Fractured Freedom(40)

I blinked.

One, two, three times.

Then my mouth dropped open.

“What the hell is that?” I gawked at a small straight crack I saw in the wall near my bed.

“It’s our adjoining room door.” He faced me and smiled as he said it so matter-of-factly that I wanted to smack him. He then took a key ever so slowly from his back pocket and swiped it behind him into what looked like the edge of the wallpaper and crown molding.

The stupid wall buzzed, and he opened it.

“No.” My voice came out low and angry, my heart beating fast. He wasn’t on the other side of the hallway or just down the hall. The man was a wall over, literally a door away, easily accessible, especially for him. I shook my head, pacing up to him, and then reached around him to try to close the door. When he stood in my way, his arms crossed, I shoved him. He didn’t grunt or move an inch.

Growling, I spun toward the hotel’s phone. “Have you been there the whole time? I’m not sharing a room with you, Dante.”

“It’s not exactly sharing. Plus, I need to make sure you’re safe, Little Lamb,” he whispered, waiting a beat before finishing, “from anyone and everyone.”

I threw a withering gaze his way. “Where is my privacy? What if I have someone over? I don’t need you listening …”

“Listening to what?” he goaded me. He knew exactly what I was trying to say.

I didn’t answer him. Instead, I continued on my mission. He chuckled at my stomping and leaned on the doorframe like he had all the time in the world to watch me throw a tantrum.

He’d see how he liked the tantrum when the hotel traded my room. I dialed the service desk and listened to the man greet me. “Yes, my evening actually isn’t going well at all. It seems my room is adjoined to another man’s and he has the key.”

“Oh, my goodness. I’m so sorry about that, Ms. …?

“Ms. Hardy. Twentieth floor. I’ll need a room—”

“Oh, Ms. Hardy. Of course!” He cleared his throat. “We can’t provide you with a room change. Mr. Armanelli requested that you be next to his room.”

“What?” I whispered as the name he announced over the phone traveled through my mind. “No, Dante booked my room. Dante Reid.”

“No, miss. Dante Armanelli checked you in. And we so appreciate—”

Dante ripped the receiver from my hand to finish the call. “This is Dante. I’ll take care of the misunderstanding.” He hung up the phone, and I stepped back, confused.

“You took the pseudonym of a mob family here?” My voice was high as I asked him.

“I took the name I was given by my father here,” he said it calmly and quietly like he was trying to soothe my nerves.

My hands shook, though. And my heart felt like it’d moved to my throat to beat furiously. I glanced up at him. “You’re telling me …”

“Go on.” He waved his big hand in front of him, urging me on. “Ask the question.”

I considered throwing the phone on the nightstand at him.

“You’re related to them?” I whispered.

His beautiful face moved up and then down. Once and then twice. He was nodding, confirming what I said, and keeping his gaze on me like I might run.

“You can’t be.” I shook my head and tried to suck in air, although it seemed all of it had been stolen from the room.

The Armanellis were cold-blooded killers. Since the ’60s, they’d been in the news for drug trafficking, money laundering, and murder. They were the biggest and most infamous crime family in America. Even now, their name was tied to rigging elections and controlling the government and nuclear bombs, having enough money to rule the country.

“You aren’t one of them,” I murmured. “There’s no way.”

“Why? Because my mom is mixed?” He scratched the side of his face. “Lilah, my dad is Italian. Directly related to Mario Armanelli. Cade and Bastian Armanelli are my second cousins. We tell most people we’re friends if they see us together and I try my best not to be seen with them now when I’m undercover. Still, we’re family.”

I knew my eyes widened. Everyone was aware of those names. They were infamous. We saw pictures of them in news articles and read about the crazy stories of them controlling billions of dollars within the country. I tried to understand what he was saying. “But I’ve never seen you in the news.”

“We go to great lengths to control the media, Lilah. And my mother doesn’t share my family background with many. I went into the military knowing I’d need the training beyond what we did quietly for me at home growing up. They also provided me with other skills while I was in. I’ve worked with the mafia most of my adult life.”

“No.” I sat down, trying to process the news articles we’d seen over the years. Dante was good. He was safe. He wasn’t them. “They’re murderers.”

“I’ve always been that too.”

“No.” I shot up off the bed and rounded it to point at him. “Don’t you ever say that being in the military is killing. That’s being a patriot. A war hero.”

“And I’ve done what I had to do for my country as a war hero and as part of the Armanelli family. I came to terms with that a long time ago.” He took in a breath that I knew was measured, the type he took when he was trying to calm himself. “What I do for the government and for the family is one and the same. We’re not all bad. We’ve done a lot of good recently.”