by Sienna Blake
“You son of a bitch.” Dante lunged at me.
Before I could get off a punch, several strong arms grabbed me from behind. More of Dante’s men must have come up behind us. If I hadn’t been so stupid, so blinded by my self-destructive urges, I’d have realized he might have arranged that.
I readied myself for Dante’s hit, but it never came. For some strange reason, Dante’s men were holding him back too. “Dante,” one of his men hissed with a warning. “Not now.”
My eyes followed their line of sight. There was a slightly older man, dressed too formally for a club, walking around slowly, his eyes sharp and peeled, looking at everything except the girls gyrating on the dance floor. An undercover cop.
Dante leaned in and stabbed a golden-ringed finger into my face. “You are one lucky motherfucker. Any other night and your head would be hanging from that chandelier.”
“You’d try. That’s as far as you’d get.”
He snorted, dismissing me with a hand. “Get him out of my sight.”
This was not ending here. I elbowed one of the men who was trying to shove me towards the exit and lunged towards Dante. Unfortunately, the other guy was still hanging on to me. “I challenge you, Dante Veronesi!” I yelled as loudly as I could. Everything seemed to freeze. I swear I heard gasps all around me. “You. Me. Outside. Right now.”
Dante glanced around, his gaze finding the undercover, then leaned in. “You want to duel outside my club. Right when there’s an undercover cop in here? Do you think I’m stupid?”
“You could have fooled me.”
Dante nodded his head. “I see. This is a trick. We duel and the pigs swarm this place. They’ll have grounds to investigate further until my family is brought down.”
“No. No cops. You and me, outside.”
Dante laughed. “You want a duel, so be it. But not here. Midnight tomorrow in Little Italy. Dead Man’s Alley.”
Mercutio inhaled sharply. “Roman, you can’t—”
“Done,” I said.
Dante grinned. “See you then. Unless you chicken out beforehand.” He waved his hand in dismissal. I let myself get dragged away.
Mercutio and I were thrown out of the club into the back alleyway. It stank of piss and the sole streetlight had long since been broken.
“This is real leather, assholes,” I yelled at the retreating bouncers as I brushed down my jacket. They didn’t bite. Looked like I wasn’t getting my fight tonight. I was resigned to taking it out on my boxing bag later. Again.
The door to the club shut, cutting the music down to a dull thumping. “Do you believe those guys, Merc?”
Mercutio stood there staring at me, a stunned look on his face.
I let out a sigh. Time for the lecture. “What?”
But he didn’t yell or rage or rant at me as I expected. It would have been so much easier if he had just yelled. Instead his face crumpled into one of disappointment, lancing me right in the gut. Why was it so easy for everyone to be disappointed in me?
“Roman,” he said. “What have you done?”
5
____________
Julianna
Espinoza and I hadn’t been making any headway on the Eddie Sanchez case. We had a body but there was no workable evidence. There were no witnesses to the actual shooting and no weapon.
We got our hands on security footage from a pawn shop across the street from the Sanchez apartment. We saw Eddie take off in his car at around seven thirty, just like Rosa said. Rosa never followed him out. She was scratched off the list of suspects.
That left only Roman Tyrell and the unreliable witness who saw somebody like Roman at a gas station several miles away from his actual murder site. It was thin evidence, at best.
My cop instinct kept wanting to blurt out Roman’s confession. It kept bubbling up onto my tongue at the most inappropriate moments. I knew Roman had killed Eddie. I knew it had been him at that gas station. I knew he somehow manufactured that insurance policy so that Eddie’s family would be taken care of after he died.
It didn’t stop me from missing him. It didn’t stop me from loving him.
It was past ten thirty. We’d both just clocked off work. Espo was driving me home. For the first time in a few weeks, we didn’t just drive in silence.
“I’m telling you, it’s a tragedy,” Espo said from the driver’s seat.
I leaned back in the passenger seat as Verona’s downtown flashed by, flexing my toes in my black leather work boots. “Why can’t Lacey and Jasmine from toxicology be lunch buddies?”
“Jasmine will put Lacey off me forever. You know how girls like to talk.”
“Oh, right. Didn’t you date Jasmine for like, three minutes, a few months ago?”
Espo let out a low hum. “Best three minutes ever.”
I made a face. “Ew. I don’t need to know.”
Espo rounded the street onto my block. “Dammit, I knew it would come back to bite me on the ass.”
“You don’t get any sympathy from me, man whore.”
“But you can do damage control. She’ll listen to you. I know Lacey will say yes to a date with me if you put in a good word.”
“Which I won’t do because I actually like her.”
“Oh, ha ha, wise guy.”
I let out an easy laugh. Espo and my relationship had been strained when Roman was in my life; Espo knew I was hiding something. Partners had to trust each other with their lives. Hiding things eroded that trust, putting our lives at risk.
Bantering like this almost had me convinced that we were back to normal. Almost.
He pulled up near my building. There was an awkward pause.
“So, er,” I asked as casually as I could, “you want to come up for dinner?” Truth was, I missed Espo. I missed our easy friendship. Everything was so confusing, so conflicting, so damn hard in my life. I was tired of hard. I missed easy. “Chinese food courtesy of my personal chef, Ming’s?” I may or may not have deliberately mentioned the name of Espo’s favorite Chinese takeout.
Espo pressed his hands to his heart. “Ah, Ming. The one girl who never lets me down.”
I ignored his hidden jab, even as it snapped against me like a rubber band. “So, Ming’s, then?”
“Sure, that sounds great.” Espo’s phone began to beep. He let out a groan. “If this is a dead body, I will kill someone.”
“If that’s a dead body, I’m pretty sure someone beat you to it.”
He pulled out his phone and stared at it, chewing his lip. “Damn, I…”
I rolled my eyes. “Let me guess, it’s a woman and she wants you to come over. Is it Lacey?”
A guilty look crept over his face. Not Lacey.
I waved at him. “Go, Espo. I can eat Ming’s all by myself. At least one of us should be getting laid.”
Espo gave me a sad look. “Sorry it didn’t work out with the rose guy.”
I shrugged, even though it hurt. “It happens. Plenty of fish in the sea and all that, right?” I lied.
It took twenty-five years for me to find someone like Roman. It might take another twenty-five to forget him.
No, that was a lie. I’d never forget him.
At least I was comforted by the fact that she might make him happy.
6
____________
Roman
From the corner of the alley across her street, I watched as Julianna and her partner pulled up in his unmarked dark police sedan. My chest tightened at the sight of her lovely profile, honey hair tied back at the nape of her neck. She laughed at something Espinoza said. My stomach twisted. See, she’s happy. It’d only been a month and she’d moved on. You were easy to forget.
She was not. She was branded onto my heart, stained into my soul.
If I was going to die tonight at Dante’s hand, then at least I could say that my life had been worth it because she had been mine. At least for a time.
Espinoza placed a hand behind her seat and leaned in. Close. Too close. Wha
t was he doing? My stomach clenched when I remembered what Benvolio had said about them. “They’re fucking, dude. That’s the word on the street. And you know what they say, where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”
Was it true? Was he fucking her? Was he the reason I’d been so easy to forget? How dare he. She was mine. For a second, rage blinded me. I strode out of my hiding spot, determined to rip them apart.
Julianna opened the passenger door and stepped out of the car.
He didn’t follow.
I stopped right there at the edge of the sidewalk. He wasn’t going in with her. If Julianna looked over right now, she’d see me.
But she didn’t. She walked into her building, giving Espinoza a tiny wave once she was inside. I backed into my hiding spot again just before Espinoza could spot me. When we both lost sight of her, he pulled away from the building.
She’d be walking into her apartment right now.
My gaze found the skeleton fire escape, a rickety ladder of rust and spider webs scaling up the side of her building, parts missing. Perhaps I could climb up her building one last time...
I could feel the heaviness of death around me. If I could just…touch her one more time. If I could talk to her…
Don’t be stupid, Roman. You came here to make sure she was okay, and she is. The best thing I could do was to leave her alone. She probably wouldn’t even spare a thought for me when she read in the papers tomorrow that Roman Tyrell’s body was found washed up downriver.
I didn’t follow her into her apartment. I slid back into the shadows, walked back to my bike, and prepared myself to meet my fate.
7
____________
Roman
Little Italy had once been a bustling trading spot for the immigrant population of Verona. After my father rose to power, it crumbled into a quivering mess of seedy bars, strip clubs, and illegal gambling dens. Mostly it was abandoned, the forgotten homeless squatting in derelict buildings. The few reputable restaurants still open shut their doors well before nine p.m. With alleyways like twisted warrens and the kind of dark that sucked up the pathetic glow of streetlights, Little Italy was nearly deserted after midnight. It was a notorious spot for things that went on that the gentile population of fair Verona didn’t want to know about. Dead Man’s Alley was right in its rotting center.
A distant clock sounded three times, signaling midnight.
“Where’s your dueling partner?” Dante’s voice rang out, distorted by the hungry wind. His silhouette extended from the shadows from the other side of the alleyway. Two others followed. Shit. Dante had come with two of his men. If he was as ruthless as they say he was, he probably had more backup somewhere else.
Where was Mercutio? He was supposed to meet me here ten minutes ago. I pulled out my phone. I’d missed a call from him. I would have been on my bike, riding across Verona when he called, the ringing lost under the roar of the bike’s motor and the wind in my ears. He was probably calling to tell me he wasn’t going to show up. Too late for me to call him back now.
He let me down. He never let me down.
You’ve let him down plenty. It’s no wonder that he decided not to stand by you for this.
As much as I wanted to, I could not hate Mercutio for not showing up. He was right not to come. He was right not to attach himself to a sinking ship. He deserved better than to die along with me. Live, Mercutio. Live a better life as a better man than I ever could.
I gave Dante a casual shrug. “I didn’t think I needed to hide behind my men. Unlike some of us.”
Dante bristled.
Jesus, Roman. Do you ever just keep your mouth shut? Not that it would have mattered. Dante wasn’t the kind of man to let me go if I asked. He’d make me beg, then he’d laugh as he killed me anyway.
He stopped about five meters from me, his men standing by his side like a pair of bodyguards. “Are you ready to join your dead mummy, Tyrell?”
I gritted my teeth and pushed aside my jacket to reveal the gun holstered to my hip. “Let’s get this over with.”
Dante nodded, a sneer lifting his mouth. He opened his arms out to the sides, revealing a single gun holstered to his side. His men helped him shrug off his long trench coat, one of them taking it from him.
We stared at each other across the dim moonlit night, the moon reflecting off the water. I saw my death in his eyes, two deep holes dug into cold dirt. My mind turned back to Julianna’s face. “Don’t do this, Roman,” her image begged me.
Too late. Too late to start again. Too late to say goodbye. Too late to change.
“On the count of three,” one of Dante’s men called, “shoot.”
I shifted my weight, testing my balance. I was a good shot, a good aim. But I had heard things about Dante Veronesi. His father had built his sons their own shooting range when they had been mere children. I had heard that Dante Veronesi could shoot the center out of the king of diamonds from a hundred yards.
“One…”
Everything seemed to slow around me, my heartbeat in my ears became long and overwhelming. Was it too much to hope that there was a heaven and that my mother would be waiting for me?
“Two…”
Who was I kidding? If there was a heaven, then I wasn’t being let anywhere near it. My fingers twitched by my gun. My vision sharpened down to two hateful eyes.
A gunshot fired, pain tearing across my left arm. I sprinted for cover behind a pile of crates as more shots whizzed past my head. The shots had not come from Dante but rather from somewhere else in the dark. My arm throbbed but I ignored it, drawing my own gun.
“You cheater,” I yelled. I cursed as a shot hit somewhere near my right, causing splinters to spit at me. “Where’s your honor?”
I heard Dante laughing. “You idiot. Your precious honor is just going to get you killed. Did you really think I was going to pass up the chance to end the Tyrell line?”
I shot out wildly from the corner of my hiding place. A barrage of bullets was their deadly answer. I was forced to crouch low as chips of wood exploded around me.
“Surrender,” he called. “I’ll make your death quick and painless. This is just business, after all.”
I wiped the sweat off my forehead with the back of my hand. They had me surrounded. This was not a duel, but an execution. I wasn’t getting out alive.
8
____________
Julianna
One hour earlier…
The second I stepped out of Espinoza’s car, the smile slid off my face. Lately it hurt to smile, like I was somehow out of practice. As I made my way into my building, my thoughts turned to Roman. I wondered what he was doing tonight. He probably wasn’t alone like I was. He had Rosaline to keep him company. His fiancée, I thought bitterly.
I had barely gotten my key into my door when a deep male voice called my name. I’d been so lost in my thoughts that I hadn’t heard him come up behind me.
Startled, I spun, drawing my gun at the same time. I didn’t expect to see him. Mercutio Brevio was standing behind me, a serious look on his face.
“Whoa,” he said as I pointed my weapon at him. He raised his hands, showing me his palms in an act of placation. “Don’t shoot.”
“Mercutio?” I frowned. He didn’t like me. The last time we saw each other he told me in no uncertain terms to leave his best friend the hell alone. The reminder of Roman throbbed like a wound across my heart. “What are you doing here?”
Mercutio’s dark eyebrows drew together. He looked away. Whatever he was here for, he was struggling with telling me. Whatever it was, it took a lot for him to come here. I lowered my weapon but I didn’t put it away, my eyes darting over his shoulder to make sure we were alone. “What is it?”
He shuffled his weight, his eyes darting around the hall. “Can we talk?”
“Talk.”
“Inside your apartment?”
I flinched. Was this a trick?
Mercutio must have sensed my hesitancy because h
e opened his jacket, then patted his body. “Look, I don’t have any weapons on me.” He eyed my gun, now pointed at the floor. “I hate the damn things. Besides, I’m positive you’d kick my ass if I tried anything.”
I didn’t move. Mercutio might not have a record, but that could just mean that he’d never been caught.
Now who’s being prejudiced, Jules?
“Please. It’s about Roman.”
I flinched at hearing his name spoken out loud for the first time since he ended things with me. Fuck. My heart felt scraped raw, my nerves fraying over just hearing his name. God, when would I be able to place him in the past? When would the wound stop feeling so fresh?
I tried to remain as calm as possible. I was sure that I failed. I nodded, my throat in a knot. I unlocked the door and let us in, holstering my gun.
“What about him?” I asked as soon as we were inside, my voice steadier than I expected it to be.
“Roman’s in trouble.”
“Trouble?” My stomach felt like someone was wringing it out.
“In less than an hour he’s going to be facing off against Dante Veronesi. A duel to the death.” My heart skipped a beat at the word death. “Dante is a ruthless cheater. Killing the only living heir to the Tyrell empire will cement his place as favorite with his father. He’s never going to let Roman walk away.”
“But the truce—”
“The truce means jack shit. They both blew that sky high. I can’t go to his family. They’d turn the duel into a bloodbath and use it as an excuse to incite a war.”
I cursed. Damn you, Roman. I swallowed hard, as bloody images ripped from crime scene photos flashed before my eyes. What the hell was he thinking by challenging Dante to a duel? They were illegal, first of all; a modern-day flashback to when men used to duel with pistols that the local Mafia had copied to sorting out their feuds. Second of all, what a stupid thing to walk into without backup. “Why are you coming to me?”
“I have no one else to turn to. No one else to help. I know…I know you care about him.” Even though you shouldn’t, was the accusation. “He’ll listen to you.”