am I?” His blood-stained smile said otherwise.
Lucca snapped his lighter closed before he even managed to light the end. The stick fell to the ground with the first word he spoke. “Lucifer killed my mother.”
“I let him take the glory,” Vinny began to brag, “but it was my bullet that ended her life.”
Dante gave a howl of pain, jerking Vinny free from Drago.
No! Lucca tried to pull his father away, to get him to see reason. “He wants you to kill him fast. Don’t let him goad you.”
“Let go of me, Lucca. I know what he’s fucking doing,” Dante growled at his son.
He witnessed true pain in his father’s icy eyes. Melissa might have been his mother, but she was Dante’s wife first …
So, he let him go.
Suddenly, Dante grabbed Vinny by the throat, squeezing until Vinny went back to his knees. “You fucking coward. How did you fucking hide how big of a pussy you are so well? It didn’t take much courage to kill a gentle woman who wouldn’t harm a fly, nor shoot someone when you can’t be seen! You’re a fucking weasel to hide in the middle of the night to plant a fucking bomb!”
Finally, Dante released his grip around Vinny’s throat when he started to turn purple, leaving him gasping for air. Taking the cigar out of his mouth, Dante raised it high in the air.
“An eye for an eye.”
Drago held Vinny’s head steady as Dante stabbed the smoldering tip of the cigar into Vinny’s left eye.
Allowing Vinny only one agonizing scream, Dante squeezed his airway again as he left the cigar in the socket.
“Drago, knife,” Dante ordered.
When Drago looked at him for permission, Lucca shook his head. Then he slowly stepped forward. Pulling out his own knife, he gave his father a knowing nod.
Dante allowed Vinny another scream, using the opportunity to hold Vinny’s mouth open. “A lying tongue, for the betraying lies you told.”
Lucca gripped the knife and cut out Vinny’s tongue, placing the flesh in the liar’s front suit pocket.
The gurgling sounds coming from Vinny showed them all he was still very much alive.
Lucca might have said One-Shot was his for the taking, but he held out the bloody knife to his father.
Taking it, Dante screamed down at Vinny, “And a heart for the broken heart you ripped out of me.” He stabbed the knife down into his old friend’s chest, carving Vinny’s heart out, ripping it right out of his body, and giving Lucca a newfound respect for his father as he watched.
Heart in his hand, Dante threw it to the ground and began smashing it under his shoe, over … and over … and over again …
“Dad.” Lucca couldn’t remember the last time he had called him that, but somehow, it seemed appropriate. “He’s dead.”
As if Dante couldn’t hear, he started kicking Vinny’s dead body, and when Sal moved to stop him, Lucca shook his head. He could understand his father’s rage. Chloe was right; Dante had loved his mother very much, and it was the one thing Lucca had always known to be true. The grief Dante had bottled up and hid from anyone watching his pain after his wife’s death was finally set free on the man responsible for killing her.
It wasn’t until several minutes later when Dante let the knife fall to the ground and took off his suit jacket. The outside a bloody mess, he used the inside to wipe his blood-covered face.
“You couldn’t save anything for us?” Lucca asked wryly as he saw Dante’s reasoning return as he flung his coat over the gory body.
“No.” Dante stared at him, then at Sal, at Drago, and all of the other men he used to order around. “I want you all to be able to look Vincent in the eye in the years to come.”