“If you’re scared—”
“I am scared,” she said, anger flashing into her voice. “I’m petrified. And you’re still dragging me around like… like I’m some prop. Some fucking prop to prove that you’re a man and you’re not scared.”
I narrowed my eyes. “It’s not like that.”
“Isn’t it? You just want me to get used to your world. But living like I’m about to die all the time isn’t my kind of life, okay?”
I stared, surprised, and took a step back. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“You know what I’m talking about.” Her fingers pressed against the door’s frame, her knuckles turning white. “You shouldn’t have brought me out with you this morning. You shouldn’t have… oh, shit.” She blinked away some angry tears, wiping them off her face with a hard gesture.
“I wasn’t trying to upset you,” I said.
“And you still did it anyway. I’m not a prop, Dante. And if I don’t want to get used to all this killing.”
I stared into her eyes for a long moment and my face hardened. I wanted to argue, wanted to explain. I was doing this for her as much as for me. I needed Vlas to know that she wasn’t a weakness, and that way she wouldn’t be in as much danger. She wouldn’t be a direct target. I needed her to know that she was my top priority, she was the thing I was fighting for.
Even if she wasn’t in my life, Vlas would come for her. That was her father’s doing, not mine. I was only trying to keep her alive.
But the words died on my lips. I couldn’t manage to find them.
My phone began to ring, a shrill scream from my pocket. She shook her head, tears falling again. “You should get that.”
“Aida—”
She shut the door in my face. I stood there, seething with anger, then tore my phone from my pocket. “What the fuck do you want?” I growled.
“It’s me,” Steven said.
“And what the fuck do you want?”
“We know where Vlas is.”
I turned away from the door, frowning down at the steps. I was so angry with myself, but Steven’s words cut through the rage. “Where?”
“He has a meeting with the Jalisco cartel. One of our informants in their ranks sent me a text. They’re meeting about a shipment this afternoon.”
“Fuck,” I said. “Where?”
“Deep south, down by the docks, this empty parking lot at the edge of the city. Quiet spot, not a lot around.” He hesitated for a second. “But it’s near the park.”
I took a deep breath to calm myself. I closed my eyes and forced myself to focus on this moment, on this decision. “Gather everyone,” I said. “I want four cars, packed with guns. We’re hitting them hard.”
“If we kill any Jalisco in the crossfire—” he started.
But I interrupted him. “Fuck the Jalisco. Tell our informant our plans, tell them to drop as soon as they see us coming.”
“They won’t like it, Dante. They want this deal.”
“Tell them I’ll pay fifty percent more than Vlas for whatever the fuck they have.”
He let out a breath. “Understood. Should we run this past Don Leone?”
“No,” I said. “Not enough time. Get it set up.”
“I will.” He hung up and I lingered on the porch.
I could go inside. I could go in and talk to Aida, explain to her what I’m doing, why I’m doing it. Maybe she’d understand, maybe she’d even forgive me.
But I can’t let this opportunity pass.
Vlas didn’t know we had a man in the Jalisco cartel. Nobody did, I met him through a personal friend, and was paying him from my own personal pocket. Not even Don Leone knew about him.
This was my shot. This was my opportunity to hit Vlas back hard for the shit he tried on me.
I walked down the steps, toward my car, and refused to look back at the house.
* * *
The sunshine slanted at sharp angles through the trees and cast light and shadow across the dash of my car. I stared straight ahead at the rundown gravel road, tire tracks bitten deep into the earth, and took deep, calming breaths.
Steven sat in the passenger side, a submachine gun in his lap. He checked the magazine and pulled back the slide before letting out a deep breath.
“Good afternoon for it,” he said.
I snorted. “Perfect day for killing.”
Steven gave me one of his rare smiles. In the back, Biagio and Gino laughed, both of them nervously holding their weapons.
The other car was parked just behind ours, engine rumbling. I checked the rearview and saw Cosimo and Ryan sitting up front. I knew Chad and John were in the back, and all four of them were armed to the fucking teeth. Half my best muscle was there and ready to get revenge for all the shit Vlas had put us through these last couple of weeks.
Ahead, the road turned around a bend and disappeared beyond the forest. I knew it headed up a short hill and ended at the parking lot where Vlas and the Jalisco were having their meeting. I checked my watch and gripped the steering wheel, my stomach doing flips. Just another minute, and it was time. We’d been staked out for a couple of painful hours, in position before the Russians arrived to avoid getting caught, and now it was finally almost time.
“This could be a trap.” Steven said it so calmly that I thought he wasn’t even talking to me.
I grunted in return. “Could be.”
“Might be a bad idea to go through with this.”
“Might be. But we are.”
He nodded. “I know. We have to. Chance to hit Vlas like this doesn’t come around twice.”
“The motherfucker. What I don’t get is why he’d start some new deal with the Jalisco cartel when he’s in the middle of a war with me. Like this wouldn’t split his attention? Those cartel guys are no joke.”
“I know,” Steven said. “I don’t know what he’s planning, but it’s something big.
