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We were in the basement of a Harlem house.

No one else was with us.

Miller’s last breath belonged to me.

“You robbed me of my relationship with my father,” he started to speak. I’d been leaning against the wall watching him. I didn’t need any information from him except his reason for wanting to take revenge. The bastard had asked me to shoot him in the head when he saw me lay a gun on the desk beside him. I told him I would if he told me his reason for going after me, going after Bianca.

“He ignored me for almost nineteen years, but he was finally ready to bring me into his organization. He said he had enemies, including his own sons, and he was keeping me safe.”

He gave a scornful laugh. “But you had to kill him. Drown him in his own fucking car with his hands tied against the steering wheel. I saw you that night. Not clearly. But you emerged from the woods.” He continued to ramble. “It was the night I was meeting my father. You robbed me of my right to be in my father’s organization.”

“If you saw me emerge, you might have saved him,” I said.

“I tried. I went into the water, but I saw…” He broke off. “I saw how you tied him to the steering wheel.”

Layers of wire wound tightly around his wrists.

“He was bleeding with the effort to break free.” Anger manifested briefly in his deadened eyes.

“You watched him…” And that was why he made me watch Bianca die.

“So you see, it’s justified retribution.”

I laughed scornfully. “Are you trying to make me feel guilty about shooting you right now?”

“End me, Rossi. Finish this madness now.”

“Your father was a butcher.”

“And you’re not?”

“I am,” I said. “But I’m not the one in that chair, am I? Your father deserved that kind of death. Bianca? You don’t even deserve to speak her name. Your father had done nothing but deny you your existence until he needed you…until his sons turned on him. Bianca…” I caught myself.

“She was everything to you.” A malicious grin formed on his deformed face. “When I looked at her with lovesick eyes…I was just testing you. I prefer women like Griselda. That bitch thought she was in control, though, but I was manipulating her. The money had gone to her head. She said she was wasting her time in the family when they never gave a damn about what she wanted. She said you’re overprotective of Bianca only as a sister. But I know jealousy when I see it. And I proved how you were obsessed with her after you killed Raffa’s men and the aftermath.”

“You were the leak, weren’t you? You were the one who planted the jammer, so I couldn’t call Sticks to warn him of Raffa.”

His grin widened if possible, confirming he was the mastermind behind it all.

He continued his confession. Burning the club pissed off Griselda, but the accountant was getting leery of helping them embezzle money because Gian started asking questions. He filled in the gaps of what happened in Raffa’s house. Gian thought Griselda’s accomplice was Sticks. He was going to blackmail Raffa in his office to reinstate him as boss before he revealed what he knew. But Miller had corrupted one of Gian’s soldiers who shot Gian first. When Griselda started screaming,and since Miller was her bodyguard, he broke her jaw and continued to beat her. Al came running down the steps and it was Miller who shot him. He had already let the Albanians in and a shootout ensued. He kept Griselda alive in case he could use her as bait, knowing she couldn’t speak because he’d broken her jaw.

It was Miller’s cohorts in the Albanian mob who shot up Jabbin’ Java. They wanted the Rossis and De Luccis to be on a collision course.

Miller slowly lost coherence. The gut shot was poisoning him.

But I wanted him writhing in pain before I sent him to hell.

I straightened from the wall, walked to the opposite corner, and dragged a trolley to his side.

Miller looked at me in confusion. “What?”

I smelled his fear. He didn’t fear dying; he feared pain. His screams were going to be the soundtrack in this basement.

“You really think I’m going to make it easy for you?” I removed the canvas covering my instruments of torture. “We’re going to have hours of fun, fucker.”

Chapter

Forty