Blood & Lies (A Twisted Duet Book 1) Read online

  Oh God.

  Was he really dead? And why did Castello believe that my family and I had something to do with his death? But the better question yet…what did he plan to do to me?

  3

  CASTELLO

  What in the ever loving fuck was that?

  I couldn’t completely process what the hell just happened. I stood there staring at the damn door trying to figure out what the fuck was going on. At first I thought for sure she was playing games, trying to trick me. It only made sense that being a Linscott, one of the most powerful families in America, her father would have prepped her on these things, taught her how to handle herself when things got tough. But now I’m not so sure. The way she reacted, the expression on her face when I told her Carlo was dead—I’m not sure one could fake that. Either she was telling the truth, or she was one hell of an actress. But I’m willing to bet a lot of money it was the latter. With the death of my brother and father I learned the very costly lesson that one should never underestimate the Linscotts.

  Our families had never crossed paths until Carlo’s death, and now it was a full on war—a war I intended to win. They knew nothing of the Cosa Nostra, and clearly they had underestimated us by thinking they could get away with murdering one of our own. They had no clue what it entailed being a powerful Mafia family such as ourselves, what it meant in every sense of the word. It wasn’t just about ruling, and throwing your weight around. It wasn’t a motherfucking gang dabbling with shit like drugs and illegal gambling, where you could do whatever the hell you want and then have your entourage of stupid trigger happy idiots save your reckless ass. All those shitty movies based on what the world thought about our kind were nothing but a bucket of bullshit. We didn’t go around killing because some motherfucker didn’t aim straight when he took a piss. There weren’t bodies of junkies who couldn’t pay their loans piling up in our backyard. Our businesses had long passed being street thugs.

  But being Mafia was first and foremost about family, loyalty, protecting your own, obeying the rules you swore to uphold, and carrying the consequences if you didn’t. We didn’t ruin and rule just for the fun of it, just to go on some fucking power trip. We fought, we conquered, and we earned every luxury our lifestyle awarded us with. Nothing came easy. Our wealth and power didn’t just fall out of thin air right into our golden laps. We earned it.

  The streets of Manhattan had been ours for years. Everyone knew not to fuck with the Fattores, but apparently the Linscotts didn’t get the fucking memo all the way in Oklahoma. William Linscott thought because he was the owner of Linscott Resources, one of the most powerful and successful resources companies, specializing in oil, that he could just go around killing whoever the fuck he wanted. Now because of their ignorance she had to pay the price, she had to atone for the loss our family had been forced to endure. Why her? Because it all fucking started with her.

  If she hadn’t clawed her way into my brother’s life in the first place he would still be here, my father would still be here, and I wouldn’t be stuck with the responsibility that was never supposed to be mine.

  I straightened my suit jacket before turning around facing Vico who had been watching everything on the monitor.

  “She’s lying,” he stated firmly.

  “I know.”

  “Mancini,” Vico scoffed. “Fucking lying slut. Does she really think we’ll fall for her bullshit? There is no way she didn’t know who he really was. He was a Fattore, for Christ sake.”

  “Maybe that’s it. Maybe they figured out who he was, felt threatened by our family, and decided to take him out.”

  “They’d be right to feel threatened. But now all they did was sign every member of their family’s death warrant.”

  I let out a breath. “Calm down, Vico. I told you earlier, you need to keep your temper intact...and vanity,” I added in a whisper which Vico didn’t hear.

  “I know. Sorry. But the fact that she is underestimating us with her bullshit just riles me up.” He turned back to the monitor. “Look at her with her fake fucking tears. She is one hell of an actress, I’ll give her that. That was an Oscar winning performance.”

  I pulled my palm down my face, frustration pulsing through my veins, making my muscles twitch.

  Vico sighed. “I just can’t believe that Carlo of all people didn’t realize what her family was capable of.”

  I snapped my gaze up at him. “The Linscotts are one of the most powerful families in the US, if not the world, Vico.”

  “Exactly, so how could Carlo have been so stupid as to underestimate them? Did he really think he could fuck the rich American girl and not carry the consequences?”

  “Enough!” My voice boomed through the room, slamming against the walls.

  Vico stared at me with widened eyes, and I took a deep breath struggling to keep my rage contained. “We don’t know what happened. All we know is that the Linscotts had Carlo murdered.”

  I rounded the table and walked up behind Vico, staring at the monitor. “But I’ll get to the truth. I’ll crack her wide open and extract every goddamn secret she has,” I vowed while watching the blonde woman cry into her palms.

  As she cried her entire body was shaking. Did I care? No. She deserved all the panic and fear she was currently experiencing. In fact, she deserved more than that. She deserved pain too, which in time she will get…by my hand.

  “You left the box in there, man.” Vico looked back at me.

  I smiled. “I know.”

  Just then, she lifted her head and spotted the plain brown box I had placed on the bed earlier. My intention was to make her open it while I was still in the room, but unfortunately the lies that spewed from her mouth forced me to leave, because I was on the verge of choking those lies along with her last breath out of her.

  Crossing my arms in front of my chest I continued to watch her knowing that sooner or later her curiosity would get the better of her. Right now she was staring at the box like she was convinced it’s a trap. But the human mind was a wonderful place. Recklessness always accompanied curiosity, hence the saying curiosity killed the cat. Now this cat was one I couldn’t wait to kill, to look into her face when she realized that the game she played had ultimately brought on her demise…and the demise of those she cared most about.

  “How long do you think it’s going to take for her to budge?” Vico tapped a finger on the table, and I just scoffed at his blatant impatience.

  “Relax, brother. Just watch.”

  While she wiped her face with the old rag she was wearing, she settled a little crossing her legs beneath her while she continued to stare at the box. When Vico brought her in almost twenty-four hours ago she looked like every other spoiled, rich girl wearing her expensive designer blouse, jeans, and heels. Besides the fact that she was unconscious she looked worth much more than she really was—which was why I instructed Doc to strip her of the wealth she didn’t deserve, and dress her in a two dollar piece of fabric that was old and tattered.

  It hasn’t even been twenty-four hours yet and already she looked like she’d been through Hell. She looked pathetic, poor, and broken while she sat there with her dirty hair and tired eyes. I haven’t even begun to exact my revenge, and already she seemed like she was close to crumbling. But to be honest, I can’t say I’m surprised. Carlo liked his women modest and reserved. A woman who lacked a voice and a spine. A woman who was born and bred to submit, and be nothing more than a pretty face to complement the man’s image. I, on the other hand, I preferred the more complex kind of woman. The type of woman who would get my blood boiling and my adrenaline pumping. I loved the chase, I yearned for the fight, and I craved the rage. There was nothing better or more powerful than forcing a strong woman to her knees, to see equal measures of fight and surrender. I wanted to see obedience when I looked at a woman’s body, but I wanted to see the fire of her strength burn bright in her irises when I stared into her eyes. It was the most rewarding sight when you broke a strong-willed creatur
e into submission, forcing her to accept that you are the ruler of the world she exists in. But her mind should be a fortress, a stronghold that would ensure she always stayed strong enough to handle the monster in me.

  I watched patiently as Tatum still stared at the box, until finally she reached out, but then pulled back. I almost laughed at her cowardly behavior. Not something I expected from a Linscott.

  “She’s too scared, man.” Vico pulled his hands through his hair, barely containing his frustration. “She’s not going to fucking open it.”

  “You need to work on your patience, little brother. Patience is a virtue.”

  “Oh God, you know I hate it when you say shit like that.”

  I lifted a brow. “Shit like what?”

  He glanced my way. “Shit like, ‘patience is a virtue.’ You act like a fucking fifty year old with all the smart shit you like to say.”

  I snorted thinking about what an idiot he can be sometimes. “Smart shit? It’s idioms, Vico.”

  “I don’t give a fuck what it is. It’s stupid.”

  I scoffed at him, trying to ignore the fact that my little brother was starting to turn into a fucking jock, trying to act all cool with his slang, his ridiculous walk which only made him seem arrogant and stupid, rather than confident. And then there was that god-awful handshake him and his buddies always seemed to give each other. It’s embarrassing to even witness.

  Tatum moved, and I glanced at the monitor. When she reached out and finally picked up the box I could feel the rush of adrenaline surging through my veins. I leaned with my hands on the table, next to Vico, fully focusing all my attention on her. I wanted to see her face when she opened that box, when she realizes that this wasn’t a dream, but a goddamn nightmare—her nightmare.

  “Open it, donna diavolo.” I gripped the edges of the table, feeling the thrill and the frustration burn inside my gut.

  Vico snorted. “Devil woman? Nice. Suits this bitch perfectly.”

  I ignored him since I was too busy willing Tatum to open the goddamn box.

  Slowly she pulled the white string, and as it fell to the sides she leaned back while she stared at the box like she expected something to jump out of it.

  “Open it,” I muttered, leaning closer to the monitor, fighting the urge to burst in there and force her to open it with my goddamn gun against her fucking skull.

  She bit her thumbnail, and I could already hear the thoughts running through her mind, some telling her to leave the damn box alone, others urging her to open it, to find out what’s inside.

  Finally the latter wins.

  As she opened the box, my spine started tingling with expectation. God, it felt like I was seconds away from getting a fucking hard-on.

  She looked down, and I knew exactly when she noticed what was inside. Her entire face turned a ghostly pale white just before she screamed and scampered off the bed, falling against the wall.

  “Oh my God,” I heard her voice through the speakers. “Jesus Christ! What the fuck is this?” she screamed between tears.

  It was fucking beautiful. It was almost poetic watching her crack, witnessing as her mind started to spin in a thousand different directions. Finally after all these months of planning and plotting, the time has come—the time for me to exact the revenge I have vowed from the Linscotts. She had taken from me what I can never get back, and the only way I would be free of this burden I carry around deep in my soul is by spilling blood…her blood.

  Vico glanced my way. “Game on, brother.”

  I smiled as I started to taste the victory on my tongue. “Game on.”

  4

  TATUM

  “Oh my God.” I rocked back and forth, clutching my knees against my chest, my face buried between my arms. I didn’t want to look up. I couldn’t. What the fuck was happening? Who were these goddamn people? And why the fuck was there a severed finger in that motherfucking box?

  Better yet, whose finger was that?

  No, I didn’t want to know. All I wanted was to wake up and realize that this was just the mother of all goddamn nightmares. Unfortunately, the longer I sat there, the more I realized this was all real. I’ve been kidnapped. Carlo is dead. And his twin brother just left me a human finger in a box.

  How could the Carlo I knew be a part of this family?

  The Carlo I knew…

  Did I really know him? Was the Carlo I knew the real Carlo, or was he pretending to be someone he wasn’t? Judging by what Castello just told me, it seemed to be the latter since I didn’t even know his real surname, and I sure as hell didn’t know his family.

  Tears continued down my face and my mind kept spinning in a thousand different directions at once. What did they plan to do me?

  Would they kill me? Torture me? Hurt me?

  Did my family even know I was missing yet?

  Thinking of my mom, my dad, my brother, and how they quite possibly might not even know what was going on had me shaking as more tears streamed down my face. For the first time since I decided to leave home, to go to New York just to get away from my family, I regretted it. If I had stayed home like my dad wanted me to, they would have known that I had been kidnapped. But because I was a stubborn girl who tried to survive on her own without being labeled as William Linscott’s daughter, I might never see my family again. I might be dead by the time they realized I was missing. And since I wasn’t exactly good at checking in with them as often as I should it might be days before they started to suspect something was wrong.

  My body ached, my lungs pleading for air while my tears choked every last breath out of me. It’s not like I wanted to cry. I hated crying. I cried for weeks after I thought Carlo had left me. I couldn’t believe that I was so heartbroken over a guy I didn’t even know for two months. It’s not like we were on the brink of getting married or anything. We only had sex a few times, for God’s sake. But I was so in love with him, and somewhere deep inside my heart I convinced myself that Carlo was the one. He didn’t seem to know who my family was, and didn’t seem to care either, which was a big bonus for me. Guys tended to swarm around me because of my surname, associating me with bank accounts filled with millions, expensive tropical vacations, trips around the world, and multi-million dollar yachts to play on every fucking day. But Carlo, he was the first guy who didn’t seem to give a fuck about who my dad was, and that’s probably why I gave him my heart so soon—hence why I spent hours, days, weeks crying over a guy that I thought left me…a guy I didn’t know.

  Carlo was there one day, whispering sweet words in my ears, and then gone the next. I thought he had moved on, that he never really loved me to begin with, yet I never could come to understand what the hell happened.

  Now I did. Castello made it clear what happened. Carlo was dead…and Castello thought I had something to do with it. It was absurd.

  The pain, the hurt that stabbed like a thousand knives through my chest caused more tears and sobs to erupt from my body.

  Fuck!

  I didn’t even know if Castello was telling the truth. Why would he lie though? It was clear as fucking daylight that he was, in fact, Carlo’s twin. How else could the remarkable—or freaky—resemblance between them be explained?

  Up until now I tried to convince myself that this was just a sick joke, and that someone would come through that door and say, ‘You’ve been punked, bitch.’ But that goddamn finger on the other side of the bed confirmed that this was not a joke, and what was happening right now was as real as it got.

  I’ve been kidnapped, and judging by the cold look in Castello’s eyes when he stared at me, he truly was convinced that I was responsible for Carlo’s death.

  Carlo’s death…

  The mere thought that Carlo was dead, that he hadn’t left me like I thought, was enough to make my chest feel like it was being cracked open from the inside.

  My body slid down against the wall, and I landed on my side still crying into my arms. Shaking and cold, I couldn’t stop the fear and pai
n from pulsing through my veins…the grief.

  More crying, more sobs.

  I had no idea how long I just lay there crying, thinking about all the horrible things that were probably going to happen to me. Castello and his family held me responsible for Carlo’s death—why I didn’t know—but thinking about what they had in store for me had me shivering like it was minus twenty fucking degrees in this God-awful room.

  I wasn’t a naïve person. I read the newspapers, watched the news. It was a big, cruel world we lived in. Girls got stolen and sold into slavery, and women got kidnapped, raped and murdered every day. I just never thought I’d be one of them. These kind of things always happened to other people, not to me—at least that’s what I thought.

  For the first time in my life I felt thankful for my father’s wealth, his power. It meant that there was a much better chance for them to find me with all the resources at his disposal. But that brought forth the most important question… How long before they realize I’m gone?

  An image flashed in my mind, and I lifted my head, staring at the bed. The box was still on the mattress, but I knew the finger rolled off the other side. There was something on that finger, something like the image in my head.

  I pushed myself up, wiped the tears from my face and continued to stare at the bed. Dear Lord, please don’t let it be what I think it is.

  “Get a grip, Tatum,” I muttered to myself, pulling my fingers roughly through my hair which was one tangled, dirty mess. I bent my knees, steadying my feet beneath me while I remained crouched down, pushing my palms flush against the wall behind me. I needed the support in case I was unable to keep myself up.

  My heart was thrumming behind my ribs, the rush of blood causing a pounding ache in my head. Even my goddamn ears were ringing while I struggled to take a breath, feeling like my stomach and my heart were both vying for first place up and out of my throat.

  I still couldn’t get that one image out of my head, and I needed to know if that’s what I saw on that finger.