by Lovell, LP
“Yeah.”
“Nero, I have some information that might interest you.” Rafael. His accent is slight but it makes every word he says sound articulate.
“And what is this information going to cost me?”
He laughs. “Consider it a favour to a friend.” We’re definitely not friends. “I hear that you are acquainted with the mad Russians favourite pet.”
I grit my teeth. “What about her?”
He pauses and draws a long breath. “I have heard she’s very pretty, much like her sister. It would be a shame for her to meet her end.” How the fuck does he know that Anna is Una’s sister? No one knows that she even has a sister apart from me, her and Anna, but of course he has Anna. There’s no telling what information the bastard would try and pry from her. I say nothing because in this situation words are dangerous. He huffs another laugh. “Five million dollars is a lot of money.”
“Five million dollars for what?” I snap.
“The price on her pretty little head of course. I hear the Los Zetas sent their best sicario for her. He’s in Miami now. I wonder if the angel of death is as good as they say.”
“This favour of yours, is there a price tag on it?” I ask.
“Just remember it,” he tsks. In other words, he’ll call it in at some point. “Tick tock, Nero. Run capo, run capo, run, run, run.” He sings before laughing and hanging up.
28
Una
I normally love Miami, but I think I’m coming down with something and the heat and humidity aren’t helping the nausea that’s settled into the pit of my stomach since I left Nero yesterday. I pull up on a quiet looking street beneath the shade of a palm tree and get out of the hire car.
Elaina Matthews’ apartment is in a small building near South beach. It’s non-descript, with a set of iron stairs and a walkway that runs along the first floor. Knocking on her door, I wait, hearing the shuffle of footsteps on the other side.
She opens the door in a tracksuit, a pile of blonde hair scooped up on top of her head.
“Yeah?” Her eyebrows pinch together in a frown.
I could probably think of a hundred reasons to have her invite me in but my head is pounding and I can’t be bothered with the niceties. Instead I ram my shoulder into her, pushing her back into the apartment.
“Hey!” Slamming the door behind me, I thrust the needle of the small syringe into her neck, depressing the plunger. She reaches for her neck before her eyelids start to droop. The mixture of Ketamine and Rohypnol works quickly and will knock her out for at least eight hours. When she wakes up she won’t remember a thing.
That takes her out of the equation.
* * *
Tugging at the hem of my tiny dress, I take the short walk down Ocean Drive from my car to the Beacon Hotel. The street is packed and it feels like a carnival. There are people everywhere, street performers, girls in bikinis walking up and down holding up signs for various bars. The sidewalk is littered with tables and chairs as the bars sprawl out into the street. People sit drinking cocktails from glasses the size of my head, the liquid smoking and bubbling like a witch’s cauldron. Cars crawl along Ocean Drive, chromed out Cadillacs and souped-up sports cars revving their engines and blasting hip-hop music. It’s like a street party, and actually, I don’t look even slightly out of place in my slutty dress. The sheer volume of people, coupled with all the music blasting out of each bar has my senses in overload. I can’t help but want to listen and probe the area around me for possible threats. I swear I can feel eyes on me, but I can’t…I can’t sense anything past all this noise. Glancing over my shoulder, I attempt to check for followers. The crowd is so dense, I couldn’t tell you even if an attacker were right behind me.
I quicken my pace until I reach the hotel. It’s an art deco building, slap bang in the middle of the bars and clubs, and honestly, if I were a wanted weapons dealer, it’s a location I would pick. If he needs to escape quickly, he could disappear into the swelling crowd in seconds, slip into any one of ten bars that I can see from here. It’s a smart move, but I’m not the FBI, I’m not here to cuff him. He won’t be running from me.
Stepping inside, I inhale a breath of the cool, conditioned air. The music from the street can still be heard but it’s muted to a low hum. Tiled flooring clicks beneath my heels and I glance up to the curved viewing gallery above. A bar opens up to my right, and I instantly spot Diego. The picture Sasha sent me was a blurred surveillance image, but it’s enough. Approaching him, I hop up on the stool beside him and order a vodka without sparing him a glance. The barman moves away to make my drink and I twist my face towards him.
He has that typical Miami look with the linen pants and a white shirt, top three buttons undone. Black chest hair peeks through the gap in his shirt and a heavy gold chain hangs around his neck. His hair is shaved almost to his head. He’s just an average-looking guy, I suppose.
“Julian?”
He glances in my direction, holding his glass in one hand and a cigarette in the other. As soon as I inhale the smell, it reminds me of Nero, the scent of smoke and expensive cologne. Diego brings the cigarette to his lips, smiling around the filter tip and making it seem like the dirty habit it really is. Whereas Nero can make the simple act of smoking a cigarette look like a work of art.
“Who are you?” he asks and his accent is a strange mix of American, Cuban and Spanish.
“My name is Isabelle. The agency sent me.” I hold my hand out to him and flash him a blinding smile.
“Where is Elena?” he asks, suspicion lacing his voice. Shit.
“She couldn’t make it. The agency thought you might like me instead.” I push as much seduction into my voice as possible and his expression softens.
Again his eyes skate over my body, locking onto the point where the miniscule dress clings to my upper thighs. Lifting his drink towards his lips, he nods once before taking a sip. Jesus, how to make a girl feel good about herself. The barman places my drink on the bar and I pick up the glass, taking a large gulp of the shit vodka.
“Are you from Miami?” I ask.
He downs his drink and slams the glass on the bar a little too hard. “I didn’t come here to talk to you.”
I smirk because I’m going to enjoy killing this one. “Of course.” I neck the remainder of the vodka. “Shall we?”
Stepping off the bar stool, he surprises me by holding his hand out to me. I take it and as my fingers brush over his palm feeling thick callouses, which is good, because then he won’t notice how equally calloused my hands are. I can pull on a mask and become anyone I need to be, but once a fighter always a fighter and the evidence simply can’t be hidden. My knuckles are thick with scar tissue, the silvery white skin marked from splitting open and healing time and time again. It’s given me away once or twice.
I allow him to glide his hand around my waist, fighting my less civilised instincts as he leads me out of the bar. Soon, we can kill him; soon, I tell the angry little demon inside my head. The second he gets me in the elevator, I’m pressed against the mirrored wall with his lips on my neck and his hands on my exposed thighs. I barely even hear the doors open but he drags me out and I play along, allowing him to force me backwards along the corridor. Jeez, when was the last time the guy got laid? My back hits a door and his hand is practically in my underwear as he fumbles with the key card. I grit my teeth and bite back the bile that’s rising in my throat. Just a few more seconds. His lips slam over mine and I try to shove him away from me when finally, the door clicks open. His arm wraps around my waist, saving me from falling backwards. Fighting his attempt to force his tongue past my lips, I clamp my mouth shut. Laughing, he shoves me hard enough to send me staggering back into the room.
The door clicks shut, throwing us into darkness and the second it does, a fissure of unease crawls through my stomach. Something’s wrong. “You make a shit whore.” He purrs. No sooner have the words sunk in than his hand slams around my throat, almost taking me off my fe
et as he throws me into a bedside table. I groan, blinking my eyes open as they adjust to the faint light drifting through the window. A lamp has fallen to the floor beside me and I reach for it, unclicking the light bulb as he closes in on me again. I get to my feet just in time to ram the bulb into his face. It smashes, embedding jagged shards into his skin. He shouts out something in Spanish as the blood pours down his cheek. I nail him in the kidney and he hits me in the face so hard, I almost go down again. Jesus, who is this guy?
I spit out a mouthful of blood and crack my neck to the side before I go for him again. For every blow I dish out, he gives me one twice as hard. I haven’t fought like this since I was training, because this is a fight to the death and we both know it. Launching me onto the bed, he lands on top of me, his hands clamping around my throat. He doesn’t bother with a gentle easing in. No, he grips hard enough to break my neck, never mind choke me. I crack him in the side of the temple, but it does nothing. Pulling my mind together, I force myself to think and not panic. Embrace death. My right hand is pressed between our bodies, if I can just…I manage to move my wrist enough to drop the silver blade from my cuff, and then I jab him in the crotch with it twice. He roars and leaps back off me. I drag precious air into my lungs, coughing as I roll over onto my front. He grabs me by the back of my neck and tosses me across the room before dragging me to my feet and pinning me against the wall with his forearm across my throat which is already bruised.
“Va a ser un buen premio, ángel de la muerte,” he hisses in my face. You will make a fine prize, angel of death. Only the Mexicans call me that. What the hell did I do to piss them off? He pushes his whole weight against my throat and my nails rake over his face. I press my thumbs into his eyes and he snarls…BANG! Pain slices across my forearm and then he drops to the floor, dead. I whirl around to face the shadowy figure who is getting up from the chair in the corner of the room.
“You’re losing your touch, morte,” he says quietly.
Nero. What the hell? I hold up my finger and bend over, bracing my hands on my knees as I try and breathe through my battered larynx. Glancing at my forearm I see a bright red line, a bullet burn. Motherfucker. “I had that. And what the hell are you doing here?”
I stand upright as he approaches me, dragging his eyes slowly over my exposed body with a cocked brow. “Working are we?” Glaring at him, I tug at the hem of my dress which has ridden up, exposing my underwear.
“Why. Are. You. Here?” I grate.
His arm strikes out, his fingers wrapping around my jaw and squeezing to the point of pain. The anger swirls in his irises like an impending storm and the muscles in his jaw contract irritably.
“Were you going to fuck him?” His voice is a low growl.
I snap my gaze to him, frowning. “What?!”
“Were you going to fuck the sicario?” he repeats, his tone calm and quiet, which is always worrying. The tension rolling off him is thick and turbulent, a pre-cursor to something much more violent.
“I was going to kill him. Or did that little show down look romantic to you?” Surely, that’s obvious. “In fact, don’t answer that.” That’s Nero’s idea of perfect foreplay.
“If he hadn’t tried to kill you?” He cocks a brow.
“I really think you’re missing the important point, which is that he tried to fucking kill me!”
He tilts my head back with a violent shove, bringing his lips close to my ear. “Listen very carefully, Morte. You can run, you can put half the world between us if you like, I don’t fucking care. But you are mine. That pussy is mine. These lips are fucking mine,” he says pulling back and swiping his thumb roughly over my bottom lip. “Kiss another man again, and you won’t like what happens next.” My stomach tightens along with his grip; until his fingers are digging into my cheeks so hard it hurts. So that’s why he let me take a beating, because he’s butt hurt that the Mexican kissed me. It’s a job! I’ll never understand jealousy.
“Were you following me?!” He doesn’t answer and I shake my head. “You’re fucking crazy.” A wicked smirk touches his lips and I wrap my fingers around his wrist, digging my nails into his skin. He touches his forehead to mine and takes a deep breath.
“This was a set-up. Someone wants you dead. This guy…” He nods towards our dead friend. “He’s one of the best sicarios the Los Zetas has to offer.” His tone is serious and I can hear the strain in his voice.
“Someone always wants me dead, Nero.” Although I’ve never had any run-ins with the Los Zetas. At least I can feel better about nearly having my ass handed to me though.
His hand slips from my face and his expression becomes serious. “Enough to pay five million for the hit?”
My eyes go wide, and I glance at the body. “How did you know?”
“I have contacts.” Every time I think I know the extent of Nero’s power, he surprises me. “Nicholai put you on this job?”
I bring my eyes to his and his brows pull together in a deep frown. “Nicholai would never betray me,” I say, shaking my head.
He takes a deep breath and drags both hands through his hair. “You’re an asset to him. And an asset that is now compromised. If he doesn’t want you dead then someone else does, and he’s fucking selling you upriver.”
“No.” I shake my head, scraping my teeth over my bleeding bottom lip. He wouldn’t, I know he wouldn’t. “He cares about me. He treats me like a daughter.”
He laughs. “Because it suits him. Do not be naïve. You can’t trust him.”
No, Nicholai is the only one who has ever cared about me besides Alex. Alex…the boy I shot, the boy he made me shoot. I press my balled-up fist to my forehead and squeeze my eyes shut. If I doubt Nicholai then I doubt everything, every single moment that has led me to this exact point in my life.
“He’s using you.”
I drag my gaze to his. “Like you did, you mean? And why should I trust you?” My world is crumbling around me. What if it’s all just a farce, even Nero?
He tilts his head to the side, narrowing his eyes at me. “Because you’re mine.”
That’s it, three words that mean nothing and everything.
“You used me, Nero.”
He smiles. “Yes, and you would do exactly the same, Morte.” He’s right, I remember thinking the exact same thing that first night when he mentioned Anna’s name. The first rule of negotiation, find something your opponent wants and use it. We’re both without morals, both equally as depraved as the other. We’re both born of bloodshed and battle and the reality is, we long for it. His thumb strokes over my jaw and my pulse picks up. “You and I are the same, and we would both use everything at our disposal to win. So let them come. We’ll destroy them all.” A twisted smile pulls at his lips, and I grab a handful of his thick hair, pulling his face to mine. I kiss him and he kisses me back, because I’m his queen and he’s my bloodied king.
29
Una
We buy a car with cash and hit the road, heading back to New York. Nero’s theory is that I’ll be safe within his ranks until I can work out who wants me dead, and then…we kill them. That’s all we have to go on for now.
Pulling my knees to my chest, I rest my forehead on them. The confines of the car are making me nauseous again. Great. We’ve only been on the road for two hours.
“You know, you should stay out of this,” I say, twisting my face to look at him. The pale blue glow of the dashboard casts his face in an eerie light.
His lip curls up slightly. “Morte, from the moment I propositioned you, we were tied. If someone is coming after you, it’s because of me.”
“Which means they’ll be coming for you.” I finish. He nods. I study his profile and narrow my eyes. “You know who it is.”
“I have an idea.” He glances at me briefly before turning back to the road. “The hit came the day after the shooting. Only an Italian would be annoyed at the death of three Italians. Arnaldo knows I was shot, but fuck, I’d be suspicious that only Gio and
I managed to escape a massacre.”
“He knows you’re dangerous. He wouldn’t have pulled you into Lorenzo’s assassination otherwise.”
“Yes, but he thought I could be controlled,” he says.
“And now you’re off book and he’s suddenly realised that you can’t be leashed.”
He nods. “You left the calling card. I walked away with a mild injury. He knows we’re working together. As far as he’s concerned, I just bit the hand that feeds me, and so did you.”
“It doesn’t explain why Nicholai called it in though.”
He straightens his arms, pressing his back into the seat. “I don’t know, but we trust no one until we have more to go on.”
“You could still go back. I can run, and he’ll have to come after me. He supported you for capo, so to admit that you went against him would make him look weak. He then goes after the kiss of death, and it looks like he’s seeking retribution. No one would ever know you were involved.”
He throws his head back and laughs. “Noble, Morte, but haven’t you worked it out yet?” He glances at me and cocks a brow. “I live for fucking war.”
“What about Anna?” Nero and I may be willing to fight, but I didn’t go through all this to save her, just to drag her into a warzone.
“She’ll be safe.” He says dismissively and it instantly makes me suspicious. There’s not a lot I can do about it right now though. If I don’t save myself, there will be no one to save her.
* * *
I grip the edge of the toilet and throw up into it. This has to be a new low in my life, facing the disgusting toilet bowl of a rest stop bathroom.
“Una!” Nero bangs on the door, rattling the metal lock.
“Give me a second,” I say. This is the second day of this, and I feel like death. I don’t get ill, but I’ve been feeling rough since Miami. We’re just outside Washington though, so we should be in New York at some point tonight. I hear voices outside the bathroom, and it sounds like Nero is arguing with someone before it goes quiet.