SALVATORE
by Cecy Robson
Publication Date: March 13, 2019
Genres: Adult, Gritty, Contemporary, Romance, Standalone
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SYNOPSIS
Desperate men do desperate things . . .Salvatore Torre is a dangerous man. If you’ve lived the life Sal has, rage is to be expected and maybe so is heart. After his father killed his mother in a jealous rage, Sal was left to raise his two younger brothers, becoming a parent long before he was ready.
Desperate for money to support his family, Sal sought help from his old friend, Vincent Maggiano, the son of New Jersey’s top crime boss being groomed to take over his ailing father’s empire.
Sal never planned to join the mob. He also never planned to fall for his brother’s sweet and ultra conservative counselor, Adrianna Daniels.
Aedry isn’t the type of girl Sal is usually drawn to. Her skirts are longer, her hair is tamer, and her heels aren’t clear. But he can’t deny the attraction he feels. And Salvatore’s dark, sexy, and dangerous persona is the exact opposite of the clean-cut business men who usually catch Aedry’s attention.
Neither planned on a life of crime nor did they plan on love. But now, both are in too far.
EXCLUSIVE EXCERPT- CHAPTER ONE
Salvatore by Cecy
Robson
Chapter One
“What do you think, Salvatore?”
Donnie taps her iPad with her long
red nails when she finds yet another pair of shoes she wants. Like I actually
give a shit what she’s buying with Vincent’s money.
“Sure. Get them,” I answer, not
bothering to really look and fixing my gaze back on the door.
She pouts in that way that annoys
me, but probably gets Vin hard. “That’s what you said about the other six. I’m
serious. Which ones should I get?”
I don’t have to tell her that Vincent
will buy her whatever she wants so long as she keeps blowing him, but I come
close. The muscles along my back are ready to tear away from the bone. Every
nerve along my spine fires a warning that shit’s about to go down. But I don’t
show it, my face giving nothing away. “Donnie, I’m paid to watch your back. Not
help you pick out shoes,” I mutter.
She starts to argue, but a knock to
the door shuts her up, so does me motioning her to the corner. She may spend
her days worrying about what she looks like and what she’ll wear, but she’s not
stupid enough to ignore me.
I lean against the wall, opposite
the door. Donnie might have shrugged off Vin yelling down the hall, but I didn’t.
He isn’t happy. Neither are the other mob bosses in Jersey. It won’t be long before
hell itself rains down on us. “Yeah?” I ask, keeping my deep voice casual, like
my piece isn’t already clutched in my hands.
“Vincent wants you in on the
meeting,” Lucca says.
Lucca’s smart. And for someone who
hasn’t been in the family long, he’s tough and good on his feet. But I pick up
enough in his voice to know this meeting’s not going as planned. So maybe Vin
didn’t send for me. Maybe Lucca thinks I’m needed. If so, things are a lot
worse than I thought.
Donnie looks at me, her
preoccupation with shoes nothing more than a memory. “Lock the door behind me,”
I tell her.
She rushes forward. I snag her
elbow and pull her in tight to whisper in her ear. “You hear shots, you leave
out the back, through the alley and down the street. Find a diner, a store, any
place with lots of people. Got me?”
She nods, but she’s trembling
already. Shots fired means there are plenty more to come. The other family
knows who Donnie is to Vin. But if they don’t know she’s here or if they find
her with too many witnesses, she’ll be okay.
She clutches my arm when I start to
leave. “Sal . . .” she says.
Donatella and me are from the old
neighborhood. We’ve known each other since back when we were kids and we were
too stupid to know shit about organized crime. Now, we’re more stupid, because
we’re willingly a part of it. She wants to say something like “be careful” or
“keep him safe” or something else I don’t need to hear. So, I don’t.
I crack open the door, making sure
Lucca’s standing there alone, and step out.
His eyes cut toward the hall
leading to Vincent’s office, where he’s meeting with Arturo, the boss in charge
of most of South Jersey, including Atlantic City. Yeah. Shit’s going down. But
I don’t move until Donnie clicks the door lock behind me.
Lucca starts forward, moving fast.
I haul him back. “Easy,” I mutter.
That’s all he needs to hear. He
slows, mimicking my pace and stance, chest out, hand curled near the piece at
his waist, face hard and unreadable.
Arturo’s men stand in unison when
we round the corner. At the sight of me, Vin’s men rise, too. They see what I
want them to see in me and Lucca and me. A united front. It solidifies our crew
and tenses Arturo’s. As Vin’s crew fixes their hard stares on the other family,
I know they’re ready for what the next few minutes will bring.
I reach Vin’s office door. It’s
open, wide open, and it pisses me off. An open door shows weakness and it
demonstrates how scared Vin is about being alone with the other boss.
I march in and take point to Vin’s
right. Lucca starts to head to his opposite side, but he catches the subtle
motion of my left hand that tells him to stay by the door. I want to tell him
to shut the door and lock it, but I can’t without raising the paranoia already
thickening the air. Like I said, Lucca’s smart. He shuts the door and flicks
the deadbolt.
Arturo huffs when he realizes he’s
closed in. “What the fuck’s this?” He doesn’t turn around from where he’s
seated directly in front of Vin, but his second sitting beside him and his
enforcer straighten at my presence. I expected them to react upon seeing me,
but I don’t expect the same response from Vin’s third, Angelo. Their reaction
is so subtle that everyone gathered seems to miss it. But me, I don’t miss a
thing, ever. The one time I did, it
cost me the only woman I’ve ever loved.
“Just a little privacy, Mr.
Sorenzo,” I answer, because Vin waited too long to respond and he’s already
lost enough face.
Vin eases back in his chair. He knows
I’m there and that I have his back, but his fingers digging into the armrest
give away he’s scared shitless. Christ.
How many times have I told him to keep his hands relaxed and his expression
like stone? His ailing father has been grooming him to take over his empire for
six fucking years and Vin’s still not ready. The other bosses are honing in on
his incompetence. Which is why I’m not sure how much longer I can help keep Vin
alive.
“Let’s get back to business,” Vin says, trying
to sound harder than he is.
Arturo smiles in that sleazy way of
his and tosses a hand out. “I believe we’ve reached a standstill,” he says.
“You’re right, we have,” Vin fires
back, getting pissed. Good, anger is better than fear and, right now, it’s
exactly what he needs. He leans forward. “You’re not getting the rest of A.C.
And you’re not getting an eighty percent―”
My 380 auto is out and pointed at
Arturo’s enforcer before his fingers reach the hilt. “Move and I’ll blow your fucking head off.” Without me telling him,
Lucca rams his guns in the back of Arturo’s and his second’s skulls. Smart guy.
I reach for my 9 mil tucked in my leather jacket, not even blinking when I
shoot Vin’s third in the leg, blowing out his knee cap.
With a scream, Angelo falls to the
floor howling. “What the fuck?” Vin growls, leaping to his feet.
I don’t explain why I shot one of
his made men, someone he trusted. My next bullet goes into the enforcer, the
impact and his pain enough to send him flying off his chair. He went for his
Sig. I wasn’t waiting for him to pull the trigger. Outside, all hell’s breaking
loose, my heartbeat pounding fast in my chest until I hear the voices of Vin’s
family taking control.
Less than a minute later, a sharp
rap to the door is followed by Benny’s deep voice. “Sal?”
“All clear,” I tell him, my tone
steady. “You?”
It’s not my words that he believes,
it’s the confidence behind them. “All clear,” he responds in the same tone,
letting me know they have Arturo’s men on the ground.
Vin’s reaching into the drawer,
pulling out his Glock. To his credit, he’s not questioning anything anymore,
not after Arturo’s enforcer went for his piece. He’s reining in his shit like
he needs to.
Lucca covers me as I strip everyone
of their weapons. Angelo is wailing like the little bitch he is. The enforcer
is swearing, pressing the wound to his shoulder as blood seeps through his
fingers. I intentionally missed his heart. But no one needs to know that.
I drop the weapons beside Vin and
far out of everyone’s reach. Arturo and his second haven’t said a damn thing.
They weren’t scared of Vin before. But they are now.
I’m not sure what Vin’s going to
say. My fear is, he may say the wrong thing in front of Lucca that makes him
look pathetic. Lucca is loyal, so are a few others, but if they keep seeing Vin
acting like he’s acting, they’ll lose whatever respect he’s managed outside his
title of boss.
“Vin knew you were playing him, you
pussy,” I tell Angelo, lying through my teeth. “Were you going to kill him in
front of Arturo? Was that your way into the family, you lying piece of shit?”
In not answering, he answers enough.
At Vin’s nod, Lucca puts a bullet in Arturo’s second, and finishes off the
enforcer.
Vin motions to the door. “Call in a
few of my men,” he tells me.
I unlock the door and do as he
asks, after I make sure everything is still under control. Vin’s not ready to
be boss, but he isn’t stupid, at least not completely. He knows Arturo needs to
die by his hands and that he needs witnesses to see as much. I pick three who
have started to question Vin’s strength, knowing they’ll tell the rest of the
family what’s about to go down, and to show them what happens to those who
don’t stay loyal.
The men pile in, but Vin doesn’t
let them get too comfortable. He shoots Arturo in the face with his Glock while
the last two who enter are still busy taking in Angelo writhing on the floor.
Vin keeps his face neutral, his confidence returning now that he knows his life
isn’t immediately on the line.
I take a step back when he prowls
toward Angelo. Angelo was Vin’s trusted third. To be who Vin wants to be, he
has to send a message. But I don’t tell him that. It’s something he needs to
realize on his own. “What did he promise you after you killed me, pussy?” he
asks Angelo.
Angelo doesn’t deny his intention.
Doesn’t beg for his life. He knows it’s over. So, he hits Vin the only way he
can. “Your father’s the pussy for letting a chicken shit like you take over.”
Vin’s heel comes down hard on
Angelo’s face, smashing his nose in. But he doesn’t stop there. He snatches the
paperweight on his desk and flings himself to the floor, bashing Angelo’s face
in, not stopping until the side of his temple caves inward.
To anyone eyeing me, it looks like
I’m watching everything and immune to it all. Yeah. My face never gives
anything away. That doesn’t mean my body’s not punishing me on the inside. I
fight back the nausea working its way through my gut and how hard my heartbeat
thunders out of control. Weakness in the mob and in life gets you killed. I
need to live, despite how my sins have all but sliced my throat.
“Fuck,” one of the boys says, looking
away. He’s new and probably has killed with his gun. But shooting someone is
easy. Too easy. It’s not intimate. Not like killing someone with your bare
hands like Vin just did.
Vin stumbles to his feet, out of
breath and covered with plenty of Angelo’s DNA. His face twists as if angry,
which makes him look good, but I know better. “Get rid of them,” he says,
spitting out blood that hit his mouth.
“What about his men?” someone else
asks.
“All of them need to go,” Vin says,
falling back into the leather seat behind his chair.
“All right, boss,” another says.
Vin’s focus darts my way. He
expects an approving nod from me. But he isn’t going to get it. As much as I’m
a part of this shit, it doesn’t mean I like it.
Or that I don’t want out.
* * *
I climb into my Range Rover and
shut the door tight. Vin’s hand is shaking as he takes a drag of his cigarette.
I knew he wasn’t going to keep it together long, so I made it like he needed to
be away from the cleanup in case someone heard the shots and called it in.
“Is Donnie coming?” he asks,
sprawling across the back seat.
“Yeah. She’s picking out girls she
thinks you might like. Says she’ll be right out.”
I snagged Donnie at a street
festival a few blocks away after I secured Vin in my ride. She flung her arms around
me and started crying when she saw me. I quickly pulled her off me and led her
to Vin. Donnie cares as much as someone like her can, and mostly for all the
wrong reasons. I know this and, maybe, she does, too, which is why we’re
outside a strip club Vin owns waiting on her and whoever she’s recruiting to
lift Vin’s spirits.
“How many girls is she bringing?”
“Two, maybe more,” I answer, not
because she told me, more because this has become the norm.
“Yeah, she knows how to take care
of me,” he says with a laugh, despite how his hand continues to tremble.
This isn’t the first time Vin’s
killed with his hands or the first time I’ve watched him do it. That doesn’t
mean it hasn’t fucked with my mind or given me more nightmares to stash in my
memories. Christ, it took all I had not to puke, seeing all those bodies lying
in a mound and the mess Vin made of Angelo’s head. But I still have a
conscience. Real mob bosses surrender their’s to get what they need. If he’s
going to be one, he needs to lose what’s left of his fast.
He takes another drag, his forced
humor fading. “How long has Angelo been playing two sides?”
“No idea,” I mumble.
He straightens. “Then how did you
know Angelo was in on it?”
I rub my eyes. I’m only
twenty-seven and I already feel too old for this shit. “He tensed at the same
time and in the same way Arturo and his second did.”
Vin curses under his breath and
reaches for another cigarette. “I didn’t see shit and I was looking at them the
whole time. How the hell do you pick up on these things?”
“It comes from the years I spent
fighting,” I answer, looking out through my tinted windows and wondering what
the hell is keeping Donnie.
“In the octagon?” Vin asks.
Vin knows I fought in the mixed
martial arts circuit for a few years, just like he knows I fought anyone who
messed with me on the street. We’ve known each other since we were kids and
long before his father became the most feared man in Jersey. I’m not sure why
he’s asking, but don’t bother to question it. Vin isn’t the same guy I once
called a friend.
“Yeah,” I mumble. “It helped me
anticipate my opponent’s next move.”
“You miss that shit?” he asks.
Considering I was on my way to
becoming the next light heavy weight champion? Hell, yeah. Fighting in the MMA
put money in my pocket and gave me a way to unleash my rage. But neither were
enough when push came to shove. “It was all right,” I tell him.
Vin takes a few more drags before
he says, “I want you to think about watching my back full-time. I’ll pay you a
hell of a lot more if you do.”
Any other boss would just tell me
this is what I’m doing and not give me a choice. But for all Vin’s not the same
guy I once knew, he was there when my world imploded around me. And in hiring
me to watch his mistress, he’s able to keep me on the mob payroll without
staining my hands with their blood. That doesn’t mean I haven’t made a lot of
people bleed. It only means I haven’t killed anyone. Yet.
“I make enough watching your gumad,” I respond.
Vin doesn’t like my answer, but he
doesn’t push it. After what went down with Angelo and with his second serving
time, I’m the only person he completely trusts. But, despite our friendship,
the time’s coming when I’ll no longer have a choice but to do what he wants.
In killing Arturo, Vin will either
gain respect from the other bosses or turn them against him and the family. I
don’t think any of the higher-ups want war, but they’re greedy and looking to
expand their domains. My gut tells me that when Vin’s father Carmine dies, the
cards unfold. But they won’t be in Vin’s favor, and if he doesn’t wise up fast,
none of us will make it out alive.
The back door to the strip club
opens and Donnie steps out, leading three laughing and almost naked women in
clear heels forward.
“I won’t forget what you did for me
today, Sal,” Vin says, right before the women pile in.
He won’t. I know that. Just like I
know I added a nail to my own damn casket the day I went to him for help.
I’m supposed to take Vin and his
dates back to Donnie’s. But Vin’s not waiting to get there. I crank the engine
when I hear his zipper yanked down and the first sound of smacking lips. He
groans, likely relieved the day is finally going in the direction he wants.
“You, go take care of my buddy, Sal,” he says between sharp intakes
of breath.
I stiffen and not in a good way
when a blonde with more hairspray than brains falls laughing into the front
seat. With a hard stomp, I step on the brake and set my SUV in park. She’s
already naked by the time I reach into the center console and shove a condom in
her hand.
She huffs. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No. I’m not.”
She looks insulted, but I don’t
care. She’s going to do what Vin’s paying her to do, whether I want her to or
not. It takes a while for me to get hard enough for her to roll the condom in
place. Once she does, she immediately buries her face in my lap.
I lean my head back against the
headrest. I should enjoy what’s happening. And at one point I did, seeing it as
the perks of the job.
Now, all I wonder about is how my
life became what it is, and how I’ll ever survive it.
ABOUT CECY ROBSON
Cecy Robson is an author of contemporary and new adult romance, young adult adventure, and award-winning urban fantasy. A double-nominated RITA® Finalist, Winner of the Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence, and published author of more than twenty titles, you can typically find Cecy on her laptop or stumbling blindly in search of caffeine.
Connect with Cecy online:
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