out of the elevator and into the cave, nostalgia hits me. The kind that puts a hole in your stomach and a small grin on your face. It’s the smell; damp and metallic, it reminds me of playing hide-and-seek down here when we were kids, long before Castiel and the other Hollow brothers turned it into one of the most prestigious clubs in the world.
Whiskey Under the Rocks. It’s a secret buried deep within the caves of Devil’s Hollow, a far cry from the glitzy strip of clubs over in Devil’s Cove. Over there, money will buy you entry to any club or casino, but this joint is invite-only. Once a month, Rafe, Tor, and Benny come together to hold a poker night. It’s a partnership that’s worked seamlessly over the years. Tor brings in the biggest spenders from his casinos in Devil’s Cove. Rafe has a reputation that has any gambler begging for a seat at one of his games. And Benny, the second oldest Hollow brother, is a fixer. From the finest Russian whores to the purest Peruvian cocaine, there’s nothing he can’t, or won’t, source to give his guests a good time.
Tonight isn’t the usual poker night, but Rafe decided to pull one together last minute, because our meeting at our father’s church meant that he was going to be in town for the week, anyway. I’m not much of a gambler, and I’m not just here to support my brother and the cousins that I actually do like. No, I’m here because the Cove and the Hollow clans want to talk shop. No doubt they want to renegotiate the terms of the port usage.
I stroll down the narrow tunnel, running my fingers over the craggy walls and remembering all the hours we spent down here as kids. When I reach the entrance to the main room, I huff out a laugh. It’s so fucking different. The exposed cave walls still drip with moisture, but now, the chandeliers built into the jagged ceilings light up all of my old hiding places. Booths line the walls, and a bar is built into the farthest alcove, selling every top-label liquor available, including, of course, the whiskey that’s made just a few caves over.
Hearing a familiar bark echo through the empty club, I twist my head to the left, a lazy smirk forming on my lips. Tor’s here already, acting like the big nightclub boss, a role he assumes so well. Behind me, the elevator dings, and a loud Russian voice spills out of it.
“Well, what the fuck am I supposed to do for the next three hours, Castiel?”
I glance over my shoulder and spot a long-legged blond in an impossibly tight dress. In front of her, my cousin Cas storms ahead, a face like thunder. He catches my eye, mutters something in Italian, and spins on his heel. “Here,” he spits, taking a wedge of bills out of his pocket and tossing it at the woman’s stilettos. “Go play.”
She yells at him in Russian and storms off. Judging by the weary gaze settling on his face, Cas is used to it by now.
I jerk my chin up. “Lover’s tiff?”
He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Lovers war, more like. My father’s on his death bed and won’t let me take over Smugglers Club until I find a wife. He seems to think that stupid Russian bitch is the most suitable.”
“So I’ve heard,” I drawl, raking my teeth over my bottom lip in amusement.
“So you’ve also heard that if I don’t marry her before he dies, the factory goes to the board of investors.” He shakes his head. Tightens his cuff links. “At this rate, I’ll be dying before he does.”
I clap him on the shoulder. “Speaking of Uncle Alfredo, I should go see him at some point before I leave. He’s always been good to me.”
“Yeah,” he grunts. “If you could shove a pillow over his face while you’re there, that’d be great.”
As much as I hate to admit it, warmth spreads through the pit of my stomach. Cas is the oldest Hollow brother; I’ve always liked him and admired his business acumen. He’s calm, money-minded, and single-handedly turned Smugglers Club whiskey from “mafia juice” into a global brand. He’s got a few nicknames along the coast, one being The Silver Fox—thanks to his George Clooney-esque good looks and salt-and-pepper hair, and the other being Mister Moonshine. He’s always experimenting with new liquor concoctions, and made men around the world go nuts for it. Owning a special-edition Smugglers Club liquor bottle, brewed by Castiel Visconti himself, is the ultimate status symbol.
We stroll toward the bar and he pours us two whiskeys. We chink glasses, and over the rim of his, his eyes glitter with mischief. “When you finally get your ass back to the coast and take over Devil’s Dip, you’ll need a wife yourself.”
“Yeah, not going to happen.”
“Moving back, or getting a wife?”
“Both.”
He laughs, but I’m deadly serious. I can barely tolerate a woman staying longer than it takes for her to make me come, let alone having one around permanently. Aside from the concept of love being absolute bullshit, I find women…boring. Weak-willed and weak-minded, they always seem to agree with what I say and do what I want. That’s what assistants and employees are for. I need a woman with a damn backbone, both in and out of the bedroom. But especially in the bedroom. I like to fuck rough, but rough’s boring when she lies back and takes it.
An unsolicited image of Aurora bent over my knee, bare-assed and red-faced, pops into my head. I wonder if she’d lie back and take it, or if she’d writhe under the palm of my hand. If she’d scream in the way I’d want her to.
Fucking hell.
A booming voice saves me from my dirty thoughts.
“I can’t find you a wife for life, but I can give you a wife for the night.”
Cas groans. I turn around to see Benny, the middle Hollow brother, stroll into the club, a gaggle of half-naked women on his arms. He shoots a wink at me. “What’s your type, cugino?”
Curly-haired and unavailable. But I don’t reply. Instead, I down the rest of my drink and lean against the bar. I loosen my tie. Since when were the caves so hot? But I’m only fooling myself. I know what’s got my skin burning up like I have a fever—the thought of spanking my uncle’s fiancee. Maybe I should get laid tonight. Find a blond, curly-haired babe and have her mutter dirty bird puns in my ear.
Cas cocks a brow. “What’s so funny?”
I hadn’t realized I was laughing. Shaking my head, I turn my eyes to the jagged ceiling. “Nothing, man.”
This isn’t about Aurora; it’s just the Coast. It’s always made me lose the plot.
Cas glances over my shoulder toward the elevator. “Guests are starting to arrive. Come—I have a private room set up, and we can wait for the others in there.”
I oblige. The room is an alcove off the main club, with little but a cluster of deep-seated armchairs around a low table and a private bar in the corner. I take a seat, and a few moments later, Rafe walks in, his men forming a wall around him.
“Fucking hell, Rafe,” Tor drawls, storming in behind him and slapping him on the back. “It’s just family; you didn’t need to bring the cavalry.”
“I’m an important man, cugino,” Rafe shoots back, throwing me a wink as he sits down next to me. He nods to his men, who then take guard by the door. “I don’t expect you to understand.”
Before Tor can reply, there’s a strange gurgling noise and a click of a safety catch. When I look up, one of Rafe’s men has a thick arm around his neck and a gun to his temple. It’s gold, with a dragon etched along the barrel. While everyone in the room jumps up and draws their own weapons, I smirk into the bottom of my whiskey glass.
I’d know that ugly fucking Glock anywhere.
Gabe’s gruff voice comes from the shadows. “Your cavalry are pathetic.” He drops the man like a sack of shit and shoves the others out the way.
Rafe sinks back into his chair, glaring at Gabe as he takes his place next to me. Rafe leans over the table and hisses, “Grazie, dickhead. You really had to embarrass me like that in front of the whole family?”
I can’t remember the last time I saw Gabe smile, but I swear, the corners of his mouth turn up before he picks up my whiskey glass and downs it in one. A server hurries over and immediately fills it back up.
“Always a barrel of laughs when the Devil’s Dip brothers come to town, isn’t it?” I look up to see Dante striding in, looking like a miserable fuck as usual. Donatello’s by his side, a huge grin on his face and a thick stack of files tucked under his arm.
My eyes dart behind them. “Where’s Uncle Al?”
Dante’s gaze darkens. “At home. Probably groping up his jail bait.” He smooths down his shirt and sinks into the chair opposite. “You know, I take care of most things these days. Going forward, you should expect to be dealing with me.”
“Did Daddy finally give you keys to the kingdom?” Rafe asks mockingly. “Or did he just lend you a booster seat so you can sit at the table tonight? Don’t worry, I’ll keep an eye on the clock to make sure you don’t miss your curfew.”
Everyone around the table laughs except Dante. The tension between him and my brother crackles like static. No one on this earth hates Dante more than Rafe does, because he swears he caught him cheating at one of his poker games years ago. The only reason he didn’t put a bullet in his head is because he’s Tor’s brother. The feeling is mutual, but not because of that fateful night. No, Dante hates Rafe because he’s everything he wishes he could be. As successful as Devil’s Cove is, it’ll never be Vegas, and as cut-throat as Dante is, he’ll never be as powerful as Rafe.
“All right, all right,” Donatello interrupts, fighting a smile. “Let’s get down to business so we can go and play. I have a lot of money to claw back off you assholes. I’ll go first.” He flips open his files and studies them. “Angelo, all I need is approval to open a trade route to and from Japan. One vessel a week, the only cargo is fish.”
Tor snorts, muttering something about him being a loser. Donatello probably is the only one around this table that doesn’t know what it feels like to snuff the life from a man.
Donatello turns pink and steels his jaw. “It’s pufferfish. Fugu. I can’t fly it in because it’s one of the most poisonous and rarest sushi dishes in the world and highly illegal to prepare if you’re not fully trained—”
I cut him off with a lazy wave of my hand. “I’ll allow your little fish shipment, Don.” I turn to Castiel and Benny. “And what does the Hollow Clan want from Santa this year?”
Cas clears his throat. “Well, it has nothing to do with the port, actually.” He cocks his head to the back wall of the alcove. “There’s a network of caves we want access to a few miles over, but it falls under Dip territory—”
“Done. Anyone else?”
“Hold on,” Dante growls. “You’re giving them access to Dip land? Yet when my father and I wanted access to the Preserve, you flat-out refused?”
“What the fuck am I going to do with a cave?”
“What the fuck are you going to do with a forest?”
Nothing. And if it’d been the Hollow brothers who’d asked for the land, I’d have probably given it to them. But now I know Alberto wants it to hold over his hot, young fiance, there’s not a chance in hell I’d even consider it. I darken my glare and recline in the armchair.
“Did you know, there’s thirteen pairs of American Bald Eagles in that park? It’s more than just a few shitty trees and a swamp.”
“What do you care?” His eyes thin. “You sound like that bitch Aurora.”
Bitch. An unnecessary amount of fury threads through my veins. I wash it down with a gulp of whiskey. “I care about the environment.”
Tor bites out a laugh. “Tell that to your private jet.”
Dante’s blistering stare doesn’t waver. “All right, what do you want?” His eyes move to Rafe. “Tell you what. I’ll let you build a hotel and casino in the Cove. There’s a great plot of land on the south headland. Has uninterrupted views of the beach.”
Rafe’s chuckle is deep and sinister. “Build a Raphael Visconti hotel and casino on your land? You wouldn’t know how to deal with the sudden spike in tourism.”
Dante slams his fist against the table. Rafe’s men step out of the shadows. I rise to my feet and put a hand on my brother’s shoulder. “Enough. Dante, I’ll think about your request.” Lie. “Now, is there anything else you leeches want from me before you drown yourself in whiskey, debt, and whores?”
A cocktail of music and laughter seeps under the door, signaling that the games are in full swing. Rafe’s shoulder twitches under my palm, and as I look around, I notice everyone’s eyes are glancing toward the party.
“Then I say this meeting is officially over.”
Everyone pours out of the room. Everyone except Dante, who sinks back into his chair and fiddles with a pen Donatello left behind. Only when the door slams shut behind Gabe, muting the music again, does he speak.
“There’s something else I want from you, Angelo.”
Sucking in a lungful of air, I sit back down and signal to the server behind the bar for another refill.
It’s going to be a long night.
The poker games are in full swing. Croupiers deal out cards with the flair of up-close magicians, and glitzy watches flash under the chandeliers as gamblers scoop up their chips. Girls in lingerie and lace work the room, weaving in between tables looking for their next John.
I watch as Rafe’s eyes follow a petite red-head, then he leans against the bar and whistles. “She’d do well on the strip, that one.”
“You buying?”
He eyes me sideways. “When have you ever seen me pay for a whore?” He looks over my shoulder and his gaze darkens. “What did Dante want?”
“You don’t want to know.”
“Oh, but I do.”
I roll the glass in my hand, watching the brown liquid slosh up the sides. “He wants the records for any calls made to Sinners Anonymous on the coast. Me taking out that dumb lackey over Sunday lunch gave him the idea. He seems to think it’ll help weed out traitors and gain intel on business partners.”
He huffs out a laugh. Runs a finger over his bottom lip. “Doesn’t he realize I’ve been doing that for years? I hope you told him to fuck off.”
“Word for word, brother.”
Although silent, I can feel the rage blistering off his body as he watches Dante from across the room. He’s in deep conversation with Nico, the youngest Hollow brother, who just graduated from Stanford and is still learning what it means to be a made man.
“God, I hate that cunt,” Rafe hisses, before sinking his whiskey and slamming the empty glass on the bar. “I swear, if you ever wanted to take over Dip, I’d be back here within the hour, drawing up hotel and casino plans that’ll make Cove look like Coney Island.”
“Let’s go for a walk.”
“Hold on.” Rafe turns toward the bar, pulls out a wedge of Sinners Anonymous cards from the breast pocket of his suit, and tosses them in the tip jar. “All right,” he says with a wink. “Let’s go.”
We amble around the club, silently observing the different games. We watch Donatello lose his Omega Seamaster to Benny in blackjack, then come to a stop behind one of the poker tables, just as the dealer sets up a fresh round.
“My money’s on Gabe,” Rafe mutters, nodding to our brother on the opposite side of the table. His leather jacket is slung over the back of his chair, and he’s wearing his signature aviators. Not that he needs them—nobody has a poker face like our brother.
My gaze shifts around the table. Dante and Nico sit to Gabe’s right, and two young guys I’ve never seen before have their backs to us.
The one with the blond hair and the too-big suit leans into his friend. “Dude. Playing against Dante Visconti is totally going to psych you out.”
Rafe and I exchange smirks. How the fuck these kids ever got into this party, I’ll never know, but at least they’ll provide a level of entertainment.
“I know,” the other one hisses back. “All the Viscontis must have grown up on a diet of full-fat milk and steroids. They are fucking huge.”
“And all look like MMA fighters.”
“Hey, I like these kids,” Rafe murmurs to me with a lop-sided grin. “Maybe I can hire them to follow me around and kiss my ass.”
I nod toward the suited guards skirting the perimeter of the room. “You have enough of those.”
He huffs out a laugh, and we go back to eavesdropping.
“They must be loaded,” the blond kid sighs, flicking a poker chip between his thumb and forefinger. “And they always get the hottest girls.”
“Even the old dude. And he must be like, seventy by now.”
“Uh-huh. Have you seen who he’s marrying?”
My ears prick up, but I force my face to remain expressionless.
“Oh yeh, that Rory chick? From Devil’s Dip High?” He lets out a low whistle, shuffling closer to his buddy. “You know he thinks she’s a virgin?”
Blond-boy glances over at Dante, then puts his hand in front of his face. But from behind him, I can still see and hear what he whispers. “I know. Hilarious. Remember when she let Spencer and his crew run a train on her?”
“Who could forget? She didn’t even go to Devil’s Coast Academy and yet everyone knows her name. Spencer and his friends were the richest kids in school, so obviously she’s one of those girls that’ll do anything to secure a paycheck.”
“Literally, anything.”
Their whispers continue but I can’t hear them any longer over the blood thumping in my temples. The ghost of whiskey now tastes bitter on my tongue, and my fingers twitch. So much so, that I slip my hand in the pocket of my slacks and curl it into a fist.
So, Aurora’s a whore. A far cry from the virgin she’s pretending to be for my uncle. I run my tongue over my teeth and take a slow, deep breath. Rafe’s silent now, and I can feel his gaze heating my cheek.
And what do I care? Why does this revelation have me feeling all hot and itchy, have me feeling like I want to connect my fist to a jaw just to hear it crack?
And then I realize why these dumb kids have got under my skin.
In the car ride back to Alberto’s house yesterday, she let me believe she was different, even just for a moment. She let me believe she wasn’t like all the other girls in Dip, just looking for a Visconti paycheck. That her motive for marrying a man three times her age was completely altruistic.
I huff a laugh into the bottom of my glass. To stop Alberto plowing down the forest. Yeah, right. That impassioned spiel she gave about all the fucking birds and the otters—she knew exactly what she was doing. Had me eating out the palm of her hand, and now I’m no fucking better than my dirty old uncle, believing her lies.
Sure, she might not have said anything, but she tricked me. Those big, doe-like eyes and flustered skin and pathetic sins tricked me.
“Everyone place their bets,” the dealer drawls, spreading his hands out above the cards then turning them upward, showing the camera above the table he has nothing up his sleeves.
Stacks of golden and silver chips slide across the green velvet. My gaze falls to the back of the blond boy’s head.
“Angelo, don’t—”
But Rafe’s voice sounds like it’s in the cave over. Before he or my own common sense can stop me, I take a step forward, loom over the kid’s shoulder, and slam my hand down on top of his poker chips.
He yelps in surprise, recoiling from the table. Then he studies my hand, my watch. The citrine ring on my pinky. He gulps, before reluctantly dragging his eyes up to meet mine.
Unlike the rest of my family, I’m not much of a betting man, but I’d bet every chip in the joint that he’s just pissed himself.
“I saw that.”
The table falls silent. The kid’s gaze widens, then moves around the table and back to me again. “W-what?”
“You slipped these chips out of your pocket.” I shoot a loaded look in the direction of his shit-talking buddy. “Both of you did.”
He pales and his bottom lip gives into a quiver. “No! I didn’t, I swear—”
I scoop up one of his chips, cutting off his protests. They are made from pure 24-carat gold, my family’s crest embossed into the middle. Ignoring the heat of everyone’s attention, I hold it up to the low lighting and let out a hiss. “Yeah, counterfeit.”
“It’s not! It can’t be, I got it from over there!” He stabs a shaking finger in the direction of the cashier booth. The chick behind it holds up her hands in protest. She doesn’t want to get involved in this shit-show and I don’t blame her.
“Let’s ask the guy who created them.” I toss the chip behind me to Rafe. He catches it with one hand. “What do you think, brother? That look real to you?”
Rafe pins me with a blistering glare. His jaw locks and he gives a shake of his head so slight that I know it’s only meant for me. But I hold my ground and wait. Flaring his nostrils, he eventually looks down, flicking the chip between his thumb and forefinger.
The silence stretches over canyons. Eventually, he looks up at me through half-lidded eyes and rakes his teeth over his bottom lip. “Faker than a three-dollar bill.”
The club comes back to life. Chairs scrape against the cave floor, and the click-clicks of safety catches releasing echo off the low ceiling. Rafe’s men emerge from the shadows and clamp their hands on both the boys’ shoulders and drag them away. I can hear their screams all the way until they are bundled into the elevator at the end of the long tunnel.
“Bastardi,” Tor growls, dusting down his suit jacket and sinking back into his seat at the Blackjack table. “They work at Delirium and constantly beg me for an invite to a private poker game.” His diamond nose stud glints as he shakes his head. “They’ve barely got hair on their dicks, let alone balls big enough to try a stunt like that.”
The music starts again, and slowly, the incident settles like dust and everyone falls back into having a good time. Feeling heat on my back, I turn around and see Rafe standing in the shadows, glaring at me. As I walk past, he pulls a hand out of his pocket and grabs my arm.
“Vicious Visconti is back,” he murmurs in my ear. I stare straight ahead, spine steeled, until he lets me go and moves off into the crowds.
Maybe Vicious never really left.
