DanteI check the cylinder on my second pistol—full—and slide it back into place with a click. Adrenaline courses through my veins as I put my eye to the sniper sight Tony set up on the apartment roof across from the Russian warehouse Cal showed us.“We’re trusting Cal Duncan?” Tony asks.“You got another fucking option?” I reply.His sharp sigh behind me tells me I’ve already won. I knew I was going to. If we give the Russians more than twenty-four hours, we look weak. But we don’t know shit about their operations, other than this warehouse. Assuming Cal was telling the truth. And if I’m being honest, I think Cal’s more likely to give us the warehouse of another syndicate, on the off chance he lied, so at least I don’t have the deaths of civilians to worry about. I lean back from the sight.Tony stands behind me, along with Seb and three other capos. Seb’s just about vibrating out of his skin, being taken on an all-capo mission. Tony said it wasn’t a good idea, but his induction is n
DanteThe lanky Russian advances on me, and I raise Seb’s pistol because mine is pinned under his body. His fingers slip limply from the trigger, and I grimace as I land three shots in the Russian’s chest. He drops like a sack of rocks. Tony skids through the haze of gun smoke to my side.“Seb,” he whispers urgently.Seb’s eyes roll aimlessly in his head. My heart hammers. Tony has no idea where his fucking gun is. It’s my job, from underneath his bleeding brother, to keep all three of us alive. A much bigger Russian advances, wearing a set of brass knuckles, and I blow him away before his attention can lock on us.“Sebastian Bellini.” Tony takes his younger brother’s head in his hands. “You have to fucking answer me, or I’m going to tell Nonna you’ve been missing her, and she should really call every day.”Seb coughs. “Dick.”Tony and I exhale matching gusts of relief. It’s not over yet. Tony wedges his arms under Seb, keeping him as still as possible while I slide out. The front of
EleniI flip a page in my textbook, but the words blur in front of my eyes. Dante’s out raiding his only lead on the Russians right now, trying to get any kind of thread that’ll lead us to their boss. I helped clean up at Piacere as long as I could, but eventually, after the week with Mama and the emotional stress, I had to call it a night. I was hoping I’d get in a little studying so I could actually be ready when classes started in a few weeks, instead of waiting until things got crazier and crossing my fingers, but reading is proving harder than I hoped.Ben, the son of Thano’s capo who saved me during exams, leans into the doorframe. “How’s it going?”“Like shit.” I lean back in my chair. “Thanks for taking me home anyway. At least this way I’m not doing a shit job with broken glass.”He chuckles. “It’s my job, somehow. Heard you’re leaving school, though. Going all in on the life?”“Going to the Tandon Institute, actually.” I close my textbook and hold it up so he can see the ver
DanteI scream up to the house, but I know what I’m going to find before I even get out of the car. My front door hangs dangerously open, warm light pouring onto the lawn I spent so much of my goddamn life, so much goddamn money keeping within HOA-approved lengths. That doesn’t stop me from leaping out of the driver’s seat, engine still running, and sprinting inside.Ben stares up at me, a grinning death’s head. One bullet hole, in the middle of his throat. A distant part of my brain registers that they had to get close, that it’s a quick death.The rest of me shouts, “Eleni?”I expect the silence, but it’s like stepping in front of an oncoming train. The pain doesn’t hurt any less because I know it’s coming. My breath turns ragged, scraping in and out of my throat as I step over Ben’s corpse.The next trail of blood leads me to the front sitting room and Andrea. Fuck. Another throat shot, like a signature. My head of house, the only woman keeping me alive before Eleni, weeps blood on
EleniMy stomach roils. The surface underneath me bumps and rolls. My head aches, and my hands scream with pain so loud I’m forced to open my eyes just to see what happened to them.The world around me swims together in pieces. Dark walls, lined with something textured. Sound-proofing? No, it’s hard plastic. The carpet under my cheek is equally plasticky. Something smells like gasoline, and for a single horrifying second, I think I’m back in the basement of Frank Lombardi’s garage, and this has all been a dream. Then, my hand pulls my attention again, and I shock back to now.With aching slowness, I drag my hand up until I can see it. A makeshift bandage rings my palm, soaked through with something red. No, I know what that is. Blood.My blood.The ground bumps again, and something moves in my vision other than me. A vision in white, totally distinct from the black of the walls and the red that is all I can understand about myself. I blink a few times, and the vision resolves.Camila.
EleniI roll over in the thin cot, my whole body aching, and stare blearily at the dull gray ceiling. The crack in one corner looks like it might’ve grown another millimeter since I last checked. Not that I know how long it’s been. There are no windows in here and just one heavy, metal door without even one of those little, barred windows you always see in movies to give me a clue what time it is. Camila dropped me off days or hours or months ago, and I haven’t seen her since. I push myself up to sit, intending to do whatever kind of exercise I can in here to pass the time or keep in shape for whatever empty opportunity I get. So far, all opportunities have been met with beatings. Bruises collect on my body between bright incisions where the edge of a nightstick or gun caught me.My stomach twists. I lurch to my feet, stumble a few steps, and fall to my knees in front of the flat approximation of a toilet they allow me in here, the only furniture other than my cot. My breakfast—or
DanteI slam my fist down on the counter, making the cat statue with its paw in the air topple over. “That’s not fucking good enough.”Wing, the boss of the biggest triad in Chinatown, looks at me without a flicker of emotion in his eyes. “You storm into my shop. You set your goon outside to scare away reputable customers. And then you tell me I haven’t met your expectations?”I suck in a breath and grab for the fraying remains of my hold on my temper. A week and a half. She’s been gone for a week and a half, and I’m not any goddamn closer than I was the night she disappeared.If I didn’t know about the three armed bruisers behind the curtain in this stupid fucking tea shop Wing and I both know handles a paltry portion of their money laundering, I’d already have my gun out. As is, I glance at Tony through the plate-glass store windows and remind myself he can’t get in here fast enough.“Is there anything else?” I ask, not bothering to keep the strain of desperation out of my voice.“N
EleniAnother millimeter on that crack in the ceiling. Or maybe the same millimeter as last time. If the cot were a little higher, I could trace it with my fingers. Yagdash hasn’t been back in three meals, and I don’t know whether I dreamed his message anymore.“—the fuck do you mean, no?” a woman shrieks.I lever myself up on an elbow. I haven’t heard a woman’s voice since Camila last left.“I need more protection here!” The voice grows louder, as if approaching, and I realize it is Camila. “Are you fucking listening to me? At least half a dozen men.”Someone murmurs a response, but their voice is too low for me to hear. Their statement ends in a thud I can’t make sense of from inside my concrete cell.“Last night, those fucking redheaded gnats hit the White Winter. We lost people. And I put my ass on the line, promising the White Winter was fucking untouchable,” she yells. “That means they’re closing in.”“No,” the other voice rumbles. “It means your ass is on the line. He’s not goi