Owning the Mafia Don

Schwartz

He stopped as he crossed the foyer of the building housing the offices of a local influential politician who was on Lucien’s payroll. A figure in a black skirt and smart jacket, her hair in a bun at the nape of her neck, seemed vaguely familiar. Slim and tall, her dark brown hair and the way she moved her head made him pause.

He knew this woman, he thought, frowning.

She turned at that moment and it came to him.

Of course, Aiyana Laughing Water Preston, the beautiful Native American FBI agent whom he had met by accident at the psychologists’ when he was undergoing counselling at the clinic of Dr. Ethan Hale. It had been immediately after the death of his beloved Fionella and she had also been there for personal reasons.

He smiled and stepped towards her. She half-turned and watched him warily. Then recognition flooded her beautiful oval face and she smiled, stepping forward, her voice husky with pleasure as she said,

“James Schwartz, isn’t it?’

She put out her hand and he shook it warmly. Almost as tall as he was, she had almond-shaped eyes and tanned skin with a full mouth. The blue eyes, courtesy of her Irish mother, were piercing and keen. She was almost as old as him but had a timeless elegance about her.

She nodded her head to the office of the Senator and asked,

‘Did you get to meet the Senator?’

Schwartz grinned easily. When anyone from Lucien’s place came a calling, Senator L. Rodericks would put away all his work and meet them. He respected the mob Boss who had saved his life on one unforgettable occasion. Schwartz had come to call on the old man to remind him that he owed Lucien Delano.

He had not been disappointed.

If there was any threat from Dmitri, the Senator had reaffirmed that he was firmly in Lucien’s corner.

Now Schwartz grinned his lopsided smile at the beautiful woman before him and nodded, asking a question in his turn,

‘What brings you here?’

Aiyana turned away. Her face darkened. ‘I had some loose ends to tie up.’ She said lightly but Schwartz sensed a wave of cold anger, a deep sadness behind her words.

Quickly, he changed the subject and asked,

“So, how is your husband, Howard, isn’t it?’

On that dark and rainy evening when he had been waiting for the doctor, he had struck up a conversation with the woman before him. Rather, she had sensed the deep anguish in him as they sat alone in the waiting room and had begun to talk to him, determined to drag him out of his deep gloom. She had come there with a work-related issue she had said briefly and he had been too distraught to ask for details. He had just lost his wife and was struggling to hold it in there. It had been Lucien who had packed him off to meet a psychologist.

They had begun to talk, small talk, that dark evening. Sensing his deep despair, the FBI agent had begun to talk of her husband who she had wed just a few days ago, She had taken out her phone and fondly showed Schwartz the picture of her husband, a beaming Texan in a large Stetson and a cheerful look.

His name, she had said with a smile, was Howard Preston and he had chased her down to the altar.

Schwartz had the distinct impression that left to herself, she would never have got married, She was a woman who was wed to her work.Upstodatee from Novel(D)ra/m/a.O(r)g

Now her face clouded over and she turned away abruptly.

With her back to him, she said stiffly,

‘He …he died.’

And then after a pause, she added,

“I am no longer with the FBI.’

Sensing that there was more to the bland statement, he nodded his head just as the Senator’s PA appeared around the corner.

‘Ms Preston?’ he asked politely, ‘The Senator will see you now.’

With a brief, ‘See you…’, she strode away smartly and Schwartz watched her, vaguely disturbed.

The woman he remembered who had sat with him and made him feel better that evening, who had also called him up on quite a few occasions to check on him before they had drifted apart, had been cool and confident. This woman looked as though there was a darkness within her, a sorrow that she was holding back with difficulty. As she turned the corner, he thought to himself,

‘She is beautiful…’ And stopped himself in shock.

But as he shook his head and turned to leave, he felt that after a long, long time, he had seen a woman he could truly be attracted to. Proserpina St. Claire was the woman of his dreams, unattainable and oh, so lovely. But this woman, with her head held high, was someone who would be an equal.

He thought wryly that he always had the strangest choices, as he turned to walk out.

His men met him and journeyed to the Club in silence.

But Schwartz made up his mind to find out more about the mysterious woman whose face remained in his thoughts.

***

Aiyana Laughing Water

She walked along the corridor, her back stiff and rigid. Seeing James Schwartz brought back so many memories. Of her husband, Howard Preston, the large, florid rancher she had met on a flight from Chicago. He had pursued her relentlessly and had finally managed to get her to marry him.

She sighed bitterly.

Howard had whispered as he kissed her at church,

“I get to make an honest woman of you, Ai.’

But he had not deserved to die the way he did, she thought as she entered the Senators’ room.

Howard Preston, the bluff, happy rancher had died because of who she had been.

He had died because of the case she had been investigating.

Her innocent husband whose world had revolved around his horses and his ranch had been strapped to a chair in their large ranch house, left to bleed to death because she had been hard on the heels of a dr*g runner and trafficker of humans. The monsters who committed that atrocity had escaped, leaving poor Howard to bleed to death painfully, a gag in his mouth restraining him from shouting for help…

Dmitri Rudenko.

She blinked.

She had been sent a message that terrible day, a voice message from her husband, desperately asking her to come home. Something about his tone had alerted her and she had insisted on flying down. Ben Church who had been her partner, had come along with her.

The scene that met her eyes was something that she could never forget.

Howard had been dead for hours by the time they broke open the door and entered. He had not died quickly; Dmitri Rudenko had made sure that he suffered. They had tortured him, her Howard, who would never hurt a fly. The man who cried if a horse had to be put down…

The ranch hands had imagined that he was away and no one had suspected foul play when they saw the convoy of cars enter the grounds and leave the ranch within an hour.

The flies had been hovering around the body of her beloved and she had cradled his head, screaming in pain as she imagined how he must have suffered. Her partner, Ben Church had had to prise her away from Howards’ body.

Immediately after that, Aiyana had resigned from her job.

She ran the ranch and stayed away from her old colleagues, living the life of a recluse.

Only the message from the Senator about news on Dmitri Rudenko had brought her here to Hollowford on the first available flight.

She would have Dmitri Rudenko’s blood.

Even if it killed her.

Squaring her shoulders, she stepped forward coolly and shook hands with the Senator.