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“What?” The cop blinked in confusion.

“That’s a problematic stereotype,” I shook my head, trying very hard to seem serious.

“Would they maybe be seen driving a go-kart into a castle to save a princess from an evil turtle?”

“Bowser’s not a turtle,” I frowned, slapping Prince on the arm.

He turned to me with a scowl. “Of course he is.”

“I don’t think so, man,” I shook my head.

“Are you fucking stu?—”

“Enough!” The cop slammed his hand on the front desk again.

“Antoni doesn’t even have a moustache,” I said under my breath, still shaking my head.

What an insult to the Mario Brothers.

I pulled out my phone as Prince turned his head to look at the cop, arching a single brow. “So, was it the fucking Santinos or not?”

The men looked at eachother, unreadable expressions on their faces.

“Just stay in your lane, fuckers,” the taller one said quietly after a while. “Or we’ll be back with a warrant and a team to rip this place to fucking bits.”

“See, look,” I put my phone up to Prince’s face, ignoring the cop’s empty threat. “Bowser is atortoise.”

“Yeah, a turtle.”

“They’re different!”

They left after that.

If they had tails, they’d be between their legs.

“I told you to stay away,” Prince said softly once they were gone. Any friendly fucking around fell away once we were alone again. “You said she had nothing to do with her family. You promised me she wasn’t involved.”

“She’s not,” I frowned.

“How do you know that?” he sighed, rubbing his forehead. “She’s still a Santino, Henny. For all we know, this innocent heiress bit is all an act. She could be running this whole fucking operation and using you to do it.”

“Zarina doesn’t?—”

Prince put a hand up to silence me.

“She is the enemy.”

I ducked my head, gritting my teeth to fight the urge to argue.

We knew the cops were in Santino’s pockets, but we didn’t know it ran this deep. After all this time spent at war against them, they had never once got the cops involved before.

So far, we had handled it like men, like true outlaws—none of this bullshit.

Really, it was the only reason we could still somewhat respect them as a group. Even with all this money and power at their disposal, they had handled everything themselves.

Even Toni, as much as I hated to give the guy any praise, was at every single one of our meetings and altercations. He never just sent his low-ranking guys to take bullets while he hid away.

He must’ve been a whole new level of pissed if he had gone down this route for the first time.