The Enforcer (Untamed Hearts Book 3)(124)

“Nova.” Carlo stared at him with wide eyes and then looked to the stairs in paranoia. “You can’t say medda like that.”

“This is our ship,” Nova repeated rather than back down. “The northern motherf*ckers and suburban zip gangsters upstairs who forgot what made them. They don’t know it yet, but Cosa Nostra is ours. We’re doing it for every Lost Boy they shit on and every Lost Girl they hurt because no one stood up and fought for them. We’re taking it back, or we’re gonna die trying.”

Tino and Carlo were stunned silent. Both of them looked to the stairs again, because that was a speech worthy not just of a mafia bullet, but a shallow grave to go with it. No priest, no casket, just a hole in the ground and a family who would never know what happened.

“I’d take a bullet for both of yous. You know that,” Nova said solemnly, his voice still hushed as he confessed the greatest of sins in the don’s basement. “But this isn’t about that. It’s about all the others out there. It’s about Mei. It’s about Bobby.” Nova turned and looked at Carlo. “It’s about Lola. We’re taking it because we’re the ones who can, and we’re not gonna let them be f*cking stepping stools anymore.”

So, there it was.

Mutiny to the highest degree, because they’d pushed Nova too far and reduced him to puking his guts up one too many times.

But Nova knew how to sell it.

All the anger Tino carried around for years evaporated and was replaced with something much easier to swallow. A revolution. An underground battle for all the Lost Kids who put the suburban gangsters in these mansions and paid for the country-club memberships with their blood, sweat, and tears.

The suits thought the war was over, but it was only starting.

They just didn’t know it.

Carlo glanced back to the stairs before he said, “Fine. You be the brains, and we’ll dig the graves. For Lola. Sounds great, but how the f*ck do you know the power won’t get you too? You’re not special. You’re not different from the old man. He had good intentions too.”

“I don’t know.” Nova shrugged. “It’s gotten to me before. The drugs. The women. I ignored a lotta shit for the high.” He reached over and grabbed Tino’s good shoulder, squeezing tightly. “You can’t lie to me again, Valentino. I’m not blaming you, but you have to promise me the next time shit gets deep, you’ll tell me. If not for me, for the greater good. We can’t let them come between us. We can’t let them tear us away from Romeo either. They don’t f*cking get that from us. They’ve taken enough.”

Tino was silent rather than answer, not knowing why he felt as guilty as he did. He had good reasons not to tell Nova, but it all felt sort of cracked in the aftermath.

Finally he sighed and said, “Okay,” because how could he not?

“Like the f*cking pope.” Carlo shook his head, and oddly enough Tino remembered what he was talking about. Only this time the dark pope was sitting right there, and he wasn’t born to rule the underworld like the don was. He was taking it by force instead. “You’re gonna get yourself killed, Nova, and for all you know, Tino or me is gonna have to pull the f*cking trigger to save your goddamn ship.”

“At least it’s something worth going down for. At least my ma doesn’t have to roll over in her grave and be ashamed she gave birth to me.” Nova ran his hand over the sheet of Tino’s bed and whispered, “At least I won’t be Frankie. You gotta kill me, do it, but don’t stop fighting to take our ship back.”

Carlo didn’t respond for a long time. Then he nodded and said, “Lost Boys gotta fly.”

“We gotta be stronger than them,” Tino agreed.

“We protect the ship,” Nova reminded them. “It’s ours. We don’t flip. We don’t run to the f*cking government. We play their game, and we make them think we love it. We don’t do anything to jeopardize the organization. Someone tries to hurt it, we put them down ’cause it’s a f*cking war, and if you need help digging graves, I’ll help you dig ’em. I’m all in. I’m taking Cosa Nostra, even if it takes me fifty f*cking years to do it.”

Tino got his first ink a week later.

Omertà branded into the muscles on his stomach.

A lifetime loyalty pledged to Cosa Nostra before he even took the oath.

Carlo got his ink down the long line of his spine, from the base of his neck all the way to the curve of his back.

Nova’s was on his right side, the oath staining the most vulnerable part of any fighter, from under his arm to the curve of his hip, though their people considered themselves above ink.

And these weren’t pretty tattoos.

They were done in big black street-gangster lettering. Dirty, his father told them later when he beat the f*ck out of Tino despite the fact that Tino was still recovering. Making Nova watch while he did it.

It made them look like trash. Tattooed like street thugs. Like the Russians and the cartel. He called them every f*cked-up thing in the book, and it took him a long time to notice that Tino wasn’t crying, and Nova wasn’t flinching, because watching Tino bleed for the greater good obviously didn’t hurt him.

Frankie stopped then, as Nova knelt there in the basement and glared at their father like he was fantasizing about killing him.