High Stakes : (A dark mafia Romance) by Jessica Hall

Author:Jessica Hall [Hall, Jessica]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-11-29T00:00:00+00:00

Fifteen

Leone

The quiet in the car is a living thing, suffocating and dense; it seems to breathe on its own, making each breath I take harsher. I’m coiled tight, and every muscle tenses as memories of the night play on an endless loop in my head. Fallon’s profile is etched against the windowpane, her eyes distant. The depth of green there is like looking into a forest at dusk—dark, mysterious, impenetrable.

My thoughts spiral back to earlier. Fallon had been gone too long, and I was about to go find her. But then my father’s hand landed on my shoulder, heavy and restraining.

“No need,” he told me, his voice a low rumble. “She’s in the hall by the kitchen,” he says, and I glance at Milo, who is watching me.

I turn to him, my suspicion a live wire snapping in the air between us. “How do you know that?”

“I’m aware of everything that happens under my roof. I got a notification that someone was in the kitchen with your mother, motion detection.”

My father’s fingers brush over his phone. The screen springs to life with the grainy image of the kitchen. I lean forward, heart hammering, until they landed on someone slightly off-screen—my mother, a glass clutched in her unsteady grip.

“Damn it,” my father hisses through clenched teeth, “Where the fuck did Lorenzo go!”

He shoves his chair out and gets to his feet when my mother looks up, her eyes moving to the door, and Fallon steps in.

My own hands tighten into fists at the sight of my mother. So much for being sober. It is a struggle we have seen too many times, a routine that never ends well. The vodka, the trembling hands…

“Wait,” the word leaves my lips in a hiss, halting my father mid-rise. My focus remains glued to the screen where Fallon’s silhouette moves toward my mother, and I grab his phone, fiddling with the volume. She reaches for the glass cradled in my mother’s shaking grasp. A sob broke from my mother, a sound which claws at my chest.

I watched, my heart pounding against my ribcage, as Fallon did the unthinkable. Wondering why she would stop her. She not only coaxed the glass away but also stood as a shield when Lorenzo sauntered in and caught my mother, his presence like an oil slick on clean water. With a lie that flowed from her lips as easily as the breath she took, she protected my mother—swallowing down liquor.

Even my father stopped in his tracks to see how Fallon was handling her, but I could tell he didn’t expect Fallon to fend for her against one of his men. He is just like me, caught between being angry my mother was drinking and Fallon lied for her, but also shocked how Fallon stood her ground and didn’t throw my mother under the bus. My father stares at the screen thoughtfully.

However, when Lorenzo tried to force her to drink another, I was out of my seat. Rage bubbled up, hot and acidic in my throat.

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