Page 98 of Niccolo (Mafia Kings #7)

Sofia

I didn’t understand why, but I was more upset about Niccolo than I had been when I got banned from the International Chess Federation.

I should have been able to brush it off.

I should have been able to say, Just another arrogant asshole.

But I couldn’t.

Oh, he was an arrogant asshole, alright –

But on the flight back to Modena aboard the private jet, I wished over and over that I’d said something different on the balcony in Taormina.

Briefing Fausto afterwards didn’t make me feel any better.

I couldn’t exactly tell him that it had been an unmitigated disaster –

And I couldn’t tell him how crushed I felt that it was over.

So I had to spin it.

“You threw him out?!” Fausto said, stunned.

“It was a lover’s quarrel,” I replied. “And it went exactly as I planned it.”

“Oh, really,” Fausto asked sardonically.

“Yes. I told him he can’t have me. Now that’s all he’ll think about. It’s human nature. You tell someone they can’t have something, and they want it all the more.”

Little did Fausto know I was talking about how I felt at the moment.

“Niccolo will contact me again,” I said with a confidence I didn’t feel. “And when he does, I’ll have the upper hand.”

“I hope, for your sake, that you’re right,” he sneered.

Fausto wasn’t happy, but he seemed to buy my performance.

Niccolo would have been proud.

“What about the mole?” Fausto asked.

I grimaced. “Taormina was a ruse to flush him out. They knew.”

“Did he give you a name?”

“Lazaro.”

“Shit,” Fausto muttered under his breath… then shrugged. “Well, at least I don’t have to pay him now.”

I stared at him in horror.

A man died helping you –

And THAT’S what you say?!

You fucking piece of SHIT.

But unlike all the accusations I’d hurled at Niccolo…

I wasn’t about to say that to my boss.

I guess I could only be brave in certain situations…

When it wasn’t dangerous.

And that filled me with shame.

“Was there anything else?” Fausto asked.

The moment had come to ask the thing I dreaded.

I hesitated… then said, “Niccolo said something else.”

“What?”

“Did you really kill the bankers who embezzled the brothers’ funds?” I asked.

I tried to keep my voice neutral, but I felt sick inside.

Fausto made a face like he couldn’t believe how na?ve I was. “What did you think I was going to do?”

“I thought you bribed them.”

“You can’t bribe people to do what they did,” he said contemptuously. “Not unless the amount is large enough that they can walk away and start another life.”

“So you threatened to kill them, then killed them anyway?!” I said, unable to keep the outrage from my voice.

“Well… I didn’t threaten them,” Fausto said with a smug smile.

Jesus.

He’d threatened their families.

That was the only thing that made sense. The only reason why they would knowingly embezzle money from a mafia family.

The bankers knew they were going to die anyway…

But they did it to save their wives.

Their husbands.

Their children.

I felt like I was going to vomit.

When Fausto saw my reaction, he sneered, “You need to toughen up.”

“They were civilians,” I snarled, repeating the term Niccolo had used.

“Which means nothing, other than they’re easier to threaten. Besides, I only did to them what my nephews would have done eventually. I just did it sooner, that’s all.”

“Your nephews would have killed them?” I asked in surprise.

“Of course.”

That didn’t make any sense.

Niccolo had been using the bankers as a moral cudgel against me – there was no way that he or his brothers would have murdered them. Not unless –

And then I understood Fausto’s logic.

Just like him, it was completely self-serving and corrupt.

“The brothers would have killed the bankers for stealing from them,” I said, “but you killed them because they stole for you, and you just wanted to tie up the loose ends. NOT the same thing.”

“When did you start advocating on behalf of our enemies?” Fausto sneered.

“When you started killing innocent people and not telling me about it,” I snapped.

He glared at me. “Maybe your little dalliance with Niccolo has been a bad idea.”

“No more killing civilians,” I seethed, “or I walk.”

“You wouldn’t dare,” he snarled – then smiled nastily. “You wouldn’t get the rest of your money.”

“Yeah, like withholding money is the only thing you’d do to me,” I said sarcastically.

“Look… let’s not go down that road,” Fausto said –

Even though he was the one who’d implied violence.

That is, before he undercut it with his comment about me not getting my money.

“No more killing civilians,” I insisted.

“Why are you reacting like this? Why no compunctions about killing my nephews, but suddenly you’re in an uproar about some anonymous bankers you’ve never met?”

“Are you really so fucking far gone that I have to answer that question?”

Fausto smiled darkly. “Because my nephews are mafia… and the bankers weren’t.”

“Bingo.”

He settled back in his chair and looked at me with disdain. “You’re not the woman I hoped you were.”

“Thank God for that,” I snarled. “From this point onward, no more killing civilians.”

He sighed contemptuously. “Fine.”

I would have asked him to swear on it, but considering he’d had his own brother murdered – and swore to Mezzasalma, then broke his own oath – I didn’t see the point.

My only option was to finish the job and get away from him as fast as I could.

Niccolo would keep his promise, a voice said in the back of my mind…

And I felt miserable about Taormina all over again.