Capo Dei Capi (Secrets of the Famiglia Part 1)

Chapter 18 (Aliyana)

He is standing behind you ALIYANA, I scream in my head.

“Why would you apologize and mean it if you don't even know me?” My question comes out as a

whisper, confusion apparent in every word uttered. Text property © Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org.

He stands next to me, on my left. Everything about Marco Catelli is wrong, evil, deadly, and wrong.

“I do know you.” His answer, simple, a fact.

I should not be drawn to him, not like this. But in this glass cocoon, surrounded by peach, white, and

yellow roses, with a made-mad-man next to me, I can’t deny the feelings I am experiencing right now.

Belonging.

Peering from the corner of my eye, I tilt my head slightly to the right and stare at his suit pocket. The

urge to touch him takes me on. His scent ingraining itself in me.

My body burns as he brushes his arm against mine. It is the second time he has touched me without

consent. It feels forbidden yet, not mistaken.

“We are practically attached to the hip now, Aliyana. How about a wager?” He slips his hands in the

pocket of his slacks.

His words take me off guard.

“A wager? What does that have to do with anything?”

“You question my honesty and sincerity. I, well, we can say I am a man that doesn't like to be

distrusted!” His answer holds more than the explanation he gives me.

“Okay, fair enough, what kind of wager, we talking about?”

“How about I give you a clue?” He asks, but is it really a question?

I can feel him watching me as the light breeze of The State he controls with his brother, blows my hair

back, cooling the heat this man is festering in me.

Did he know he was going to affect me like this?

I feel betrayed by my own body, for even staying here.

Why is Marco here with me? Does he feel the same way I am currently feeling? Or is he like Gabriel, a

man who just wants to live in the moment, an impending death, an early grave? Or like Mero, a quiet

fox, with a deadly plan.

“You want to spoil my virtue?” It is a rhetorical question and earns me a laugh when I say it. Not sure

why I say what I do, but they are now words between us. His laughter sounds nice, but I will never

admit that to him. There is a lot of things I would never tell a soul.

How I really feel right now, is one of them.

“You aren't too far off the mark. Better me than some strange man downstairs."

“Why is that? Do you crave the kiss of death?” My sarcasm is unbidden.

“A kiss of death is not a bad way to leave this world.”

I grin as I bite my lip, “You have an answer for everything. If you want me to even consider a wager

with you, I’ll need more than just sweet words.”

“How about I make an honest woman out of you and show you more than just sweet words?”

I snort at how absurd that sounds.

He is a Catelli.

There is no way a Catelli would marry a half-blood Russian woman who is easily 10 years younger

than him. I am tainted-blood. And there is no way Papa will even consider it, he hates the Catelli Family

for what they did to my sister.

“My father will have the honor in that if I don't choose a man soon.”

“You aren't like other girls, Aliyana.” My name rolls off his tongue, putting my heart in overdrive and my

conscience in turmoil at what he just said.

“Of course, I’m not. I actually have a brain.”

He chuckles again. This man isn’t serious, is he? Of course, not Aliyana!

“You sound like you have too much faith in your father. It makes me question if you have any faith at

all.”

"Faith. It's the only thing I can have. I'm the lucky girl of my family. The Russian half-blood.”

Marco is quiet as I voice out the obvious, he already knows, no need to sugar coat it.

"You will get an option. You are a lucky girl. Men don’t even get such options in our world any longer."

His voice is soft when he talks, and his eyes drift to the lights from a distance. I know because I am

looking up at him. His eyes are so black, unique yet fitting for a man as mysterious as him.

“Options,” I mutter.

“You don’t want the option, do you, Aliyana? You fear rejection, loneliness, you crave to just belong.”

His words are so accurate and brutal that I feel it inside my very being. The parts of me that I keep

hidden only to come out when I am weak. I don’t want to be vulnerable. I hate it, always have.

“Everyone deserves their share of happiness, what I want is nothing more than everyone else.” My

answer is a fact, we all want a bit of ordinary in this world.

“You are not everyone else, look around you, this very building you stand on, that holds your life on its

very foundation was built with blood money, and I can tell you the souls that died didn’t do so

smiling.”