Envy: A Dark Mafia Romance (Criminal Sins Book 1) Read online

  ENVY

  Criminal Sins Book 1

  Sasha Leone

  Also by Sasha Leone

  The Savage Royalty Series

  Trapped With You

  Koralev Bratva Duet

  Vowed to the Bratva Boss (Book 1)

  Broken From The Bratva (Book 2)

  Other Standalones

  Blood Bound

  Copyright © 2020 by Sasha Leone

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Cover Design by Clarise Tan, CT Cover Creations

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  Contents

  1. Angel

  2. Catalina

  3. Angel

  4. Catalina

  5. Angel

  6. Catalina

  7. Angel

  8. Catalina

  9. Angel

  10. Catalina

  11. Angel

  12. Catalina

  13. Angel

  14. Catalina

  15. Angel

  16. Catalina

  17. Angel

  18. Catalina

  19. Angel

  20. Catalina

  21. Angel

  22. Catalina

  23. Angel

  24. Catalina

  25. Angel

  26. Catalina

  27. Angel

  28. Catalina

  29. Angel

  30. Angel

  31. Catalina

  32. Angel

  33. Catalina

  Epilogue

  Also by Sasha Leone

  1

  Angel

  It’s a hellish task, to have to choose between two lives—even when you don’t give a shit about either of them. That’s why I’ve always tried to keep my heart locked away in a cold black box. It helps if you can help it, but recently I’ve been compromised; a pretty little dove has fluttered her way into my life and brought hell with her.

  That’s where I’m at right now, surrounded by fire, being forced to pick between the only two people in this world who I actually care for: my brother or my girl—one has to die, and the decision seems to rest entirely on the barrel of my gun.

  Sweat drips down my tensed fingers as I hover over the trigger, eyes big and wild and desperately searching for a way out of this mess that doesn’t involve the death of my past or my future. I’ve bullied my way out of so many battles before, but this time is different.

  Catalina is supposed to be my future; the woman I run my empire beside; the eventual mother of my children, my queen. She’s the only stranger I’ve ever let past the cold gates of my icy heart, and now everything threatens to burn because of it.

  My brother, on the other hand, is my past. Dante. He’s the kid I grew up with; the kid I practically raised after our parents tragically passed. He’s the reason I had to close off my heart in the first place. There was no room in our lives for anyone else, we already knew what it was like to lose and we weren’t about to put ourselves through that again. All we needed to survive was each other, but even that began to fall apart. Maybe, If I’d been more focused, then we’d never have lost our way and ended up here, on the edge of oblivion.

  If I wanted to, I could blame Dante for leading us to this end—hell, I could even blame Catalina—but I won’t. I’m supposed to be the leader. This is my own failure; there’s no one to blame but myself.

  Still, it hurts. I was ready to take control of my own legacy. I was ready to rule, but so far only chaos has ruled under my reign. Fire burns all around us. The weeds and the vines that litter these crumbling cobblestone walls are being singed away, right alongside the last bits of my strength. I’m supposed to be powerful, I’m supposed to be the young king, the transformed prince, the dark lord of the largest cartel on this side of the Atlantic Ocean, but I’ve been put in an unwinnable situation. This is the biggest decision I’ve ever had to make, and it’s so small. Just two lives hang in the balance—well, three, but I don’t count my own.

  I’ve faced so much savagery before, so much violence, that it hardly even makes me blink anymore, but now the lives at stake are ones I don’t want to risk, lives I’ve seen grow and flourish before my very eyes, lives that now teeter on the brink of destruction. The duty has fallen on me to pluck one of these flowers from the face of the earth and sacrifice them to the flames, and if I don’t make a decision soon, then we may all perish.

  This is not a position I would wish on my worst enemy, but it’s the one he has put me in, and to make him pay for it is to make my final move.

  “Are you alright?” I grit my teeth and push forward, towards the stoic damsel stuck in between me and my bloody brother.

  Catalina. My wild little jungle bird.

  She’s been my light at the end of the tunnel, the sweet perfume that drowns out the smell of rotting corpses, the vision that distracts me from all the ghosts I’ve created with my own hands.

  Little did I know that the light she stood behind all along was a raging fire, one that threatens to crumble my empire and fracture my family forever.

  “She’s fine!” Dante barks back for her. My brother sways on the other side of Cat, drenched in dark blood. How much of it is his own and how much of it is from those he’s killed to get here isn’t clear, but I’m not interested in adding to the black stains—my life has already been stained enough.

  “Shut the fuck up!” I growl at him, the older brother in me coming out with a frustrated fury. “These words aren’t for you. Cat...”

  “I’m fine,” she quickly snaps. Liar. She’s not fine. The duels that have led us here are child’s play compared to the conflict I see raging behind her big brown eyes. Flames flicker in the reflection of her glossy skin. I want to lunge forward and get one last touch before my world implodes, but I know that will only speed up the apocalypse.

  A great man needs to be patient, whether he’s in the garden or surrounded by fire. Be. Patient. That’s what my father always told me—some good that did him.

  Be. Patient. For once.

  Fine.

  “What do you want?” I ask, more to the smoky black ether than to the cruel hand that has twisted my fate into something so disformed that I barely recognize it anymore.

  “I want what’s mine!” I’m told in response.

  “I’ve never stood in the way of that...” It’s the truth. I’m still not sure what’s happening. What has become of those I thought I knew so well? Right now, everything is as opaque as the dark smoke that billows up into the stifling air above us. The moon was out and bright earlier tonight, but now the memory of its white light is as distant as the memory of the life I once expected to live.

  My future is black and indecipherable; I only know one thing for sure: it needs to be with Cat, otherwise, it’s not worth living at all.

  “Everything was always handed to you,” the nearly unrecognizable voice accuses me through the ashes. “The keys to the kingdom, the hand of the princess, the hearts of the people, you’ve never earned any of it. Well, I’m here to make you earn it, and if you’re not up to the challenge, then I’ll take it all for myself. Including this tramp.”

  My grip around the burning steel in my hand
tightens. I instinctively raise the barrel to my accuser. How dare he!? “You don’t get to talk to her like that!” I growl, ready to risk it all just in the name of vengeance. So much blood has been spilled so far; I’m sick of it, but if anyone threatens my girl again, I’ll paint the jungle with their insides.

  “I never get to do anything!” The fucking child.

  “You had everything anyone could ever ask for,” I jab back. “All the money and influence and none of the responsibility. You were living a dream that millions would kill to live, and you threw it all away for what? Because you were jealous?”

  “I haven’t thrown anything away,” a cruel foreign grin crosses the lost soul’s cracked lips. “No, instead, I’ve taken it for myself. Your throne, your power, and now... your girl!”

  Catalina flinches as I fire a warning shot around her. The clap cuts through the ashy air, but nothing changes.

  “Not so patient anymore,” I’m teased.

  “Shut the fuck up!” I roar.

  “Make me!”

  He knows I won’t. I care too much about the people here to risk getting them hurt. All I can do is bluff. I’ve never felt so useless—it’s infuriating. The gears in my mind twist and turn, desperately trying to find a way out of this. “No more blood,” I shout.

  “You’re weak,” I’m told.

  “You’re cruel,” I respond.

  “I’m winning.” He’s right. For the first time in so long, I’m an underdog. The challenge that it entails cooks inside of me like a crackling volcano; the intense molten lava slowly reawakening my senses.

  Good. Let me be an underdog. If I’m ever going to become the man I need to be, it will be after I’ve had to overcome this. I have the object of my desire standing right in front of me. It’s time to take what’s mine.

  “You’re a coward,” I taunt right back, desperately trying to pretend like Cat’s not there, ripe for the taking. I have to avert my eyes from her beauty, or else risk being hypnotized. One lapse in judgment could mean the end of me, of us. I’m fast, but bullets are faster. “You have to stab those who care about you in the back to get what you want. That’s not strong.”

  “It’s smart.”

  “It’s weak.”

  Cat stands in the center of our showdown like a lighthouse braving a deep-sea storm. The waves are growing against her stone walls, but I’m doing my best to take the brunt of the fury.

  I start pacing to my left. Like my mirror image, the traitor does the same. Cat’s eyes dart back and forth between the two of us. She stands tall, but I can see her long legs are shaking. It’s no secret that she’s being used as a human shield. One wrong move and it’s lights out. Behind her, my brother is limping, panting like a wounded beast. The world turns with us all.

  “Stop running,” I command.

  “I don’t run.”

  “Then face me like a man!”

  A blood-soaked gargle that almost sounds like laughter slithers through the smoky air. “I told you already, I’m the smart one. There isn’t a single soul in this entire world who doesn’t know you would win in a fair fight, but I don’t fight fair, not anymore.”

  The ground vibrates beneath us as an explosion rumbles off in the distance. The fire is closing in. Memories of my parents and their final moments rush through my mind. Is this what it’s like to be burned alive?

  I shake that thought from my head. I’ve been burned enough already; I’m not going to let it happen again. I keep pacing, circling my prize as her captor does the same. The fire seems to cool against the rage that festers inside of me at the idea that anyone could ever think that Catalina should be theirs. No, you idiot, she’s mine, now and forever.

  A nearby stone statue collapses under the growing heat and shatters against the ground. Sweat drips down my forehead. “We can’t stay here forever,” I sneer.

  “Sure we can.”

  “You idiot...”

  The devil just shrugs. “I’m willing to die in this fire, as long as it means taking you down with me.”

  Who the hell does he think he is!? Frustration bubbles inside of me; I’m being cooked alive, by the fire and by my own fury. Sorrow and anger clash behind my chest. This isn’t a situation I ever thought I’d find myself in. There’s no preparing for this. I practically have my arms wrapped around a veritable suicide bomber, and he has his arms wrapped around the girl we’ve both fallen for. The difference is, he wants to cut her in half and share what’s left, but I don’t want a single hair on her pretty little body harmed. The thought of Catalina being hurt under my watch nearly crushes me with despair; I’m only kept from suffocating by the unfiltered rage that flickers up from the deepest darkest pit of my soul.

  “So, let her go and let’s die together,” I offer.

  “No, you’ll kill me the second she’s gone. She’s stuck in hell with us... unless you give up and leave. It’s the only way she’ll survive.” The bastard knows me well. I may be vicious, but I don’t hurt those I care about; that’s what’s making this whole situation so fucking hard, because I don’t give up either.

  “I can’t do that. I’m not leaving her.” My eyes dart to Cat. “I’m not leaving you. I promise.”

  My dark princess looks like she’s lost in another world. Sweat pours down her shiny caramel skin like rain, but her eyes are distant. Sorrow weighs on her sharp features so heavily I fear she might sink through the scorched earth—at least then she’d be free from this nightmare.

  “Cat...”

  “No,” she trembles, her gaze suddenly exploding back to reality. “We can’t die here.”

  “You’re damn right,” I snarl. Blood pumps through my throbbing heart. There’s the girl I fell for. She won’t give up—as if I ever thought she would. I know what she’s been through. Lesser women might have crumbled and been swept away in the tornados she’s faced, but she’s a fighter. Together, we’re unstoppable.

  Flickering flames lash at us from all angles but I barely feel their heat anymore. I’m going to get us out of here, if it’s the last thing I ever do. We’ve been through too much to lose it all like this. I’ll sweep her up to my castle in the sky, then I’ll burn the world below to ashes, but only when I have her safe and sound and back in my bed.

  My fingers tighten around the sizzling gun handle. The world slows as adrenaline courses through my veins. It’s now or never.

  “You ready, babe?” I whisper, just loud enough for her to hear. She knows what I mean. We’ve seen enough violence in our short time together to know what’s coming next. I’m about to pounce and I need her to be prepared for it.

  “No.”

  A chilly breeze follows from her lips. It takes me a second to feel the icy smack of her rejection, but when I do, the wind is instantly drained from my sails.

  What the fuck does she mean, ‘no’!?

  “Cat,” I growl, expecting to be interrupted, but she doesn’t speak up. The gears are turning in her mind like great monoliths being moved by a little dove. She’s strong, but maybe the pressure is finally getting to her. The coolness of her response fades away and the heat of our situation comes back, full force. My skin is burning; my clothes are being singed away. I swear there’s ember on her flowing white dress.

  “Time’s running out, Angel...” the dark blurry figure hisses from behind Cat. He seems to grow like a looming shadow of doom.

  “Cat,” I take an instinctive step forward and hear the click of a safety pin being removed. It stops me in my tracks.

  “Another step and I’ll cover you in her blood.”

  I try my best to ignore the threat and concentrate on what matters: her. “What’s wrong?” I plead, wanting so badly to just throw caution to the wind and explode in a fireball of brutality. I’ve always fought my way out of the darkness before, but this time it’s different—this time, I’m not truly alone. There’s a light I want to bring with me, and she’s weighing me down so heavily that I wonder if we’ll ever be able to escape this dark pit toge
ther.

  “I can’t do this,” Cat whispers, like it’s more of a thought said out loud than a response to me. Her tender shoulders angle away, ever so slightly, and she caresses her belly, tossing her flowing raven-black hair aside. “You need to leave.”

  There’s a sudden conviction in her command that burns me way harder than any fire ever could. It’s enough to get through my thick skull before I can even start to question what I’m hearing. “Never!” I growl back, as if she’s who I’m fighting now.

  This is no time for a lovers’ quarrel—as if that’s ever stopped us before.

  It takes all of my will power not to jump at her and end this all right now. The thin white shoulder straps of her dress are loose and dirty. Ash falls between us. I want to let my fingers fall over her skin. The shadow that keeps us apart still grows in the background. Flames nip at our heels.

  “I’m not leaving you, Cat. Never...”

  “Go!” she whips around to face me with big globs of tears in her eyes. The pain in her voice shreds through my heart like searing shrapnel. I tumble backwards under the force of her plea. She’s the only person in this world who could ever make me retreat... and that’s what she’s asking of me right now.

  But why?