Deviant Prince [Romano Brotherhood, #2]

1 | Massimo

Present Day.

"You heartless fucking piece of shit!"

The man next to me in first class crunches on his airline-provided bag of pretzels as he listens unabashedly to the woman screaming at me through the phone pressed to my ear.

"Mrs. Hernandez—"

"My name is Alexandra. Don't 'Mrs. Hernandez' me, Massimo Romano," she hisses my name with an impressive amount of hatred. "You're not getting out of this. I'm a person, I-I was a mother. And now I'm not. My daughter," she dissolves into wet sobs, "my poor daughter. You killed her. You fucking killed her!"

The man next to me chokes on a pretzel.

I stand, striding quickly past the cluster of passengers in the middle of boarding. A flight attendant approaches me, no doubt to direct me back to my seat, but thinks better of it at the last second, veering off to help someone else. Smart woman.

I slip into the tiny bathroom, sliding the door shut. I'm immediately assaulted with the stench of un-flushed fecal matter.

If I were typically amused by things, I'd find it humorous how abysmal this day has been.

First, the jet I chartered endured an unexplainable engine issue, forcing me to catch a commercial flight. Then, since commercial flying insinuated things like waiting in long lines to be groped by TSA, there was what some may call an incident. The TSA agent I made cry, and the ensuing drama, nearly made me late for my flight. I hadn't attempted to elicit that reaction from her, but if she thought it acceptable to be touchier than what a security checkpoint called for, it was within my bounds to retaliate accordingly.

I hadn't expressly asked for her to be fired, but that was what her supervisor had thought appropriate.

As if that were not enough, I had an intrusive seatmate who loudly ate all his flight snacks preflight. And now this abomination of a bathroom and the woman crying in my ear.

"Mrs. Hernandez," I cut in, interrupting another emotional tirade. "I have already given you everything that my family can give you. While I empathize with you for your loss—"

"You don't empathize with shit," she snaps, and though she's right, her grief is making her too reckless for my taste. People typically know not to speak to me this way. "You're a monster. I don't care about money or any other bribe you think makes up for the fact that my daughter, my baby girl, is dead."

"Unless you would like your husband to be next, I strongly advise you not interrupt me again. Speak only when I ask you a question."

Her whining cuts off abruptly, and I loosen my hold on the edge of the sink. "I've been patient with you, have I not? All I can offer you is money and certain compensation to make your life—and your grief—a little easier. Do you want what I'm offering you, Mrs. Hernandez?"

"I—I don't... No, no I don't want your money."

"Then don't take it," I suggest softly. "My brothers and I have been kind in extending you and your husband grace over the way you've conducted yourselves these past weeks." They had shown up at my home, threatening my guards and causing a ruckus at the gate. "But it's time for you to take your grief off my doorstep, my phone, and preferably out of my life."

Matters like this are just one more inconvenience to add to my stockpile of reasons for leaving Chicago. Alone.

Mrs. Hernandez—depressed, understandably grieving mother she may be—is no longer my concern. If she were to blame the person who deserves it, she'd be crying to her husband. He got them involved in this business in the first place; he's the one who became indebted to the wrong man. The fact I couldn't save them from their own mistakes is no strike against me.