Page 99 of City Of Thieves

“Renzo, I can’t,” she says quietly.

“You can do this,dolcezza,” I urge through gritted teeth as she reaches for the phone in the middle of the table. “And we’re right here dancing in the rain with you.”

We.

Three.

She flicks me another look as her hand closes around the phone, and I see a woman finally free of her chains. A woman with the power to change it all.

“What is your final choice,kiska?” Konstantin’s mocking voice rings out across the silent gallery.

“Me,” she says, her eyes never leaving my face. “I choose me. I choose a life worth living.” Switching her hand from the phone to my gun lying next to it, she picks up my Glock 17. and shoots Konstantin four times in the chest.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Tatiana

The momentI made the decision to pick up the gun was the moment I set my past free.

I wasn’t going to let him hurt me anymore.

I wasn’t going to let him hurt us.

I read between the lines of Renzo’s words, but in the end, it came down to trust again—that fragile vernacular that started in a hotel room in London, then strengthened on a balcony in New York.

He believed he knew where my daughter was, so I did too.

All day, I’d felt a pressure building up inside me with no outlet—a toxic mix of desperation and anger. When I was lured here on false pretenses by my double-crossing assistant, and then when I saw Renzo surrounded by guns, standing opposite the man who’d ruined my life, I felt my lungs being squeezed until I couldn’t breathe.

But now it’stime to let the pressure go.

Four bullets for the four years he made my daughter suffer.

The first one causes Renzo to erupt from his chair and drive his fist into the throat of the nearestpatsan. After that, it’s a blur of shouting and movement as I keep my eyes fixed on Konstantin, watching the surprise on his face turn to rage with each subsequent bullet, until the clip is empty, and there’s nothing left to fire at his dead body on the floor.

“It’s done,dolcezza.” Renzo lowers my gun for me and wraps his hand around my wrist. “Time to go.”

Despite my shock, Konstantin’s gray monstrosity of a painting is still bearing down on me.

“Wait…”

“There’s no time.”

“Please, Renzo, give me your knife.”

After a beat, he does as I ask, and I sink the blade deep into the canvas slashing a huge “X” through it.

“Gray for chains,” I whisper. “But I’m free now.”

“We’ll be fucking dead now if you don’t shift it.”

As we spill out onto the sidewalk, he’s reeling off instructions into his phone. I’m catching pieces, but I’m not really listening. My head is numb, but every breath I take feels like I’m sucking in air for the first time.

“Fucking ambushed… All dead… Needs a clean-up crew, but the place is wired to blow…”

He stops by a black SUV and smashes the butt of his gun against the window. “Get in,” he orders, above the clanging of the car alarm.

A minute later, we’re weaving in and out of congested New York City traffic, Renzo cursing the cacophony of angry horns and hand gestures as his eyes flick constantly between me and the road.