Page 51

RIOT

The air was thick.

Late spring in Queens always hit like a wet towel to the face—sticky, slow, hard to breathe in. The humidity clung to my skin like a warning, heavy and sour like the city knew something ugly was about to happen.

I didn’t break a sweat.

Not when I stepped out the van.

Not when the crew fanned out behind me.

Not even when I tightened my grip on the Glock and pictured Boaz’s face under my boot.

My blood ran too hot for sweat. My body too used to war to flinch.

Allure’s silence still rang louder than the noise of the city.

Her walking away. Her pulling that gun. The look on her face when I told her what I’d done.

But this couldn’t end like it did with Malia.

I wouldn’t lose another woman to guilt and ghosts—not when I’d already carried too many bodies to the graveyard. I had to hold on to something that felt real. Something that wasn’t just blood and empire. Something that looked like future and legacy.

But I couldn’t have that until Boaz was dead.

I couldn’t let this shit slide.

Not this.

Not after everything.

My crew moved like shadows—silent, precise, no mistakes. Rollo led the charge through the side door. Creed posted up with Von to sweep the perimeter. Irina gave us the codes, the floor plan, the blind spots. It was almost too easy.

Which made me more tense.

Boaz had underestimated me. Again. That was his second fatal mistake.

The first was touching Allure.

I kicked the front door in with enough force to rattle the beams. Security was thin, mostly asleep. Soft niggas. The bulk of his crew cut out of the country after they were arrested, leaving them unprotected.

One tried to draw, but Rollo put a round through his forehead before the idiot could even shout.

I didn’t stop. I was already moving.

Avi came stumbling out of the back room in a tank top and Versace boxers, hair wild, pistol in his hand like he knew what he was doing with it.

“Riot?” he gasped, raising the barrel.

I didn’t flinch. Didn’t wait.

One shot.

Dead center in the chest. His body jerked like a puppet cut loose and dropped like trash against the wall. His gun clattered to the floor.

I stood over him for a second, breathing hard.

Avi.

The piece of shit who tried to rape Allure. Who locked girls in cages. Who walked through that house like a prince when he was just a coward with a bloodline.

I almost spit on him. But he wasn’t worth the saliva.

“Clear!” Creed called from the hallway.

I turned.

Boaz was waiting in the master suite.

It was cleaner than I expected—walls painted soft gray, high-end furniture, an oxygen machine humming quietly in the corner like a mechanical prayer.

He sat in a motorized wheelchair, tubes in his nose, skin pale and loose.

There were scars across his arms, and one side of his face drooped like a stroke had been there and gone.

He looked like death already. All I had to do was finish the paperwork.

“Well,” he wheezed, a dry chuckle bubbling up from somewhere between phlegm and madness. “Look who finally showed up.”

I stepped into the room slow, gun low but ready. My crew hung back in the doorway. This was personal.

“You betrayed me,” Boaz croaked, eyes sharp despite the decay. “Why did you snitch like a bitch. Your father would be disgusted.”

I raised a brow. “I shot my own father. Why the fuck would I snitch on you?”

He narrowed his eyes.

“I preferred the old-fashioned way,” I said coldly. “Like I’m doing now.”

“After everything I gave you…”

“You gave me money for a tiger.” I said. “You’re a disease. You’re a pervert. And your whole lineage is filled with perverts.”

He let out a laugh that turned into a wet cough. “So it was you.”

“What?”

“Raz. My son.”

I didn’t blink. “Yeah. I killed that sick fuck. It was easier than this and this has been a breeze.”

Boaz winced, but there was pride in his eyes too. “He was a monster. But he was mine.”

“And she was yours too, huh?” I took a step closer. “Allure. The Virgin. You kept her locked in that fucking compound like a rare bird. Watched her cook and clean and waste a decade of her life while your son tried to force himself on her.”

His jaw clenched. “Allure was special to me.”

“You don’t get to say her name.”

His fingers twitched reaching for a gun.

I noticed the glint of metal a second before he moved, hand jerking toward the underside of his chair.

I shot.

One bullet.

Straight through the back of his hand.

He screamed. The gun clattered to the floor.

He writhed in the chair, oxygen tube dangling, blood streaming down his wrist. “Fuck you!” he shouted, voice cracking. “You ruined everything!”

I walked forward, slow and steady. “And yet I feel just fine.”

He gasped, sucking through the mask. “You hit up my winery. That was low.”

His head jerked up, surprise slicing through the pain. “What?”

“You heard me. Was that your retaliation?” I growled. “You sent goons to my event. With press and buyers and senators walking around. Was that your play?”

He shook his head violently, coughing again. “That wasn’t me, you dumb fuck. You think I’d be that stupid with the feds crawling up my ass? I’m on oxygen and house arrest. I can’t afford a body count!”

I stared at him. Read him.

And I believed him.

For once, I believed the devil.

But that didn’t mean he got to walk.

“This bullet ain’t for the winery,” I said quietly, lifting the gun.

Boaz’s eyes widened. “Wait?—”

“This is for Allure.”

One clean shot to the forehead.

His body jerked, then slumped. Blood rolled slow down his temple.

The machine beeped once and then went still.

I stood there for a moment, staring at the body.

This was justice.

Not revenge.

He caged her. Hid her. Stole her life.

And now he was gone.

“Clear the place,” I barked to the crew behind me. “Let’s go.”

They moved fast. Silencers still up. Gloves on. No prints. No noise. We were out in six minutes.

By the time we hit the van again, I was the last to climb in.

I didn’t say a word on the ride back.

Because the mission was done.

But the war?

The war was still unraveling.

And I didn’t know if I’d ever find peace again. Not until she looked me in the eye… and said my name like it still meant something.