Mag-log inThe Milovich family fell faster than I'd expected.The week Vasily's scandal swept through the underworld, the street outside the Milovich compound was packed every day with cars full of people coming to settle scores.Partners pulled funding, allies turned on him, the Council of Elders moved to impeach. One blow after another, not even leaving Vasily room to breathe.Three months later, the family that had once rivaled the Stascia empire was completely off the West Coast map.I went back to school to finalize my withdrawal.The president walked me to the gates personally and handed me an envelope, a receipt for the scholarship I'd donated to the school.I took it, said thank you, and slipped the envelope into my bag.That afternoon I visited the cemetery. My father's headstone sat halfway up a hill on the edge of town, facing the ocean.The photo on the headstone was from his fiftieth birthday. A gentle smile, light in his eyes.I crouched down and laid a bouquet of white roses at the
The meeting was set at a French tearoom downtown.I'd booked the entire place. White tablecloths and silver tea sets lined the window tables, three-tiered stands loaded with macarons and croissants. It looked like an ordinary high-end afternoon tea.Vasily arrived on time.He wore a meticulously tailored charcoal suit, his hair combed without a strand out of place, a polished smile on his face. He even nodded to the server on his way in.The actual head of the Milovich family looked like nothing more than a respectable businessman.He sat down and took a sip of tea. "Miss Stascia, I've heard so much about you. What happened to your father has always weighed on me.""Has it." I dropped a sugar cube into my cup and stirred.He sighed. "Everyone always says our families are bitter enemies, but the truth is, your father and I were on quite good terms while he was alive. He left us so suddenly. I still think it's a real shame."I set down the spoon and looked up at him."Mr. Milovich, by 'g
Damian was gone. His old place was cleared out.I tracked him through the night using the GPS device, but the signal vanished in an old residential neighborhood on the city outskirts.At first light, Capitano took his men to the location. It was an abandoned house. Inside, all that remained was a pile of burnt paper ash and half of an old photograph, warped and smudged by water.On the back of the photo was a handwritten string of numbers, blurry but still legible. A Swiss bank account number.I sealed the photo in an evidence bag.Damian must have realized something was off. After being caught following me at the nightclub that night, he'd probably dug deeper and put the pieces together.I had Capitano trace the bank account. Three years ago, a massive wire transfer had been deposited into it. The sender had been routed through three layers of shell companies, and the trail ultimately led back to an internal financial hub within the Milovich family.Blood money.Damian had escaped, bu
On Saturday night, Capitano had booked the top-floor private room at an upscale nightclub downtown.When I arrived, the eldest son of the Milano family and the third son of the Burke family were already waiting on the sofas.Both families were serious players on the West Coast. They didn't match the Stascia family's peak-era reach, but they were agile, and they'd grown resentful of the Milovich family's unchecked expansion.I sat down and got straight to the point."The Milovich family has taken too much of the market. After my father died, they swallowed three of the Stascia pipelines. Now Vasily's reaching for the ports."The Milano heir swirled his glass. "Lois, you haven't exactly secured your position in the Family yet, have you? I heard you went back to school. Interesting. What are you bringing to the table?"I slid the partnership agreement I'd gotten from my uncle across to him."This is a copy of the underground partnership the Stascia and Milovich families signed twenty year
I spent a full day and night in a room at the Family's private hospital.The wound at my waist took eleven stitches. The doctor said another inch to the left and it would have hit an organ.The following afternoon, Capitano pushed through the door carrying a thick stack of files."Principessa, we found everything you asked for."I propped myself up against the headboard and flipped through the documents page by page.First, Tina's phone records. Between last September and December, she had made seventeen calls to the same encrypted number, each lasting over ten minutes. The number traced back to the Milovich family's stronghold. The person on the other end had to be Tina's uncle, Vasily.Next, a supplementary background check on Damian. Three years ago, he'd been the Black Serpent's top assassin. But the organization had fallen apart soon after, its core members either dead or scattered.Last was the document I'd photographed in the warehouse. I'd had the tech team enhance it, and the
The weekend arrived quickly. I woke at seven. The sky outside was overcast, dark as ink-soaked cotton.Capitano had texted at four in the morning."Principessa, warehouse coordinates locked in. A shipment is coming in this afternoon. The Milovich underboss will be there personally."I changed into a black bodysuit, pulled on a bulletproof vest, tied my hair into a tight ponytail, tucked a modified Glock into my boot, and clipped a flare and a miniature communicator to my belt.Before heading out, I checked the mirror.The person staring back had sharp, hard features, nothing like the girl who rode a Rolls-Royce to school every day.This was the real principessa of the Stascia family.We set up in a tower near the warehouse. At two in the afternoon, three black Hummers rolled in.The first to step out was a bald man with an old scar across his face. Kovac, the Milovich family's underboss. I'd seen his photo in my father's files. He and his men carried six metal crates inside.I steadied







