Thin Lives (Donati Bloodlines #3) (25 page)

Emma wasn’t entirely sure when the awareness began to seep into her consciousness, but she knew it didn’t come all at once. It started with a tingling in her fingertips, and then light behind her eyes. Yet, even with those sensations prickling at the blackness of her mind, she still couldn’t seem to wake up.

She wanted to, though.

Mostly for the murmurs she could hear whispering around her. The ragged breaths, catching every so often, and the apologies slipping from his lips.

I’m sorry, I’m sorry.

I’m so sorry, Emmy.

This shouldn’t have happened.

Not again.

I’m sorry, baby.

More than anything, Emma wanted to reach out through the haze of darkness and the invisible weight keeping her down, and grab onto him. She wanted to pull him close, tell him it was okay, and that she would be okay.

She could hear it in his voice.

The guilt.

His blame.

This wasn’t his fault—he’d promised to fix things, and she knew he would.

He hadn’t done this.

“I’m so sorry,” she heard him say again as the blackness slipped back into her mind.

She was pretty sure she managed to tell him, “It’s okay, Cal.”

It wasn’t—but it would be.

Emma winced as Calisto ran the pads of his fingers over her bruised cheekbone. She couldn’t seem to get the taste of her blood out of her damn mouth. It didn’t matter all that much, anyway. She ignored the sting of her split lip, and the throbbing behind her eyes. The ache in her ribs would go away eventually.

What she really wanted to fix the most, what she hated seeing more than anything else, was the guilt and the wetness filling Calisto’s gaze as he looked her over.

He’d gotten her awake, though she had been mostly confused at first. The pain had come in swift and harsh, reminding her of every single little detail that had alluded her for those first few blissful seconds of awareness.

Her son was gone.

She’d failed to protect him.

Affonso took him.

But he beat her like a dog first.

“I’m so—”

“Stop,” Emma said hoarsely, ignoring Calisto’s wince. “Please, just stop.”

“I waited too long. I thought I was doing this right—fucking with him. But it became more about me than him. It turned into a game for me, and I shouldn’t have let that happen when I knew what was on the line. I put you in danger, and I’m so sor—”

“Cal,” Emma interjected softly. “You didn’t do this.”

Calisto sighed. “I might as well have.”

“But you didn’t. It was his fists. His kicks. His words.”

Jesus.

She wished it didn’t hurt to breathe.

His thumb swept over her cheekbone again, and Emma smiled, despite the pain it caused. Another trickle of blood seeped onto her tongue, but she swallowed the tangy metallic taste back without saying a word about it. Clearly, Calisto was having enough trouble about all of this as it was. She wouldn’t feed into his guilt.

But her own guilt?

That was a killer.

“I tried,” she told him.

Calisto’s brow furrowed, and he dropped lower on his knees so that he was below her and she had to look down at him. His hands never once left her face. “Tried what,
dolcezza
?”

“I tried to keep him from taking Cross, but it wasn’t enough. I wasn’t strong enough or—”

“Emmy, stop.”

She wished she could. While her words quieted, her feelings just exploded until tears were streaming down her cheeks and sobs caught hard in her throat.

From the moment she knew she was pregnant with Calisto’s child, she had done all she could to keep that baby boy safe. She’d done everything that was asked of her, and lived alongside a monster in hopes that Calisto would remember, and she wouldn’t have to pretend anymore. After, when Cross was born, she continued doing what she had to for his sake—his life—and nothing more.

Where had it gotten her?

She was without her son.

She was battered.

Weak.

Stupid.

“Emma!”

Emma’s gaze flew wide, and she found herself staring straight into one of her favorite sights. Calisto’s soul-black eyes.

“Not weak, not stupid,” he murmured.

Had she said that out loud?

Wonderful.

“I let him take my baby,” she mumbled.

Calisto wiped away her tears quickly and gently. “I’ll get him back, Emmy.”

“He just took him from me, Cal.”

“I’ll get him back, I promise.”

She wasn’t really hearing him, though. The panic swelled in her throat until she was gasping for breath and struggling to see straight.

All of the sudden, Emma’s world got a little smaller as Calisto wrapped her in his embrace, and held tight. Her scattered, shattered pieces were held together for a single, quiet moment in her tattered life when he was holding her together. She felt his lips brush the top of her head, his apologies whispered over her hair, and then he was tipping her back a little to kiss her.

Emma needed that—every hard, rough caress of his lips and the demanding strikes of his tongue against her own. She didn’t mind how tightly he grabbed her, even though she was sore and probably needed a fucking doctor. All she cared about was for those few moments, her world was quiet and right.

“I will get him back,” Calisto said against her trembling lips.

More tears slipped from her eyes.

She didn’t wipe them away.

Neither did he.

Instead, Emma let them fall as she focused in on the truth in Calisto’s hard, cold stare.

“I just want him back, Cal.”

“I will,” he promised. “Thank you for keeping my son safe, but now you have to trust me to do what needs to be done, Emma. You can’t do this like I can. You need to stop feeling like you didn’t do enough—you did everything for that baby when I didn’t even know he was mine. Please, trust me right now.”

She nodded.

It was the best she could do.

Calisto

It took every single ounce of willpower Calisto had to leave Emma alone in the bedroom with the doctor. The man was a doctor that the Doanti family kept on hand for emergencies they wouldn’t be willing to take into a hospital and be put on record.

While Calisto didn’t mind getting Affonso’s abuse of Emma on record for the world to see if it pleased them, he knew that she didn’t want that. Being on the receiving end of her bastard of a husband’s fists while she tried to protect Calisto’s son and keep Affonso from taking the boy had been enough for her. She wouldn’t want people touching her, or asking questions.

Please bring him back to me. I did everything I could for all these months. Don’t let Affonso take him from me, Cal.

Calisto’s heart ached, but the burning fire beginning to rage out of control in his soul was much worse. It had been a long time since he felt fury of this sort—one that literally couldn’t be contained without some sort of violence to let it out.

Affonso had lied to him for months—no, for years. Calisto had finally been in a position to put a stop to the man’s abuse, manipulation, and poisoned ways.

But he’d pushed him too far this time.

Calisto could see it now. Wasn’t that always how hindsight worked?

God knew Emma had done all she could throughout her pregnancy to keep his son safe from Affonso’s dirty ways. She lied to Calisto over and over, simply because she couldn’t figure out a way to tell him the truth, but also keep herself, their child, and Calisto alive at the same time.

But, Calisto’s need for revenge had outweighed what he knew would have been the smarter route. One where he could have forced Affonso into a corner, and took what was rightfully his.

Now, Calisto was without his child. His son was in the most dangerous of positions, given who he was with. Calisto knew all too well what Affonso would do to someone he thought was getting in his way, or worse, what he would do to something he wanted to keep if he believed someone might take it from him.

He loved you once
, a part of him whispered.

Calisto knew it was true, even if he hated admitting it. Affonso had loved him—selfishly and unhealthy, no doubt, but he had all the same.

It still didn’t make a difference.

Calisto was done playing Affonso’s games.

He was taking his son—his life—back.

“Calisto?”

Calisto spun on his heel at the new voice, coming face to face with Wolf Puzza. He’d been the one and only Donati man in the family that Calisto kept in contact with during the period he stayed away from Affonso after regaining his memories. Calisto trusted Wolf, but he didn’t trust a lot of other Donati men.

“I got here as quick as I could,” Wolf said.

“No worries—the doctor is doing his thing.”

Wolf scowled, shooting the bedroom door a look. “She okay?”

“Bruised, and terrified, but I’ll handle it one thing at a time. Right now, the one thing I need to handle is getting Cross back for her.”

And for him. 

“
You’ll
handle it. Cal … the beating her thing, that’s never going to be okay with anybody. But you can’t force a man to give up his child.”

Except it wasn’t Affonso’s child.

Cross was Calisto’s boy—always fucking would be. 

Calisto swallowed hard, knowing it was now or never. He needed to set himself up for the future as the Donati boss. There was no other options but for him to take the seat, otherwise, he risked the punishment from another man for what he planned to do to Affonso. But worse than even that was the idea of someone controlling Calisto and his choices again.

Affonso had done that enough.

Calisto refused to answer to another man in Cosa Nostra but himself.

“How long have we been friends?” Calisto asked.

Wolf shrugged, smirking a little. “Since we were kids, Cal.”

“You know I trust you, right?”

“Yeah, I got that over the last while.”

Calisto grinned, but it quickly faded. “He took my son, Wolf. Not his—mine. Cross is my boy.”

Wolf didn’t even blink at the admission. “Well, this makes much more sense.”

“Does it?”

“You seemed … close to her before the accident,” Wolf admitted. “Most overlooked it, but we’ve known each other a while. You don’t get invested in
people.
You were invested in her, for whatever reason.”

Calisto chose not to go into detail about his relationship with Emma. He had to protect her reputation from outside influences within the Donati Cosa Nostra, and from those outside of it. He would never allow her to be shamed simply because she had fallen in love with him. No, he would protect that—her—at all costs.

“I need to get Cross back, and I don’t care what I have to do in the process. She kept him safe for me, and the least I can do, is bring him back to her.”

The Capo cleared his throat, and shoved his hands in his pockets. The actions were far too blasé for Wolf, given how tense the man usually was, even when he seemed cool and calm. “And then what?”

Calisto’s brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“After you have him back, and Affonso is dead. Are you just going to out the fact he’s your son and you’ve been having an affair with your uncle’s wife to everyone? Is that the sort of problem you’re prepared to deal with? Because all I see there is an opening for someone to come at you—a retribution of sorts for a made man who broke every single rule he could and wants to get away with it.”

Jesus.

Calisto had to admit, Wolf made a good point.

“He deserves to die—he’s a bastard,” Calisto said.

“Protect yourself first,” Wolf responded. “Somehow, figure out a way to get out of this unscathed. I will always have your back, Cal, but I don’t know who else will in this situation. Protect yourself, and then you can protect them, too.”

Still … now Calisto had to consider other things. Like the fact the Donati
famiglia
saw Cross as Affonso’s son, and Emma as his wife. He wouldn’t be able to take Affonso’s place as a husband and father without raising some alarm bells.

This was bad all over.

“One thing at a time,” Wolf said almost like he could read Calisto’s thoughts. “What’s first and foremost important at this moment?”

“Cross.”

He was the
most
and
only
important thing.

“Affonso is not going anywhere without someone in this city knowing,” Wolf said. “You’ll find him, Cal.”

Calisto was already walking down the hall, and pulling his phone out of his pocket to dial a familiar number. Wolf had made a damn good point—there was no way a person as influential and well known as Affonso could move from place to place within New York without somebody noticing.

There was only one family Calisto thought might help him to start looking.

Or rather, a friend from that family.

Giovanni Marcello.

Sure, Dante—the Don of the Marcellos—wasn’t exactly pleased with the Donati family at the moment, but Calisto figured Gio might be able to sway his brother’s opinion.

Calisto put the phone up to his ear as it started to ring and called back over his shoulder, “Wolf, don’t leave Emma’s side.”

“Got it,” he heard the man reply.

Giovanni was picking up on his end at the same time. “
Ciao,
Marcello speaking.”

“Gio,” Calisto said instantly, “I need your help.”

Affonso could be anywhere. He had ties to several different countries outside of North America.

And the bastard had a head start, too.

Calisto just couldn’t think that way.

He
couldn’t
.

The phone Calisto had tossed into the center console of the SUV continued to interchangeably buzz and then ring. Message after message. Call after call. He didn’t pick up any of them.

No doubt, most of the calls were from Emma, as well as the messages. He’d pick up one earlier from her, and Jesus, it nearly killed him. She’d been so angry—
terrified
. He didn’t have answers for her, just another empty promise after two days of being gone and not being able to bring their son home that he was working on it.

That was the best he could give.

Calisto understood Emma’s anger and her fear. It wasn’t him that she was mad at, it was herself.

And Affonso.

Even still, Calisto chose not to take any more calls from her until he could give her a solid answer, something that would be true and sure, so she could stop crying, begging, and praying.

He was sure there were other calls and messages from some of the Donati men wondering where their boss was, or where in the hell Calisto had gone. It was one thing for Ray to go missing, but now Affonso was nowhere to be seen, and Calisto had dropped off the face of the earth too after showing back up.

It was all a little strange.

Bosses and their closest men didn’t just … leave.

Calisto was less worried about the men—he could handle them and their bullshit at another time. His main concern, and his only focus, was on Cross.

He needs to eat every three or four hours.

He needs to be changed and bathed every night.

What if his teeth are giving him a fever again?

Sometimes he cries a lot at night, and Affonso didn’t like that.

What if he gets angry with him?

He’s just a baby, but Affonso doesn’t understand.

Calisto could still hear Emma’s frantic questions driving into his thoughts through the bouts of planning and wondering. It was almost worse than having her cry over the phone as he tried to placate her, because like this, it was just her voice inside his head, and no matter what he told himself, there was no placating anything.

Scrubbing a hand down his face, Calisto leaned back in the driver’s seat and peered through the windshield into the darkness of the street ahead. Two days, and he had fuck all for answers.

Nada.

Wait
, he’d been told.

Give us time
, they said.

We’ve done this once before
, he was assured.

Calisto didn’t have much of a choice but to trust the Marcellos and give them all the faith he could muster up in order to bring his son home. Well, not all the Marcellos, just the one.

Giovanni.

His old friend asked for the truth about the situation, and feeling like there were no other options, Calisto told Giovanni what there was to tell. He offered little details about how Cross had come about, and the relationship Calisto shared with Emma, but he explained the most important details.

Like the fact Cross was his son, not Affonso’s.

Giovanni took that information in stride, and then asked for a bit of time to get what information he could gathered up.

Calisto knew a few things for sure.

Affonso hadn’t left the city on a plane, bus, or any other means of transportation that didn’t include walking on his own two feet. Between the contacts the Marcellos had throughout the city, and the ones Calisto had, there had been no reports of Affonso being seen or using one of his many alias.