“Miceli’s going to be pissed.” There was satisfaction in Dario’s tone.
“Yeah. We have to take the victories where we can, I guess,” Val said without opening his eyes. “I don’t want Emme to be at the club.”
“You know she’s going to be there, Val.” Dario’s voice was back to no expression. “She’s tough, and she won’t hold you responsible for anything she sees there. She knows you’re not into the shit she’ll see in the dungeon. Her job, her family’s job, is to find the women and hopefully the kids so we can burn that place to the ground.”
Val stayed silent while he thought that over. He felt for Dario. Sometimes there was no talking to him, no reaching out. Dario had been fucked over by Miceli. It didn’t matter that the man was his father; Miceli didn’t give a shit about him. It hadn’t occurred to him that his son would become hard and dangerous and would have been an asset to him. Now it was too late.
“We’ll shut them down, won’t we, Dario?” Val murmured.
“Damn straight we will,” Dario answered. “And find out who’s behind this. We’ll shut them down, too.” He gave a little snicker. “Who would have thought we’d turn into the fuckin’ good guys?”
“That is a little ironic, isn’t it?” Val opened his eyes to look at his cousin. “And a bit on the scary side.”
“I don’t know how to do ‘good guy.’”
He grinned at Dario. “There’s no ‘good’ for you. That’s just taking it too far.”
The car pulled to the curb, and Val and Dario looked out the window. The strip club was across the street. In the early morning hours, the building appeared deserted. There were few cars in the lot. Marge’s vehicle was there, but she had an apartment on the premises. Valentino and Dario had the complete layout of that luxury apartment. It looked like the replica of a penthouse suite at one of the finest luxury hotels in Chicago, which was such irony given the stark contrast of the conditions the women were taken to when kidnapped and sold at auctions.
Those women had a concrete floor with a drain to relieve themselves, a tiny cell, barely large enough to turn around in, no blankets, no warmth or air-conditioning, no clothes, no privacy, and they were beaten, subjected to electrical shock, raped, brutalized in every way, while Marge lived above them in luxury, listening to her music and entertaining her friends with the finest wine and the best food money could buy.
“Marge has a tremendous amount of security in her clubs. Cameras everywhere. She thrives on blackmail,” Dario said, his dark gaze on her car.
“The Ferraros are good at what they do. Once they’re in, Bernado will do the rest.”
“Did you ever think the Ferraros would be our allies?” Dario asked.
Val shook his head. “Honestly? I thought Stefano would try to kill me, not help me. He loves Emmanuelle. I’m not nearly good enough for her.”
“You’re good enough for her.”
Dario startled him with the proclamation. It wasn’t something Dario did often. They didn’t show their affection toward each other often. They weren’t like that, even though they were closer than most siblings. Val didn’t make the mistake of looking at Dario. He kept his gaze fixed in the parking lot.
“Emme heard what I said to Marge that night. About her not knowing anything about sex. Her mother had already done such a number on her, making her feel worthless. Marge has experience and confidence. She could so easily tear Emmanuelle apart. This entire scenario is fucked up, Dario.”
He let the worry show, even though both Luca and Quintu were in the front seat. The privacy screen was down, but they still might have overheard. He usually was more cautious. He wanted Dario’s help with Emme, just in case something went wrong. His gut was telling him things could go south in a heartbeat.
“Emmanuelle’s strong, Val. Tough as nails.”
“Not when it comes to being a woman. She’s vulnerable.”
Dario was silent so long, Valentino pulled his gaze from the hot red sports car in the parking lot to look at his cousin. Dario was looking down at his phone, studying an image on the screen. He handed the phone to Val.
There was a photo of Marge with her blond hair falling around her face. Her features were beautiful at first glance, but when one really looked, they were hard. Her lips thin, her green eyes sharp and jaded. There was a multitude of lines around her mouth from smoking. The continual Botox injections had taken a toll by showing the sites, with tiny brown pinpricks looking like raised freckles above her upper lip and around her forehead. Her smile was fake, not lighting her eyes, but drawing back her lips to show her whitened teeth while her eyes stared straight ahead in a predatory way.
Beside Marge’s photo was one of Emmanuelle. Her hair was all over the place. Pulled back in a ponytail, so much had escaped the way it often did, showing his wildcat. The thick silk fell every which way around her small heart-shaped face. She was definitely Italian, with her skin and curves and that glossy hair. Her eyes laughed along with her generous mouth. She was so beautiful, she took Valentino’s breath away.
Dario took his phone back. “You can see.”
“I can see. You can see. God knows, any man can see, but I doubt that Emme can see. Her mother made certain of that, and I played right into Eloisa’s hands. I don’t understand why a mother would want to undermine her daughter’s self-confidence like that. It makes no sense.”
“Any more than a father forcing his son to fight for his life and the life of his mother just for the pleasure of other men like the ones in Miceli’s basement tonight?”
Valentino took a deep breath. Dario’s tone hadn’t changed in the least. They could have been discussing the weather. “Yeah. I don’t understand that shit, either.”
“Or forcing a son to witness him torturing a man for days, one who’d sat at his dinner table and who he’d known from his childhood. Forcing him to participate, including delivering the killing blows with a hammer?” Dario continued.
Val refused to turn his head. He couldn’t imagine telling Emmanuelle he was going to teach his son the way Giuseppi had taught him. The end of an empire. He pressed his fingers to his temples. What kind of legacy did he give his children? On the other hand, how did one stop the kinds of things that needed to be stopped?
The cops couldn’t stop human trafficking. The FBI couldn’t do it. The special task forces set up couldn’t stop them. They tried. It wasn’t that they didn’t. These rings had so much money. So much. They bought and sold human beings. The wealthiest in the world were above the law. They made their own laws. They were the law. The politicians. The religious leaders. The bankers. Valentino knew because he had the money and the ability to look into that world. He could supply whatever was wanted. He saw the depravity. Someone had to stop it all or at least slow it down. Save as many kids as possible. To do that, he had to be in the dirt with the filthiest. That meant he had to ask Emmanuelle to do so.
“Don’t think about it,” Dario said. “At least you’re a good man. You’ve got something to offer Emme. I can’t offer a woman anything but heartache and pain. I find the right one, I know I’ll take her, but it won’t be right. It won’t turn out like you and Emme. That fuckin’ shadow thing, it will be doing its job, working to keep us together.”