Chapter 52: Family Man

HAYLEY

When Luca walked into the bedroom, Hayley was reading her favorite vampire novel.

“Luca?” Even in the dim lighting, she could see blood on his white shirt. “Oh my God! Are you hurt?”

She jumped out of bed, and he lifted his hands as she approached him.

“Not my blood.” He huffed as he walked past her to the bathroom. He didn’t close the door.

His answer hadn’t helped—~anything~—it just made her stomach lurch.

“Then whose—”

“~Fuck!~” he shouted, flinging his shirt into the bathtub then wheeling to face her. “I’ve had a shit day, Hayley. Can we not with the million and one questions?”

“No, Luca, what the hell? Whose blood is that?” she shouted back.

He shook his head as he removed his pants, then added them to the bathtub and walked past her again.

“I sorted out a problem, a risk to my family!” he yelled from the closet.

He came out with his shirt open and a new pair of dress trousers on.

“Luca, I—”

He gripped her shoulders. “What the hell do you want me to say, Hayley? Huh?” His eyes were filled with rage. “I took out a rat, a traitor.”

“And all traitors must die…” Her stomach dropped as she uttered the words.

He let her go and began to button up his shirt. “The worst part is, I’m not even sorry.”

“Who was he?” she asked after he went to get a new tie. She was feeling scared for Benny—and even a little for Max.

“Does it matter? He’s gone now.”

She sighed. “Did you know the cop was going to be there the other night, Luca?”

“Of course. But only because I knew a rat would lead him there.”

“The rat…was he in your family?”

“No, Borroni’s,” he said gruffly, then disappeared back into the closet.

“But why did ~you~ kill him?” she asked when he reappeared with a new suit jacket. “Why are you doing Borroni’s dirty work—”

“Hayley!” His tone was harsh and silenced her instantly. “Why all the fucking questions? You can’t understand—you’re not a Marcello!”

The words hurt. She had no reason for it; they just did. “And I’m fucking glad! You’re all bastards!” She stormed into the bathroom and slammed the door.

“I’m going out!” he yelled, but she didn’t respond.

When she heard him leave, she sat on the toilet seat lid with her head in her hands.

She was angry Detective Blake had failed one of his informants, angry Luca had killed someone, and angry that she couldn’t do a damn thing about any of it.

She sighed, then decided she might as well clean up the bathroom. But when she picked up Luca’s trousers, she heard something fall into the bathtub—a bloody switchblade.

She flashed back to Borroni cutting her with a similar knife, and her stomach churned. This could have just as easily been her blood.

She threw the trousers back into the tub, dug through her toiletry bag for the burner phone, and called the only number on it.

He answered, but she fiercely cut off his greeting.

“One of your rats is dead. I hope you’re happy.” She ended the call and turned off the phone, then sank to the floor and sobbed.

The next rat to die might be her.

***

Hayley refused to go to sleep; instead, she paced the room, then wandered aimlessly around the empty house filled with locked doors and long hallways.

Luca was out and so were his two right hands. There were just a couple of men hovering about.

Eventually sleep must have found her, though, because when she was woken by her phone notifying her of a text message, she was in the comfy chair in the corner of the master bedroom.

She sat upright, and a jacket that had been draped over her body slipped down slightly. Someone must have put it on her as she slept.

She was still alone, though. The bed across from her was empty and Luca’s side was undisturbed. The faint smell of his cologne lingered, but he was not there.

The text was just Siobhan calling a meeting. Hayley got up and wandered around the room. He’d left no note, no nothing. Had he even been back at all?

She needed to shower; she needed to get herself together… She went into the bathroom, which stank of bleach. All traces of last night were gone.

She tried to push through the memories—their fight, the blood on his clothes, the knife in his pocket.

She hated this… hated all of this—and she couldn’t do it anymore. She wouldn’t. She was done being played with like a puppet by the cop. And like a toy by Luca Marcello.

She cared about him; of course she did. She couldn’t just turn off her feelings. But she also couldn’t go through a night like last night ever again.

This wasn’t her home, and these weren’t her things. All she needed was what she’d come with.

She showered, dried, and changed, pinning her hair into a neat bun and dressing in a blue silk blouse and a knee-length gray pencil skirt.

Then, grabbing her oversized black handbag, she packed her things—her phone, her charger, and her toiletry bag. She also made sure she took that goddamn bangle.

***

“Hayley?” A deep voice stopped her right before she reached the front door.

She turned and smiled weakly at Dom. “I’ve got to go to work.” She’d tried to keep her voice strong, but it failed her.

Dom looked her up and down. She knew she looked a wreck.

“I’ll drive you.” Dom grabbed some keys from the hook, walked past her, and opened the door.

“Thank you.” She started to walk out but paused to glance back at the kitchen. “Is Luca here?”

“He was, but he had business.”

Of course he did, she thought bitterly, stomping out of the house into a light but icy-cold midmorning drizzle.

***

After her meeting with Siobhan—who’d repeatedly asked her if she was okay, to which she’d lied, telling her everything was fine—she cleaned the Dublin like her life depended on it.

On a short break for coffee, she texted Ava, warning her that she’d be home tonight and that she needed to get as drunk as possible. Ava responded with a million smiley faces.

Hayley was polishing the bar top to a high shine when a pack of Marcello men entered the building, led by Frankie.

She threw down the rag and walked around the bar. “Can I help you?” she asked coldly.

Frankie raised his eyebrows, then gestured to Benny Conti, who stood beside him. “Boss wants all security cameras and monitors checked.”

“Why the gaggle of goons?” she asked, and Frankie chuckled.

“The cameras will be down for around ten to twenty minutes, and Luca doesn’t want anything to go wrong in those unaccounted for, unprotected minutes.”

“Where is Luca?”

“He had—”

“Business,” I know.” She rolled her eyes. “Come on then.”

She led the way to the camera room, followed by Benny—and Frankie after he instructed his men to spread out and keep a lookout.

Benny went into the security office first, leaving her outside with Frankie.

“Luca wants you to observe Benny,” Frankie said. “He’s going to teach you how to use the system and how to fix minor technical glitches.”

Hayley nodded.

“I’ll be back out front if you need me.”

Frankie turned and walked up the hallway, which meant it was now or never for Hayley. She didn’t want to have to phone or contact Luca.

“Frankie!”

He turned back to face her.

“Tell Luca I won’t be staying at his home tonight. In fact, probably not ever again. Tell him I won’t be spoken to like that.”

Before Frankie could reply, she walked into the security office and slammed the door.

She wanted to break down; she wanted to cry. But the sound of someone clearing their throat reminded her she wasn’t alone, so she composed herself and turned to face Benny.

“Is it true?” he whispered.

She noticed the monitors behind him were off.

“Did Luca kill a rat?”

Hayley nodded, and Benny’s face paled.

“~Shit~.”

“I can’t do this anymore, Benny,” she confessed.

“We have no choice, Hayley,” he croaked, shaking his head. “We’ve been dancing with the fucking devil, and now we have to finish the damn song.”

“We can still say no—”

“Hayley!” he hissed, and she could see the fear in his eyes. “I have a wife, kids. Luca killed someone for being his ~enemy’s~ rat—fuck knows what he would do to us.”

“Not if we get out,” she tried to explain, but Benny shook his head.

“I’m in too deep. ~You’re in too deep,” he began.

“Every time you wore the bracelet, every time I pretended to delete footage but handed it over—even last night when you called the cop to tell him the rat was dead—was a witness statement to him.”

Hayley knew Benny was right. If Luca found out the truth, he’d kill them both instantly.

“I don’t want to die, Hayley. I just wanted to make a bit of cash for my girls.”

Hayley felt for Benny; this was just a job to him, he didn’t kill people. And yet, he was taking the biggest risk with his own life.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “But I won’t be a puppet for the detective anymore. And I can’t let Luca mistreat me.”

“Do you think either of them will let you just walk away?” Benny’s eyes bored into hers. “The detective will make sure Luca finds out about your betrayal.”

He sighed. “I grew up in this city. I watched the place being torn apart by the Mafia. But back then I couldn’t give a shit. In fact, I loved the idea of joining and helping with the computers.

“But then I got married—we had our girls—and I realized, what if they marry one? One who killed? One who was a drug dealer? What if my girls stumbled onto something—a Mafia crime scene?

“Or what if they got addicted because of the shit these people sell? Could I live with the guilt if one of my girls dies because of something I could have stopped?”

Hayley was moved by Benny’s words and the raw emotion he was showing. Suddenly he wasn’t simply a family member or a police informant—he was a parent looking out for his children.

“You can’t protect them from everything,” she whispered, and he shook his head.

“No, but I can try. If I could help put these three families in prison, then that’s one, two, maybe three fewer threats in this fucked-up world.”

“But what about the risks?”

“I would die for my girls. I would move mountains, swim oceans. Hell, the only time I would kill someone would be for my children, for my wife.”

Hayley could feel the love and the desperation coming from this man.

“If I stop now…” He paused. “Well, I’m already dead—Luca would kill me in a heartbeat. But he could hurt my girls too.” Benny was visibly pained by the thought, as was Hayley.

Could Luca hurt children for their father’s betrayal? Yesterday morning, she would have said no, but today she wasn’t so sure of the answer.

Last night he murdered a rat who was betraying his enemy, and he wasn’t even sorry for his actions. ~All traitors must die~ were his own words, after all.

What would he do if he found out a family member had betrayed him? Or if he found out ~she~ had betrayed him?

“I won’t tell you what to do, Hayley, but you have to make a choice,” Benny said, bringing her out of her thoughts.

“You can either walk away and take your chances with whatever the cop has on you, or you keep going and help clean up New York.”

Hayley wanted to be the heroine in this story, to see the bad guys get what they deserved, but it was hard when one of the bad guys was Luca—someone she cared about.

Someone she wanted yet, at the same time, wanted to run from.

“Tomorrow morning, the three family leaders are meeting at a secret location known as the Halfway House. Detective Blake wants you to use the tracker and lead them to it.”

“Like the casino night?” She fumed, remembering how she was caught in the crossfire with Luca and the cop.

“No, they’re not planning a raid. They just want to know the location.”

“Luca wouldn’t take me with him. Besides, we’re not together anymore. I’m useless.”

“No, you’re not useless… Maybe put the tracker on him?”

Hayley laughed out loud at the suggestion. “Are you kidding? The tracker is a bracelet. How the hell am I going to get him to wear the bloody thing?”

Benny frowned. “Get creative. If you want to stay alive, get creative.”

Those were Benny’s last words before he turned on the monitor, made a show of saying how everything was done, and then left the room.

Through the monitors she watched all the Marcello men leave the club, then sat staring aimlessly at the screens.

Her mind was all over the place, but one thing she knew for sure: tonight she wouldn’t be sharing a bed, a house—or even the same air if she could help it—with Luca Marcello.