Deathless & Divided (The Chicago War #1) (38 page)

“Dino doesn’t have much to do with
this
,” Damian said.

“He might say that, but I can assure you it is far from the truth,” Terrance replied, still unbothered. “That man plays his part well. He makes everyone believe his loyalties are entirely wrapped up with the Outfit, but he lies as well as he breathes. He gets that from his father. Dino never forgave me for killing his parents.”

“Maybe so. I wouldn’t blame him if that were the truth. He was left to raise two younger siblings and he never even got the chance to have his own life because of it. Nonetheless, I am not here because he sent me or asked for it. And you gave me the perfect opportunity to get this finished when you admitted your grandchildren would remain at the wedding reception and you came home alone. Their parents always stay to keep an eye on them despite the fact they’re grown adults. Predictable. Which makes this a hell of a lot easier.”

Terrance’s jaw ticked. “Damian—”

“Why me?” Damian asked, interrupting Terrance before the man could say anything.

“I beg your pardon?”

Standing from the chair, Damian tapped his gun to the top of the desk. “What is it about me that you liked enough to begin inserting me into your position?”

Terrance sucked in a sharp breath. “My position?”

“Neither one of us are parrots here. Pay attention and listen. Wasn’t that what you always used to tell me?”

“When you were a boy I said that. You needed some kind of structure. Moving from place to place like you Rossi kids did wasn’t good for any of you. You can’t expect children to grow up into well-behaved adults when they have no routine and structure.”

“I wasn’t your child to raise,” Damian said.

“I didn’t raise you, I simply helped whenever you were around. Just the same as I did for Tommas and his sisters.”

True enough.

Damian chewed over his thoughts, wishing the hurricane inside his head would calm. “I thought you liked me because of the man I was, not because of what I could do for the Outfit.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“The Commission, the calls from the men, the private consultations about business and the information you’ve shoveled on me over the years. Are you saying that was all innocent in nature? That you had no other motives for bringing me into your closer circles?”

Terrance raised a single brow. “Of course, I had other motives.”

“And I don’t want it!” Damian barked.

The boss barely flinched at Damian’s show of rage.

“I don’t want it,” Damian repeated quieter. “I like the place where I am currently at. I have no desire to move higher in the Outfit or be someone else’s puppet, Terrance. I never have. I don’t want to be the one controlling these greedy, spoiled bastards you call family.”

“Is that what you think I was doing?” Terrance asked.

“It’s kind of obvious, isn’t it? Why else would you put me closer to your side if you didn’t mean for me to eventually match you, hmm?”

Terrance eyed Damian with a little more curiosity than before. “You’re wrong.”

Damian scoffed, disgusted. “I don’t think I am.”

“You believe I meant for you to be my understudy.”

“Yes,” Damian said.

“No intelligent man would give away his secret weapon, Damian. Not if he planned on using it without someone else trying to get a hold of it for his own purposes. Clearly I failed in trying to keep mine private if someone else has poisoned your thoughts against me.”

Damian wasn’t even listening. He didn’t care what Terrance had to say and the man’s time was quickly running out. Damian’s time was ticking down, too. He needed to get back to the reception and soon if he didn’t want anyone to notice his absence. The drive was a good twenty minutes from the Trentini place. There was no time for games.

“No one poisoned my thoughts,” Damian said. “But you were terribly smart about infecting them with what
you
wanted for me. You were doing it slowly over time so I didn’t catch on. You never said a thing about me having control or even suggested that I did, but other people knew it. Other people could see.”

“People like Dino,” Terrance said, nodding.

“More than him. I have calls all the time from your men that want things.”

“Because I’ve never hidden your closeness to me, Damian. I’ve always kept quiet about our understanding of your job in the Outfit but hiding our friendship was pointless. It makes sense for men to turn to you if they think it will get them closer to me.”

Damian shrugged. “Have your excuses. I don’t care.”

“They’re not excuses. They’re facts.”

“They’re lies,” Damian retorted. “Tell me, who do you think would make a good boss, Terrance?”

“I—”

“A name would suffice.”

Terrance’s gaze narrowed. “There are very few men left in high standing that would be appropriate for this position. I think we both know that.”

“Riley is still alive.”

Damian knew without a doubt that statement would hit Terrance right where it fucking hurt. Friendships like the one shared between Terrance and Riley didn’t end easily, but rather, tore apart all the seams of everything surrounding them. All of the things that they had shared and built together over the years during their comradery would be ripped to shreds. Like families, loyalties, and anything else that was left barely surviving in the mess.

“How long will he stay alive?” Terrance asked. “I think that’s the better question.”

“Longer than you.” Damian smiled, knowing it looked cruel. “And if Riley is also out of the pool, who is left?”

“Nobody worthy, as far as I’m concerned.”

“There are men waiting to come out of the woodwork. It’s too bad you’ve been too focused on me to see them.” Damian chuckled. “I’m sure it’ll be an interesting fight to the finish.”

Terrance frowned. “You truly believe that, don’t you?”

“That you were grooming me for your spot? Yes.”

“I never did that,” Terrance said. “It was never my intention to, either.”

“Lying will get you nowhere.”

Neither would telling the truth, but Damian didn’t think he had to mention that. The gun in his hand with a long silencer attached spoke more than he ever could about how their encounter would end.

Terrance slipped off his suit jacket and tossed it over the arm of a leather couch. He said nothing as he kicked off his shoes as well. Damian let the man have his final moments in peace.

“How much has Dino had his hands in?” Terrance asked, taking a seat on the couch. He undid the buttons on the sleeves of his dress shirt and rolled each up his arms. “With this whole mess, I mean. How much of it was him?”

“Practically all,” Damian said honestly.

“But?”

“I helped here and there.”

Terrance smiled. “Ah, the DeLuca girl.”

Damian smirked. “Rossi, now.”

“Yes, well, she’ll always be a DeLuca at heart. A ring doesn’t change a person’s blood, my boy.”

Damian tried not to react to Terrance’s innocent phrasing, but he barely managed to hold his growl back. Things like that had become all too common over the years. Before, it felt like Terrance’s way of caring. Now, he saw it as nothing more than Terrance making Damian think he gave a damn.

Maybe he did.

It didn’t matter.

“I did think you two were a good match,” Terrance said. “I still do. Why kill Ben?”

“You really have to ask that?”

“I think so.”

Damian lifted one shoulder, bored with the entire conversation. “He didn’t like me being as close to you as I was and he didn’t like where you planned for me to go. His vocal disapproval about the marriage arrangement to anyone and everyone who would listen was proof. Besides that, he could have proved dangerous for Lily at some point. I fixed those issues.”

Terrance stilled on the couch and glanced up at Damian through dark eyes. “Ben liked you very much.”

“No, he couldn’t find a way to manipulate me,” Damian said, laughing darkly. “Like I said, he couldn’t even keep his mouth shut about the marriage—”

“Because Dino didn’t give him a say in it,” Terrance interjected calmly. “Not once did Dino allow Ben to have any involvement or say in the deal between the DeLuca and Rossi families. Considering Ben was the head of the family, he should have been able to put in his opinion.”

Damian shook his head. “That’s not important.”

“It is but you’re not hearing me, Damian. It wasn’t you he disapproved of, it was the way Dino went about the entire thing. He was fine with the marriage but he would have liked to be able to be involved. Had you took the time to talk to Ben about the situation, you would have known that. My guess is you took Dino’s word for what it was and ran with it. You always were loyal to DeLuca in that way.”

Something painful and heavy squeezed around Damian’s heart, nearly pushing it up into his throat. A sick feeling balled in his stomach. Terrance was right about everything he said. Most of Ben’s disagreement and vocal displeasure had been about Dino’s side of things and not Damian’s. Ben had barely been included in any of the wedding planning or even for Lily’s side of things where family was concerned. It was almost as if Dino wanted the man to seem unimportant to the DeLuca family.

“It doesn’t matter,” Damian said.

“It does,” Terrance replied. “Because chances are, Dino used what he thought would get under your skin the most in order to have you do the work he wouldn’t.”

Damian barked out a laugh. “Like what? Look at all the things he’s done, Terrance. Look at the people he’s killed and the problems he’s started. What could I possibly do that he couldn’t have if he wanted to?”

“Killing me,” Terrance said.

The words came out softer than Damian had ever heard his boss speak before.

“You’re wrong,” Damian said, sure of it.

“I don’t think so. Dino always believed I did him and his siblings wrong when they were children. I know I did when I had their parents killed, but Joseph DeLuca didn’t give me a choice. I tried to make up for it over the years with Dino and Theo, but clearly my remorse never bled through to the man enough. Or maybe it did and his conscience just won’t let him do what yours is capable of.”

Damian ground his teeth so hard his molars ached. “And what is that?”

“Killing someone who cares for you.”

Fuck.

Damian cocked back the hammer on his gun. “Like I said, it isn’t important.”

“His lies are,” Terrance murmured, staring down the barrel of the gun. “You don’t have to, by the way.”

Kill him?

Yes, Damian absolutely did. Despite the fact Terrance’s statements made a hell of a lot of sense and Damian felt like a wrecking ball had just slammed into his body, the boss still needed to go. Terrance knew too much. Damian would never get away with all he’d done to the Outfit if he let the man live.

“We both know I do,” Damian said, never lowering the gun.

“No, my boy.” Terrance smiled as Damian’s finger wrapped around the trigger. “I meant to say you don’t have to apologize. I understand.”

“Do you?”

“Yes,” Terrance said. “Take this as your final lesson, Damian.”

“What is that?”

“Trust no man.”

Damian pulled the trigger and didn’t look away.

Damian slammed the bathroom door open, zoning in on the figure he’d been searching for in the crowd of people since he arrived back at his wedding reception. No one noticed him gone and no one noticed him return. Damian was smart in that way.

Dino, however, had a few things to answer for.

The man barely got his pants zipped up before Damian fisted Dino’s tux jacket from behind. He yanked him away from the urinal and slammed him into the closest wall which just happened to be the side of a stall. The stall shuddered from the impact as Dino cursed his surprise.

Dino’s eyes flew wide at the sight of Damian. No doubt, Damian’s rage was clear to see if the way his muscles clenched and trembled with the sensations passing through him. It was like someone had kicked him straight in the fucking gut; like he’d been used and manipulated when all Damian wanted to do was stay the fuck away from that kind of shit.

“Whoa!” Dino said, his hands flying wide.

Damian’s fist cracked into the stall right beside Dino’s head. “Shut your mouth.”

“Hey!” someone shouted from inside the stall.

“Get the fuck out,” Damian growled.

A man dressed in a sharp suit quickly scurried from the stall without even flushing the toilet and disappeared from the bathroom. Once the door closed, all of Damian’s attention turned on Dino again.

“All you had to do was tell me the fucking truth, Dino,” Damian said through gritted teeth.

Every breath he took ached. He’d trusted Dino. The man put him in a positon by using lies and bullshit where Damian had to make choices he wouldn’t have otherwise.

“What are you going on about?” Dino asked, still not fighting back.

Damian slammed Dino into the stall again. “Ben, Terrance … ring any fucking bells for you?”

Dino’s brow lifted. “Hey—”

“No, be quiet. Unless you’re going to give me something worth listening to, I don’t want to hear another goddamn thing coming out of your mouth, asshole. I did the final job tonight—I followed that through like I said I would. But it had nothing to do with you, right? That was supposed to be all for me. You’re such a liar, Dino. Christ, it’s no wonder your eyes are brown. You’re so full of shit it’s starting to show.”