“I’m afraid, Elie.” Her voice was a mere thread of sound. “I’m all or nothing. If you shattered me, I’d never be able to put myself back together.”
He heard the raw truth in the admission and it humbled him. He’d protected his heart for so long against everyone, never realizing until Stefano showed him a man could be strong and still love his family fiercely. Somehow, Brielle had slipped inside him, even when she wasn’t present. Had she been real all along, or was she his fantasy? He was as terrified as she was to make that huge leap of faith.
“It’s the same for both of us, Brielle. You aren’t alone in that particular fear.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Hello, Dino,” Elie greeted softly. “I heard you were looking for me.”
Dino Colombo whirled around to stare at him, shocked that Elie Archambault would show up in the middle of the night in his private locked office. In his home—his gated home—the one with his security force all around him. He was also very aware his father and mother were in the house as well. They had come to visit and were spending the night in the guest suite just one story below his office.
“Move away from your desk,” Elie instructed in a clear, concise and very low voice. “Normally, I would have simply killed you and let it go at that, but I thought maybe we could talk this out. I know your desk is equipped with an alarm button and several weapons. If you reach for either, it will be the last move you ever make. Know that at this moment, every member of your family has a member of my family visiting them, including your wife. Make the wrong move and they will all be wiped out. I suggest you very quietly take the chair out in the middle of the room facing me.”
Dino glared at him. “You don’t know who you’re screwing with, Archambault.” He pushed off the edge of his desk, took three strides and dropped into the chair that had mysteriously been set up in the center of his office.
Elie let silence stretch between them for a few moments. Then he smiled. The smile didn’t touch his eyes and was rather cruel. “I know everything there is to know about you. When we send assassins, we make certain our investigators don’t fuck up. You take orders like any good little minion, so you didn’t bother to check Valentino, Dario or me out for yourself. You took the word of your good friend Carlo Santoro in New York. Unfortunately for you, he fucked up royally. He was so careful not to give the order to touch a Ferraro. There’s a reason for that, Dino. No one ever touches them because once that happens, retaliation is swift and brutal.”
Dino did his best to look bored. “Just because you know Santoro’s name doesn’t mean shit. And everyone who’s anyone knows you don’t fuck with the Ferraros.”
“Valentino Saldi is married to Emmanuelle Ferraro, the youngest and only girl in the Chicago Ferraro family.”
Dino straightened in his chair, looking as if Elie had struck him. “That’s not possible.”
Stefano moved out of the shadows and sat on the edge of the desk, folding his arms across his chest. “She’s my baby sister.” His hooded eyes burned a hole right through Dino’s shocked gaze.
Dino began to shake his head and sputter.
Elie took out a photograph and slapped it into Dino’s large hand. “Take a look at that. My bride walking down the aisle to me. Brielle Couture. Recognize the man walking her down the aisle?”
Dino’s big fingers nearly crushed the picture as he looked at the man in the suit, so clearly Stefano Ferraro. “I’m sorry, Mr. Ferraro, I didn’t know.”
“Look at me, not him,” Elie said quietly. “Brielle is married to me. First you gave the order to kill her. When that didn’t happen, you sent two teams, first with the order to kill her, then at the last minute it was changed to kidnap her. You’re part of an international human trafficking ring. Who gave that order to you that she was to be kidnapped, not killed? Understand, Dino, the lives of your entire family are at stake.”
“The order came from Carlo Santoro at the last minute. The Santoro family is tied to the Toselli family in Barcelona through marriage,” Dino supplied. He tried to sound arrogant, as if just the name Toselli would scare Elie and Stefano.
Elie was well aware of those ties, thanks to his brilliant wife. At one time, the Toselli family had ruled parts of Sicily, Italy and Spain with an iron fist. No one moved without their say-so. They were so powerful, they had ties to governments and certainly law enforcement. Most notably, they were tied to the drug cartels of South America.
Eventually, other families in Sicily and Italy went to war when the Tosellis in those regions tried to bite into their territories. The feuds went on for quite a long while. Unbeknownst to the Tosellis, the Ferraros were enlisted to aid one of the smaller Italian families, and with no explanation, the Italian family became the undisputed ruler of the territory. Little by little the Toselli family lost ground. Recently, they had begun to come back in strength, building their power again, both through drugs and human trafficking. He should have known the Toselli family was involved.
Both the Ferraro and the Archambault families had their investigators tracing how Brielle’s name had gotten back to the Toselli family to put her on a hit list. She had turned her findings over to the investigators of the rider family in Barcelona. None of them could conceive of a rider on the payroll of the Toselli family, but the shadow riders weren’t taking any chances.
Elie studied Dino’s face for a long time, allowing the man to see he wasn’t impressed. “You don’t seem to understand we can get to anyone and no one ever knows we were there. That includes the Toselli family. How did they know Brielle investigated them?”
Dino shrugged. “I have no idea. I just got the order from Carlo. You’d have to ask him.” He smirked. “He’s in New York in case you want to go see him.”
“I intend to do just that. I don’t think you have anything else to tell me that I don’t already know.” Elie didn’t move from his chair. “You’re not too smart, Dino. You should have done your homework before you targeted my wife. You would have known the Archambault family is no one to fuck around with. We police the Ferraros. And messing with Valentino Saldi and Dario Bosco? Are you out of your mind? You have to know their reputations. They will skin you alive. I might have promised to keep your family alive, but they aren’t nearly as nice as I am.”
“I told you what you wanted to know. Get the fuck out.”
Elie arched an eyebrow. “Did you think you’d live through the night after you tried to have my wife killed? I promised to let your family live, not you, you son of bitch.”
Behind Dino, Stefano grasped the man’s head in his hands, in the age-old traditional manner of the kill. He yanked in one fluid motion, breaking the neck easily. “We didn’t get anything new.”
“Not really, just confirmation of everything Brielle already told us. Let’s get back to the jet. There’s a party going on with the LA cousins and we can’t leave until Ricco, Mariko, Giovanni and Sasha return. We’ll head for New York.”
Stefano stepped into a shadow and Elie selected a second one. At once, his body felt as if it were being torn apart, the skin flying from his bones as the tube shot him through it with unbelievable speed. The shadow took him down the stairs and through the great room and under the door, nearly spitting him out before he could halt in the mouth of the portal, waiting for his body to orient while he looked for the next shadow to step into.
All riders kept maps of cities in their heads. He knew the route to the airport and made his way back without hesitation. Used to riding the shadows, he chose the smaller feeder tubes that were extremely fast, so much so that oftentimes they could make an experienced rider ill, but he wanted to get back to the plane and go over all the reports sent in from the investigators.