Betting Over My Grief

Five years after my younger brother Luca and my fiancée Elena were killed in an ambush, I arranged my own burial at sea. I was pressing the engraved nameplate onto my custom urn when my father, Don Salvatore Leo, walked into the room with a cigar between his lips. "Antonio, you don't need to go to the docks to mourn them this year. They're not dead." My fingers went white around the nameplate. Then the hidden door in the safe room opened from the inside. Luca walked out with Elena in his arms, casually spinning the emerald ring I had once given her around his finger. "I won the bet," he said, lazy about it. "I told you we could live right next door to him for five years and he'd never figure it out." Then he leaned toward Elena, pitching his voice so it landed exactly where he wanted it. "So tell me. The family heir's seat should be mine now, shouldn't it? Hm?" The woman who had once cried over me and sworn she would marry me, after I took a bullet for Luca and was sent onto the operating table, now rested coldly against his chest. She looked at me with disgust. "He was just stupid. He really believed we were dead." So the safe room connected straight through to the house next door. No wonder my father had used the excuse of reinforcing it to keep me out all these years. I really had been a fool. Right up to the end, I was still thinking about what flowers to bring to the water for them. Chapter 1 Antonio's POV "Why?" I forced the word past the knot in my throat and held down everything clawing at my chest. Elena frowned. There wasn't a trace left of the tenderness she used to show me. "Antonio, when are you going to grow up? You're the illegitimate son nobody's supposed to talk about. Why do you keep trying to take the succession from Luca?" My father ground his cigar out on the burial-at-sea contract lying across my desk, burning a black hole through the paper. Not one of them noticed what the contract was. Not one of them noticed the urn sitting beside it. "These five years were meant to grind that temper out of you," Dad said. "To teach you your place. Luca is the legitimate heir to the Leo family. That seat was never yours to fight for. "Be smart about it. From now on you're Luca's cleaner, and you're done scheming." Scheming? My mouth twisted into something that almost resembled a smile. My heart felt as if someone had fired a bullet straight through it. "I've never schemed for anything," I said hoarsely. I'd known my place since I was a child. I was the bastard people whispered about behind closed doors. I had no standing in the organization, and I'd never even met my birth mother. In my earliest memories, Dad and the woman I called Mom treated me well enough. Then Luca was born. After that, the way they looked at me started to change. Luca liked spicy food, so every dish on the table burned my tongue. Luca liked custom handguns, so I carried whatever old piece he'd grown tired of. The year I turned sixteen I stood a full head taller than him. The tailor came to fit us for family suits, and Gianna made a point of telling him to cut mine to Luca's measurements. For three years I showed up to family functions in jackets with the sleeves riding up my forearms while every cousin in the room laughed behind my back. Then I met Elena. She'd just risen to second-in-command of the family. She was brilliant, fearless, impossible not to look at. I thought she was my salvation. I gave her everything I had. Then she got close to Luca. And she changed too. She decided I was lying in wait. That I was quietly playing for his seat. So that was how it worked. Even when I wanted nothing, even when I fought for nothing, the simple fact that I was alive looked like theft to them. I should have understood years ago. Antonio Leo, they never once thought of you as family. Maybe something in my face finally unsettled Elena. Her expression softened for half a second, and she held out a cigar. "Antonio, look forward. We're still family. Luca and I won't shortchange you." I didn't take it. Luca immediately put on a guilty expression, clutching his chest as though I'd wounded him. "Tony, this is on me. Why don't I hand you the heir's seat? Elena and I will go. Would that fix it?" Gianna crossed the room and slapped me. Her voice shook with fury. "Antonio, enough! Elena is carrying Luca's child. That baby is the legitimate Leo bloodline. Do you want it born marked the way you were?" I stood there, barely able to keep myself upright. Right. I was the son my father had with a nightclub dancer when he was young. To Gianna, I was living proof of her husband's betrayal. To Dad, I was cheap labor with a gun. Useful, disposable, and not worth mourning if I died. I'd always known that. That was why I volunteered for the worst jobs. I went in first every time the shooting started. I brought home the most wins and collected the most scars. I thought that if I made myself useful enough, strong enough, loyal enough, one day they'd look at me and say I'd done well. Only now did I understand. They never wanted me to do well. They wanted me not to exist. As it happened, that was already taking care of itself. I was dying. I didn't have long. Elena stepped closer and reached for my arm. I jerked away. "Don't touch me." Five years. Five entire years. Before every job that could have killed me, I turned toward the docks and begged the dead for forgiveness. I kept thinking that if I hadn't insisted Luca and Elena handle that shipment for me, they'd never have been ambushed. But none of it had been real. My father. The woman who raised me. The woman I loved. My own brother. All four of them had run a five-year performance together. I looked at Dad. My voice trembled. "You told me that safe room was being reinforced. You just didn't want me finding out they were living on the other side of it, did you?" He frowned, then gave a dismissive laugh. "So what if I did? It was for your own good. It kept you from pining after things that were never yours, and it kept you doing your job." "For my own good?" I laughed, and tears came with it. "You watched me stand at an empty dock every year and beg forgiveness. You watched me carry the blame for getting Cosimo Barone killed, five years of it. Every stretch of ground I nearly died taking went into Luca's name. And you call that good for me?" "Antonio!" Gianna snapped. "Is that any way to speak to your papa?" Her patience was already gone. "Luca and Elena love each other. They had to play dead to stay out of their enemies' sights. They've given up enough. What more do you want from them?" They love each other. The words hit harder than any bullet ever had. At that exact moment, my phone lit up. I looked down. [Mr. Antonio Leo, your burial-at-sea service is now active. When your monitor registers that your heart has stopped, your location will be transmitted automatically. Our recovery team will reach you within two hours.] I locked the screen. Then I took the Leo family tag I'd worn around my neck ever since Luca "died" and set it on top of the burial contract my father had burned through. "Fine," I said quietly. "I'm done making a scene." What I didn't say was that I'd finally run out of hope for every one of them. Chapter 2 The next morning, the burial service delivered my monitor band. It sat over the old scar on my wrist and covered it exactly. Rain started tapping against the window. It took me back to another rainy day five years earlier. My engagement night with Elena. Luca had told me he was putting together a surprise. I waited in the banquet hall all night. The surprise turned out to be a call from the police. Their car had exploded. The only thing recovered from the wreckage was a ring engraved with my name. I got to the scene and dropped to my knees when I saw what was left of it. Gianna cried until she had no voice left. Then she pointed at me and told the room I'd killed them. The whole family whispered behind my back. Rain mixed with blood and ran down under my collar that night. I carried that cold in me for five years. Now I knew every one of those tears was staged. They'd blown up an empty car themselves. No wonder the kitchen kept turning out Luca's favorite spicy dishes long after he was supposed to be dead. No wonder Gianna always found a reason to skip the memorial at the docks. She'd been walking next door to sit with him instead. It didn't matter anymore. I'd spent almost everything I had on the burial service. Once I closed out the last set of accounts in my hands, I could go. That evening, we had a family dinner. I was about to step away to meet a contact when Luca called after me. "Tony, everybody's here tonight. You're the best drinker in the family. Work the room for me, would you? Elena's pregnant, so I need to look after her. I can't be drinking." He had one arm around Elena, and there was nothing apologetic in his eyes now. Yesterday's remorse had evaporated. Elena leaned into him with one hand resting over her stomach. "Luca isn't well. You're his older brother. Is it really so much to ask that you handle the room for him?" Dad nodded as if the matter were settled. "Go. Keep Luca away from the liquor. You've always been the sensible one. This won't be hard for you." I didn't move. Luca sighed for the benefit of the room. "Tony's still angry with me. It's all right. I'll do it myself. Don't push him." The old guard around the room started murmuring at once. Elena's face hardened. "Antonio, it's a few drinks. Do you really have to make a face about it? Luca is the heir. Helping him is your job." Dad smashed his glass against the floor. "When I tell you to go, you go. And if you won't take an order, at least remember we're family. Stop keeping score." Family. The word had never sounded uglier. I looked around at the table, at all the faces angled toward me. Then at Dad. Gianna. Luca. Elena. The four of them standing together. That was the family. I was the extra body in the room. "Fine," I said. "I'll do it." I carried a glass from table to table and went through nearly three bottles of whiskey before the room warmed up. When I finally tried to slip away to meet my contact, Luca grabbed his throat and went down. His face turned blue. He vomited across the floor. Everyone rushed toward him. Luca fought for breath. "It's fine. It's nothing to do with Tony. My health's always been bad." The more he defended me, the more the room looked at me like a traitor. Then someone found traces of white powder on the floor near the spot where Luca and I had been talking. The kind of thing that sets off an asthma attack in seconds. Elena shot to her feet, finger leveled at me, voice pitched high. "Antonio! You know Luca has asthma! Do you hate him that much? Do you want his seat that badly?" Dad pulled his gun and pointed it at me. "Put him in the basement cell. How did the Leo family raise a snake like you?" Gianna turned her face away as though looking at me too long would dirty her. "You'll sit down there and think about what you've done. And no more tricks." Elena hesitated. Then she helped the guards shove me inside. The steel door slammed and locked. The cell was dark and damp, and the whole room smelled of old blood. An old gunshot wound in my back flared badly enough to put me on the floor. A full day and night went by. No food. No water. My head started going soft at the edges. With the last of my strength I dragged myself to the door and beat on it. "Open up. I need a doctor." My voice broke. "Elena. Papa." Chapter 3 I beat on the door until both palms were slick with blood. Nobody answered. But I couldn't die yet. I still had one encrypted flash drive on me, and it had to go out to the place I'd arranged months ago. I don't know how long I kept at it. Eventually the steel door opened. Elena stood in the doorway. The moment she saw me curled on the floor, something like panic went through her eyes. She crouched and put a hand to my forehead. The heat startled her badly enough that she snatched it back. "You're burning up. How did it get this bad?" "Medicine," I managed. "Coat pocket." Elena went straight for my coat, dug out the bottle I used for the gunshot wounds, poured water, and helped me sit up. "Take it. It'll stop the pain." I'd just swallowed the pills when Luca walked in. He looked at the bottle and frowned, all exaggerated disappointment. "Tony, why would you lie to us? Those aren't painkillers. Those are the stimulants you took off that rival crew last time. You've been faking so we'd let you out, haven't you?" One sentence, and the panic in Elena's eyes turned to fury. She shoved me away hard enough that my shoulder hit the wall. "Antonio! Are you out of your mind? How many more games are you going to play?" Gianna came in behind him, her face dark. "I should have left you to die in the slums with that stripper who whelped you. We never should have brought you into this house." Dad jabbed a finger at me. "Hopeless. Completely hopeless." I shook my head over and over. Blood and tears ran down my face together. "I didn't. I swear I didn't." "Enough." Elena cut me off. She sounded exhausted. "I don't want to hear another explanation, Antonio. I'm so disappointed in you." After that, nobody came back. I got myself upright somehow and made it to my room. It took three full days before I could stand without shaking. At dawn on the third day, I finally sent the encrypted flash drive out. The moment it was gone, a message came in from the burial service. [Mr. Antonio Leo, we're detecting repeated irregularities in your heart rate. Please take care.] I sent back one word. [Okay.] It was almost funny. The only people in the world who cared whether I lived or died were the ones waiting to collect my body. Chapter 4 Three days later, there was a gang shootout between the Leo family and a rival crew at the docks. I was crouched behind a shipping container swapping magazines when Luca came around the side. He was wearing a nasty little smile. "Tony, how are you still alive? You know Elena still has your engagement photos on her phone? Makes me sick every time I see them." I ignored him and turned to go. He caught my arm and leaned in close to my ear. "Cosimo, five years ago. That was me. You've carried it long enough, Tony, it's time you handed it back. Go die." He shoved me out from behind the container. He lost his own footing as he did it and went down on the concrete. Then he screamed at the men behind us. "Help! Tony's turned on us! He's working with them, he's trying to kill me!" Dad, Gianna, and Elena came running with armed men behind them. Not one of them looked at me first. They all closed around Luca. "Luca! Are you hurt?" Elena pulled him against her, her voice shaking. Gianna cupped his face, checking him over, tears already starting. Dad raised his gun at me. "Antonio, you ungrateful animal! I fed you all these years and you turn on your own blood?" They started backing away with Luca in the middle of them. Nobody seemed to notice me stranded at the edge of the dock, alone in the open. Bullets snapped past my head. One had already gone through my shoulder. Cold sweat poured down my back. With the last of my strength I shouted, "Elena!" She finally turned. For one second, she looked as if she might come back. Gianna caught her arm. "He just tried to kill Luca. Why would you save him?" Dad said, "Let him sit in it awhile. It'll knock the ideas out of him." Luca, pale and weak in Elena's arms, murmured, "Elena, Tony's with them. Nothing's going to happen to him." Elena hesitated. Then she turned her back and walked. I watched the four of them leave together. And I started laughing. Twenty-eight years, and it turned out I really had been the extra one the whole time. "If I die, will you finally believe I didn't sell you out?" A shot cracked through the rain. The bullet went through my chest. Blood misted across the dock. I went straight back off the edge into the freezing Harozon River. On the way down, I thought I heard them calling my name. There was panic in it now. Water flooded my nose and mouth. So cold. And I was so tired. I closed my eyes.