Prologue
“Come in, son.” Leon Harris opened his father’s office door and slipped inside the room he was rarely allowed to enter. Just shy of twenty-five, he had moved back home two months ago after finally graduating with his master’s degree in accounting. He wasn’t interested in the occupation, but he did like money, so it seemed like it could be a good match. Not to mention, his father had hinted there would be a future in the family business if he got his degree.
“Sit,” Ray Harris said, motioning to the large brown leather chair situated in front of his obnoxiously oversize and imposing mahogany desk.
Leon barely kept the sneer off his face, the expensive furniture reminding him of the vast differences between them. He was sick to death of his father controlling his allowance and not giving him the money he needed to live the lifestyle he felt he deserved. Everyone knew Ray Harris was loaded. Why he’d made Leon live on only a hundred thousand a year while he was at school was still a mystery. One that pissed Leon off.
“Good evening, Father,” Leon said in a perfectly controlled and modulated tone, none of his anger toward the man leaking into his words.
Ray Harris sat back in his own leather chair, fingers pressed together in front of him as he contemplated his only son. Finally, he took a deep breath and leaned forward, piercing Leon with an intense gaze. “Congratulations on earning your degree. I told you after you graduated high school that if you got your graduate degree in accounting, I would hire you . . . and you’d start on a journey there’s no turning back from. My question for you is this: Are you sure this is what you want?”
“Yes, Father,” Leon said immediately.
Ray held up a hand. “Not so fast. You have to completely understand what it is we do.”
Leon nodded eagerly. Finally he was going to be invited into Father’s inner circle. The curiosity over the years had been unbearable. He’d seen his father enter meetings that were secured by several bodyguards, both his own and those of the visiting businessmen invited behind the office door. Leon hated not being in the know, and it looked like he’d finally jumped through enough hoops that his father was going to enlighten him. About fucking time.
“A couple years ago, Joseph Carlino approached me and asked if I would join his branch of the Cosa Nostra. Do you know what that is?”
Leon nodded, even though he wasn’t sure. The last thing he was going to do was admit to his father that he didn’t know something. Smug bastard would use it against him for the rest of his life. It’s what the asshole did.
Ray’s lip curled, but he didn’t call his son out on his obvious lie. “Cosa Nostra is the Mafia. One of the oldest and most well-known divisions. It began in Sicily in the eighteen hundreds. It was brought here to the United States by immigrants and is alive and well in our country today. There are different branches of the organization, and Joseph Carlino is the head of the Cosa Nostra up in Denver. There are several other influential families he works with, and he asked if I wanted to join their ranks, bringing their brand of business here to Colorado Springs.”
“And you said yes, right?” Leon asked excitedly. The Mafia was cool as shit, even if they used a stupid Italian name like Cosa Nostra.
His father sighed as if his question was absolutely ridiculous. “Yes, Leon. I did.”
“Cool,” Leon breathed.
“If you’re done acting like an eight-year-old, I’d like to bring you up to speed on what we do.”
Leon nodded, but inside he was seething. He hated that his father treated him like he was still a kid.
For the next two hours, Ray Harris told his son details about what the family business involved. He outlined the insider trading, extortion and protection rackets, occasional drug dealing, and blackmailing operations that were the backbone of their family’s contribution to the Cosa Nostra, including how money was collected.
When he was done, Leon’s mouth was practically watering.
The thought of the amount of money he could get his hands on was almost overwhelming. He’d not only have the kind of lifestyle he’d always known he deserved, but he’d also have power and respect to go with it. “What will I be doing, Father?” he asked, visions of roughing up business owners and suitcases full of money flying through his mind.
Ray Harris leaned on his desk and looked his son in the eyes. “I’ve told you what we do, but that doesn’t mean you’ll immediately be in the thick of things.”
Leon’s eyes narrowed. That didn’t sound good. “What do you mean?” he asked.
“I mean don’t think it’s escaped my notice that you were a fuckup at the university. You skipped classes more than you went to, you paid other students to do your work, and you even slept with, then blackmailed, some of your professors. While that kind of behavior would normally get a student kicked out, you were lucky that the president of the university owed me a few favors. Not only that, but you barely graduated, thanks to your behavior.”
Leon sat back in the chair and crossed his arms over his chest. Father had always been a huge stick-in-the-mud. Women were put on this planet to serve men. They were weaker, not as smart. Of course he’d used chicks at school to do his work for him. And the teaching assistants he’d slept with were nothing but whores anyway. “What will I be doing?” Leon repeated, not liking where the conversation was going.
“You’re smart, Leon,” Ray said. “Your grades don’t show it, but I know it as well as you do. But you’re going to have to prove yourself to me before I give you access to any of my spreadsheets. It’s not only the Harris family name that’s at stake here. It’s also the Carlinos’ and the Smaldones’, the two most influential families in the Cosa Nostra. If even the smallest thing is screwed up, we’re out. And I don’t mean just kicked out. We’re dead. Do you understand that?”
“Yes, Father,” Leon answered obediently. He’d learned over the years how to deal with his old man.
“Good. Since our money is tied up with Joseph Carlino’s, I’m not willing to simply let you loose on the spreadsheets to run amok. You’re going to have to prove that some of what you were supposed to learn in your classes stuck. Show me that you inherited some of the same math aptitude as your sister.”
At the mention of his sister, Leon ground his teeth. He hated being compared to Chloe. Father was always throwing her successes in his face, and Leon was sick of it. She was five years older than he was, and Father had always treated her like a fucking princess instead of the stupid cunt she was. She was working for some company downtown—he couldn’t remember the name—as a financial adviser. She apparently made good money, but Leon didn’t give one little shit. He hated the spoiled bitch. Always had. Always would.
“Why don’t you have her work for the business?” he asked a little snarkily.
Ray slammed his palm on the mahogany desktop, and Leon flinched in surprise. “Don’t tempt me, boy,” he said in a vicious, low tone. “She’s female, that’s why. The Cosa Nostra doesn’t have women at their helm. But make no mistake—she’s twice as smart and can run circles around you when it comes to making money.”
Leon cleared off all emotion from his face, checking the old, familiar rage. It had always been this way. Why can’t you be like Chloe? Chloe would know how to do this. Chloe gets all As; why can’t you? He was so sick of being compared to his perfect older sister, he could scream.
Ray Harris took a deep breath and steepled his fingers under his chin. “When I married your mother, she was the sole heir to her family’s fortune. She was worth millions. But that’s not why I married her. I fell in love with her and didn’t give a crap about her money. I made enough on my own. Her family lawyer managed the money for her, and it wasn’t ever an issue between us. After she passed away, I discovered there were stipulations put in place over a century ago that further protected the almost half-billion dollars she had in her accounts. The money was solely hers. Even though she’d married me, I had no legal right to it.”
“But . . . when she died, you got it, right?” Leon asked.
Ray shook his head. “No, son. I receive a stipend every month, but the rest of the money is untouchable.”
“That’s bullshit!” Leon said.
“When Louise passed five years ago, her fortune automatically went to her daughter, but Chloe doesn’t receive it until she’s thirty-five. Apparently, her ancestors preferred that their women have more time to get married and have children of their own before they inherited.”
“That’s not fair,” Leon said. “What about you?”
Ray shrugged. “I don’t need one dime of her family’s money.”
“So I get nothing?” Leon fired back.
Ray eyed his son critically for a long moment before saying, “That’s right. You get nothing.”
“Thanks for nothing, Mom,” he murmured.
“Don’t speak ill of your mother,” Ray chastised. “She set things up so fifty thousand dollars is transferred every month to my account, to be used on Chloe’s behalf and to pay for the management of the fund. But you know what I’ve been doing with it?” Without waiting for an answer, he went on. “I’ve been giving you an allowance, so you could screw around at the university and fuck any woman you want, whether or not she wants you. I’ve been cleaning up your messes and paying people off so they don’t press charges against you. I’ve been paying your drug bill when your dealers come to me complaining that you haven’t paid them for the merchandise you’ve taken off their hands. I’ve been using it to cover your ass, son. But that stops now. You’re on your own. No more allowance from me. And when Chloe turns thirty-five, I’ll tell her about her inheritance. How she uses her money will be up to her.”
Everything in Leon’s vision went red.
This wasn’t happening. There was no way his fucking sister had that kind of money at her disposal, and he had nothing. “That’s not fair!” he whined again.
Ray shrugged. “Fair or not, it is what it is. Here’s the deal. You can have that fifty thousand a month flat-out. But . . . I want to see what you can do with it. Your job is to see how much you can make it grow. If, after one year, you’ve turned that six hundred thousand dollars into at least two million, I’ll welcome you into the family business with open arms. I’ll let you have access to and manage the money in the business account.” He squinted at his son. “Prove to me that you learned something, anything, in the last seven years while you were at school. Show me that the money I spent was used for more than just fucking, drinking, drugs, and partying. You do that, and you’re in.”
“I have to live off that and invest it?” Leon asked.
“Yes. You won’t get another dime from me. You can live here, and you can have your car. But that’s it. Everything else is in your hands.”
“And if I don’t agree?” Leon asked.
Ray put his hands behind his head and leaned back in his chair, looking relaxed and unconcerned. “Then you’re on your own completely. No more allowance. No more car. No more living off Harris money.”
Leon didn’t move for a moment as he and his father stared each other down. The unfairness of it all was almost too much to swallow. He knew his father was trying to light a fire under his ass to motivate him.
But instead, he’d lit another kind of fire.
A dangerous one, which would soon blaze out of control and consume everything Ray Harris knew and loved.
Slowly, Leon stood and held out his right hand toward his father. “Deal.”
Smiling, Ray also stood and shook his son’s hand. “Make me proud, son.”
Without a word, Leon nodded and turned to leave. As he shut the heavy wooden door behind him, Leon dropped the amenable mask he’d been wearing for his father. A snarl curled his lip up, and he glared at the office door.
“Mark my words, Father. Chloe’s money is going to be mine. Every penny. Not only that, but I’m going to take yours too. In fact, I’m going to take everything. Prove myself to you? Fuck that. I don’t have to prove myself to anyone. No one tells me what I can and can’t do.”
And with that, Leon Harris spun around and headed for his suite of rooms on the opposite side of the large mansion, his mind going a hundred miles an hour. He had plans to make. Big ones.
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