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“No.” My word’s razor-sharp. “And I’d appreciate it if we keep it between us. I want to do this my way, Luca. I need to ensure I’m going to be made when this is all over. And I need to be ready in case they change their minds.”
“You don’t trust them?”
“I don’t trust anyone.”
Bullshit…I trust Luca with my life.
But some things stay locked down—like how bad I want that seat at the table, how much I need our family name to meansomething again. Show that hunger in our world, and the sharks start circling. Next thing you know, you’re wearing concrete shoes at the bottom of the Hudson.“
“So what’s the play?” Luca asks, checking under the bed.
“Taking her to the Vegas house.” The thought of heading back to my territory puts steel in my spine. “Home turf advantage.”
“You think she’ll talk?”
“She fuckin’ better.”
“And if she doesn’t?”
“Then we do things the hard way.”
“What... kick the shit out of her like some douche bag? She’s a woman.”
“So?”
“So...” he presses, reaching under her pillows while Alessa breathes steadily, oblivious to our debate over her fate. “It’s below us to beat her to a pulp. We don’t do that shit.”
He’s right, and it makes my teeth grind. Dad was a cold-blooded bastard in business—broke more bones than I could count—but he’d put a bullet in any of us who raised a hand to a woman. ‘A Gianelli man knows the difference between a target and a lady,’ he’d say. The other families might not draw that line, but the Gianelli’s do. Some lines, once you draw ’em in blood, you can’tcross without becoming something else. Something I promised the old man I’d never become.
Women were to be respected, protected even. It’s a weakness in our profession, but one I’ve never been able to shake.
“There are other ways, Luca, I don’t like it, but we have to get creative with this one if it comes down to it.”
I reach under the pillows, fingers searching methodically. Then I feel it—cold metal, the weight instantly familiar in my palm. I pull out the silver pistol, its fleur-de-lis engraving catching the light.
Her mother’s gun. The one Alessa stole from me after that night together. My throat tightens as I run my thumb over the engraving, memories crashing through me—Isabella pressing it into my hands after I saved her, the weight of her approval heavier than the weapon itself.
Isabella saw something in me worth a damn when she handed me this gun. Only person who ever did. Then Alessa grabbed it like it was hers to take. Like my one fucking trophy meant nothing.
“Fucking finally,” Luca sighs.
I tuck the gun into my waistband, its weight against my spine like coming home to a place you’ve been exiled from.
“Let’s go.” Luca nods before gathering Alessa in his arms. I grab the manila envelope along with all her secrets and follow behind, my injured leg protesting with each step.
The scent of vanilla and coconut lingers in the air as we leave—her scent, now imprinted in my memory alongside the taste of her skin, the sound of her voice, and the sting of her bullet.
We leave blood and chaos in our wake, but I’m taking something far more dangerous with me to Vegas. The woman who’s already left her mark on me twice.
Isabella Russo’s daughter.
The key to my future.
This job should be simple—find Marco, earn my button, secure my family’s future. But nothing about Alessa Russo has ever been simple.
Part of me craves seeing those green eyes flash with defiance, hearing that sharp tongue challenge me. Another part wants to break her, to make her pay for the gun, for the bullet in my leg, for the way she’s haunted me for four years.
What the fuck would she think if she knew the truth? That I don’t just want a seat at the table—I want the whole damn thing. Isabella Russo saw it in me—the kind of hunger that carves kings out of killers.