Mafia Kings: Adriano: Chapter 1
Mafia Kings: Adriano: Dark Mafia Romance Series #2
Fuck the mafia.
I live in Florence, Italy, and theyâve been a part of my life as far back as I can remember.
A shadowy threat around every corner since I was a child.
You see, my fatherâs a gambler â and heâs bad at it.
Which means he borrows money he canât repay⦠and then loses it on stupid bets.
I want to hate him for it â for all the pain heâs put me and my mother through â
But heâs my dad.
And heâs a sweetheart when heâs not making us miserable.
Itâs an addiction for him, the same as if he were an alcoholic or a drug addict. A sickness.
Heâs tried to stop â he really has. Heâs gone to those meetings, the ones like Alcoholics Anonymous, for years.
But every so often, he relapses.
I know heâs deeply ashamed when he messes upâ¦
Because it always ends up hurting me and my mother.
So I donât hate him.
Iâm ANGRY at him a lot⦠but I donât hate him.
Guess who I do hate?
The assholes who keep loaning him money for his stupid betsâ¦
And then come knocking on the door when he canât pay them off.
See, my father works for the judicial system in Florence.
Heâs not a judge or a lawyer â just a low-level worker in the bureaucracy.
Officially, anyway.
But heâs also a âgo-betweenâ for the Cosa Nostra â the ones who really run Florence behind the scenes.
My father is the one who deals with the judges and prosecutors who are on the take.
Heâs the one who makes sure the District Attorneyâs office knows when theyâre supposed to throw a caseâ¦
And he lets the judges know when theyâre supposed to give unfair advantages to the defense.
My father not only delivers the money, he also looks for new recruits.
He knows all the gossip and where all the bodies are buried.
He knows whoâs gotten divorced recently and needs moneyâ¦
He knows who has a drug problemâ¦
He knows who has a mistress with expensive tastesâ¦
And he knows who has a problem that the mafia could make go away. All it would require would be a little âfavor.â
Heâs the man the mafia relies on to make their corruption work.
I know this makes my father sound like a monsterâ¦
But heâs not.
He hates what he does for them.
Heâs tried to get out time and againâ¦
But like I said, heâs an addict.
The gangsters know that, and they take advantage of it.
Thatâs how the whole system works.
Yes, half of the judges and lawyers on the take are greedy bastards â
But the other half are people who are in despair. Who make bad mistakes. Who start down self-destructive paths. Who dig holes for themselves that they canât get out of.
Theyâre desperate.
Desperate people are vulnerable.
And the mafia is always there to lend a helping hand⦠for a âfavor.â
But once you shake hands with the devilâ¦
He owns you.
I know, because they own my father.
They use both a carrot and a stick.
The carrot is the money they lend him to gamble. They feed his addiction, like a casino that gives a customer an endless line of credit.
The stick is when they threaten him⦠and worse.
Over the years, heâs had his legs broken twice.
They snapped his right arm three times.
Theyâve broken his fingers more often than he can remember.
They kept breaking his bonesâ¦
Until they broke him.
The mafia got him under their thumb decades ago.
Now itâs not just the debts they hold over his head â but threats against me and my mother.
So Papa always does what they tell him toâ¦
And he despairs.
Heâll try to stay away from gambling, and heâll do great for months at a timeâ¦
But then heâll give in just a little to the demons inside him and place a betâ¦
Then another⦠and anotherâ¦
And just like that, the Cosa Nostraâs grip on him tightens.
He despises himself for it.
Heâs a broken and defeated man.
And thatâs why I hate the mafia.
I always have. I always will.
Which is why it kills meâ¦
Absolutely destroys meâ¦
â¦that I fell in love with a mafioso.