Page 12 of Caught in the Crossfire

He glanced at the watch on his wrist. His father’s watch, the one with the silver band and deep blue face. Max and his motherhad given it to his father on his last birthday before his mother died. “I’d say about twelve hours.”

My eyes snapped open. “That’s how long I was out?”

He nodded. “You’ve been asleep since they brought us back to the cell.”

My chest tightened. Where were my guys? Were they coming for me? I glanced at the door, hoping they’d burst through it any moment.

The Camorra. The Albanians. War. My father. Other product on the ship. My brain felt like it was skipping from puzzle piece to puzzle piece, trying to link them all together in a way that made sense. They wanted to sell me, but they wanted to use Max against the Camorra.

“So this is your fault,” I accused. “They’re after you because you are buddies with the Camorra. What the hell?”

Max scoffed, derisive and cold. The concerned look dropped from his face. “You’re the one who took out our best defense against the Albanians. If you want to blame anyone, blame yourself.”

I tried to sit straighter to retort, and pain shot down my spine. I settled for a seething stare. “You started this?—”

“No, your father started this,” he interrupted. “Blame him if you’d like.”

I opened my mouth and closed it. My father had been working with the Albanians. He was the one who let them into the city. I knew that, andwewere trying to fix it. It would have been easy to blame Max for killing him and causing their attention to turn to me, but that just led right back to Luciano Vero and his mile-long list of fuckups.

Still, it felt like there was some piece I couldn’t see. Something Max knew that I didn’t. The clue was in the twitch of his jaw and his avoidant posture.

“What are you hiding from me? What was Lucia doing for you?” I asked. He’d told me at Trattoria Luminosa during the VCIboard meeting that Lucia, his hacker, was their best defense against the Albanians. He’d told me I’d had no clue what was going on, and I had thought it was all a ruse. Was I wrong? “Tell me the truth.”

He looked to the side but said nothing.

“Seriously?” My voice broke on the question. “You still won’t tell me?”

The Max of our childhood used to tell me everything. It wasn’t until we were teenagers that he stopped talking to me.

His hand clenched into a fist. His right arm still hung limp, but he rested the other against his knee. “You know what happened. Your father let the Albanians into the city, and I’ve been trying to fix it ever since.”

“Oh, what a hero,” I said sarcastically.

His head snapped in my direction. “I never asked to pick up the pieces of Luciano’s failures. All I wanted was to keep you and Cas out of them. But you justhadto be typical, stubborn Leona and stick your nose where it didn’t belong.”

“You murdered my father at my birthday party!” I practically shouted. My lungs burned, and I pressed my palm to my ribs as I winced.

“And I let yougo, Leona!” he shouted right back, leaning slightly off the wall.

My mouth clamped shut. Hedidn’tlet us go. He tried to kill us that night. Didn’t he? I tried to remember what happened when Cas grabbed my arm and ran through the backyard. All I could remember was the image of Max staring, that dead look dulling his eyes.

“You ordered a hit on us.”

He rolled his eyes. “Cas was more than capable of handling a few amateurs.”

“So then what the fuck were you doing?” Why would he order a hit if he knew Cas could easily kill the people coming after us?

“Trying to run you out of the city!” He raised his good arm exasperatedly and then let it fall in his lap.

“Bullshit,” I snapped. “You knew my life challenged your rule over the Family, and you wanted me dead. I saw too much that night.”

“I thought Cas would be smart enough to take you far away from New York. But he let you do whatever the fuck you wanted—like usual. I should have known better. So then I had to go after you so you didn’t make everything ten fucking times worse. If you had justlistenedto me, everything would have gone according to plan, and neither of us would be on this ship.”

A chill ran through my body. I wished I still had Ryuji’s knife so I could plunge it into his chest. “How dare you talk about Cas?”

His mouth thinned, and he schooled his emotions back to passivity.

“You tortured him. You almostkilledhim.” I couldn’t stop a tear from spilling down my cheek, but whether it was the physical pain searing through my every limb or the cavern yawning inside my chest, I wasn’t sure. “Your best friend.”