Page 61 of Wounded King

Mallard's number is saved under Cop Eight; no reason to put in names. The call will go straight to the burner phone he keeps with him.

"Marcello. There is no trace of her." Mallard greets. Getting straight to the heart of the matter.

For a cop, he has a pretty good head on his shoulders. He's also one of the rare men who hasn't been bribed to work for us. He's married to my cousin Lucy. He's got access to family money, doesn't need to work an actual job, but he likes what he does. Makes him think like he's doing something good, I suppose. Which makes him a nutjob in my book, but hey. Everybody's moral compass is wired differently. He keeps his eyes closed when it comes to our family shit and goes heavy on the competition. He also makes Lucy happy.

"What the fuck happened?"

"As far as we've put it together, Roberto was taken three days ago, and he was kept alive and tortured for at least two days. His body was dumped in front of my police station yesterday morning."

"Yesterday morning?" I explode. "Why am I just now hearing about this?"

"Because we had to run DNA, and that takes time. I expedited it, of course. Plus, we had no idea that Sophia was missing."

"You didn't know…" I break off, run my hand through my hair, while Luciano watches with the same disgust mirrored on his face that I feel. "It didn't occur to you to call her?"

"I wasn't about to call your sister until we were sure it was Roberto's body," Mallard protests, proving that deep down he's nothing but an idiotic cop like the others, no matter what I thought before.

Luciano moves his hand in akeep him talkingway. He's right. This is not the time to explode on Mallard, no matter how much I want to put a bullet through his useless brain.

"What happened next?" I press out in a clipped tone.

"We identified the body, and I attempted to call Sophia, so did Lucy, but she didn't answer. I was already on my way to her house, so…" he drifts off, gathers himself, and I realize this is personal for him too. I'm not a man who gives many breaks, but I might have to concede that Mallard isn't at his best right now either. But he'd better get his head into the game now; otherwise, I'll remove it. Nobody fucks with my family, and nobody fucksupwhile my family is in danger.

"So you went into the house and found that massacre site? Was that where Roberto was killed?"

"We haven't found any evidence of that yet. I'm expediting all DNA analysis, but we haven't found any blood belonging to him or Sophia yet. At least not as much as would indicate a crime." His words should give me some relief, but they don't. Roberto was in the hands of some psychopath for days, the same amount of time said psychopath has been holding my sister.

"What's that supposed to mean?" I demand.

"Marcello, there's no easy way for me to say this…"

"Just spit it the fuck out," I say, bracing myself.

"We found traces of her blood in the master bed and bathroom. Plenty of it, but not enough to indicate she was killed or tortured, at least not like the others. Most of the blood is older… some is weeks old, some months, and some years."

Someone, most likely Roberto, has been abusing my Sophia,my sister!For years! I clench my jaw, taking a deep breath, which does nothing to tame my anger. If that fucker Roberto wasn't already dead, I would cut him to pieces for daring to lay a hand on her.

"We also found some stuff… I'm keeping this quiet," Mallard says.

"Like what?" I put my free hand on my face and close my eyes.

"Whips, cuffs with her blood on them, dog collars… do you want me to continue?"

"I get the picture," I grind out. "Find her." The phone flies through the air, hitting the wall, where it breaks into a hundred little pieces. "That fucking bastard."

Luciano's phone rings. "Mallard," he says, holding it out to me.

I nod at him to put it on speaker. I don't trust myself with anything fragile in my hands right now.

"One more thing I think you should know," Mallard says. "Raffael DeSantis was at your hospital the same day Sophia came and visited you. I pulled CCR footage from the security cameras. It might be just a coincidence, but I don't like the way Raffael is staring at Sophia and Roberto in the footage. I'll send it to you."

Luciano and I exchange a surprised look. Raffael DeSantis is one of Stephano Conti's underbosses. "Why was he at the hospital?"

"He needed stitches on a cut on his arm," Mallard replies.

My eyes lock with Luciano, stunned. None of us would go to the hospital to have our arm stitched. That kind of shit is done by Doc Brown—ourfamily doctor,or we do it ourselves. "I want all the footage, from the moment Sophia, Roberto, and Raffael entered the fucking hospital."

"You got it," Mallard agrees.