My Merciless Don – Extended Epilogue
Audry
I lay luxuriously on the beach bed, enjoying the cool breeze coming off the Pacific Ocean as the sun set. Marco had surprised me with an impromptu picnic – he called it that – giving me just enough time to grab my bikini before we headed out.
There was nobody else about, just us, some seagulls and a few trees, leaning curiously towards us in the breeze to see what leftovers we had. It had been a rather romantic day. We didn’t have a lot of those with a clan to run on his end, and cons to plan on mine. I was quite relieved when I realized that neither Marco nor his family was going to oblige me to join the family business. They were quite content for me to do as I pleased.
“If you want a role in the family, well, that’s a process. We trust you but that doesn’t mean everyone does,” his mother told me.
“Not after what I did.” I said sadly.
“No, they’re just a distrustful bunch. But considering everything you’ve done for our security and the new business you’ve brought in, let me tell you, they’re inclined to accept you,” she whispered confidentially.
“As long as I prove myself loyal.”
“Yes.”
I took a breath and nodded determinedly. “Okay, challenge accepted.”
As a result of that promise, I’d been doing my best to discover ways they could up their game businesswise including setting up an automatic payment system so that no one had to go around collecting protection money anymore. Of course, no one wanted to be made redundant so I suggested reassigning those guys to a boxing gym in the poorer neighborhoods, where they could recruit distributors loyal only to the Cassio family and find out what the word on the street was before it became a problem.
“You’d have seen me coming a lot sooner than you did if you had had an underground network of informants.” I said with a shrug. “Just saying.”
Marco’s face was inscrutable. “What makes you think I don’t?”
“I think you rely a lot on technology for surveillance with George and his assistants, but for some things you need boots on the ground. Now, if your goons are not busy terrorizing businessmen-”
“They don’t do that, but continue.”
“They could be building a trade, helping in the community, and advancing themselves. Your goal should be everyone has a chance to be better than what they started as, right?”
He stared at me in stupefaction. “Is that your goal? To be better than where you started.”
I blinked a few times, totally caught out. “Okay if I’m keeping it 100, I love the job I do. It takes smarts and I’m not ashamed of it. But what’s my end game?”
He shrugged at me, “Do tell.”
“I don’t know yet. But I’ve been that kid on the street, and I know that giving them purpose outside of knocking people’s heads together will breed loyalty like you’ve never seen.”
“I agree. And the boxing gym is a very good idea. But I think instead of joining one, we could start a few in the poorer neighborhoods. Teach the kids how to defend themselves, while doing a low-key recruitment exercise. So thank you for that idea.” He pulled me to him and kissed my chin. Then he smiled. “We make a good team.”
I smiled back. “Yes, we do.”
I smiled with my eyes closed as I thought back to that conversation.
“Why are you smiling?” Marco asked from his own beach bed.
I opened my eyes and turned my head to look at him. “Nothing really. I’m just glad to be here. This was a good idea.”
He grinned at me. “I did promise to give you a soft life.”
“You did.” I reached out my hand and he took it. “And you’ve done an excellent job congratulations.”
He gave us a praised laugh and sat up. “Well, um I have one more thing up my sleeve, if you’re up to it.”
I raised both my eyebrows and sat up as well. “I’m always up for a little adventure. What you got?”
He got to his feet and bent to take something from the basket. I sat up watching him as curiously as a squirrel. His hand emerged from the basket, clutching something that fit in his palm. I waited on tenterhooks to see what it was. Another plan to steal a rare jewel maybe? I couldn’t really see that happening on this beach.
Then he went down on one knee and my mind shut down. Literally, there was a blue screen flashing error 404, no thoughts – just shock.
I watched him open the box in his hand from another plane of existence. He removed a ring and my eyes widened. It was a plain white gold band, embedded with an emerald and opal and a diamond. My mouth dropped open, but my throat was closed, and I didn’t remember what words were.
“From the moment we met,” he began, “my life has been a whirlwind of chaos, danger, and excitement. But through it all, you grew to be my constant, my partner, my love.” He was staring into my eyes, and it was like staring into the sun. “I can’t imagine my life without you, and I don’t want to. Audry, will you marry me?”
I don’t know if I was crying, but my vision was blurry. I felt as if I was standing on the edge of a cliff and about to jump off it. Even more remarkable, I wanted to jump off it. I cleared my throat trying to remember how to make sounds. “Yes Marco,” I couldn’t quite stop the trembling in my voice. “Yes, I’ll marry you.”
He took my hand in his – it looked so small compared – and gently slipped the ring on. It fit perfectly, I could hardly believe it.
“God this is so trippy.” I said with wonder, my eyes on my ring. My engagement ring. “Somebody pinch me.”
He laughed. “I won’t pinch you, but can I kiss you?”
“Definitely,” I put my hands around his neck and pulled him to me. Our lips met in what was supposed to be a perfunctory little kiss, an acknowledgement of our new status, new commitment. But it escalated it into a mauling of each other’s mouths – just uncivilized licking and sucking and biting, me trying to stick my tongue right down his throat. Eventually we let go of each other, maybe even exchanged some sheepish looks and grins.
We both resumed sunbathing, on our respective sunbeds – or rather watching the sun go down over the water. It was a beautiful sight, so apt. Marco turned to me with a grin. “So tell me, missus Cassio-to-be, how do you see this going?”
“Well now that you mention it, I’ve been thinking about going to Las Vegas.”
He gave me a quizzical glance, “You wanna elope?”
“No! Don’t be silly. Your mother would put a hit out on us.”
He chuckled. “True.”
“What I want is to go and find my brother. He needs to know what happened with me and James, and I need to see him.”
“Huh.” Marco said looking thoughtful, “You know, now that you say that, there just might be the perfect job for us down in Las Vegas. Title fight. We could clean up.”
“I like how you think,” I rubbed my hands together in anticipation. “Let’s do this.”
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Great finished
Thank you so much for reading Vernice! 🖤