He touched what belonged to me. No one touched what was mine.
Besides, this was my last act before I officially retired, or as the organization saw it, disavowing. I had orders to take care of him before the summer event at Club D. He wasn’t worth the fucking trouble he caused.
The cabin was cloaked in complete darkness, except for the small fire, and he thought he was using it to his advantage. He assumed I wasn’t here. I’d sent word back from Atlantic City that I wanted a meeting with The Boss.
I’d never pulled a bait and switch before, never had the need to, so when I set up the meeting, the family in New York believed it. In times of war, though, nothing was fair. Because they were all waiting for me to show up, fuck up, or get out of town.
They had no idea that half of my heart and half of my wife’s couldn’t be left behind. Angelia was as vital to us as the thing that beats in a chest.
Boy tracked me here easily, because he thought he was smart enough to catch the scent I purposely allowed him to follow, and he assumed that I was hiding my wife while I went to face fate.
I had waited for him in a dark corner. He hadn’t seen me. He wouldn’t hear me. He’d feel me—when it was a second too late.
A second too late, he gurgled when my knife slid across his throat. As I cut, I dragged him toward the other side of the room so Rosalia wouldn’t be touched by his mess.
“Niello!”
“Stay where you are,” I said, letting him slip to the floor without a sound.
“What’s going on?” she said, her words whispered and rushed. “Did they find us? How? I can barely see a thing!” She exhaled. “Who was that? Is he gone?”
She was anxious. Too fucking chatty. She’d never be able to fish or finish a stakeout.
“Loose ends have found us first,” I said. “The real threat is still in the city.”
“Niello,” she said slowly. “Lights. Outside.”
The window wall was one way. Transparent on our side but reflective outside. Every so often, a light would come on, barely highlighting the man who turned on his flashlight or phone. They couldn’t get service out here, but it gave them some light to see by.
She made a breathless noise when I hauled her up. “Silence,” I whispered to her in Italian as I carried her from our bedroom to the bathroom. I didn’t want her to step in the mess.
I set her down near me after I closed the bathroom door.
“Boy?” a voice asked from the front door as I opened the linen closet. “Hurry the fuck up. Who knows when that animal’s going to show up!”
Rosalia was holding on to my arm, and when she heard him, she squeezed and held on even tighter.
Grumbles echoed from the same man after. He was complaining to someone else about not having a good feeling about this. Then the door opened again.
“Boy?” The same voice. “Boy?” Then a long whistle. Trying to signal to him if he hadn’t heard his name.
The inside of the cabin was dark, no candles lit, so unless the men had phones or flashlights, or the ability to see in the dark, they couldn’t see shit. But lights also made them a target, so it was up to them how much of a risk they were willing to take.
Darkness was never an issue for me, but even if it was, I’d memorized every inch of this cabin.
I moved the cabinets inside of the linen closet to the side, took Rosalia by the hand, and pushed her inside ahead of me. I pulled the cabinet closed as the door to the bathroom opened.
From outside, it would look like we’d forgotten to close the closet door. If the men figured out how to move the cabinet, then they would realize it was more than just a closet.
A box was secured to the wall on our side, inside of it a few things. A flashlight was one of them. I turned it on and pointed it toward the few steps leading underneath the house. I didn’t miss her eyes when she took me in, wearing Boy’s blood, but there was no time for stalling.
Men were talking, some shouting to one another. They were looking for Boy. It wasn’t going to take them long to find him. And the man on the other side was digging through the closet, flinging things aside, trying to figure out if his gut was telling him the truth.
We had slipped right past him. Only a piece of metal stood between him and us.
A gun went off from the other side of the cabinet, blasting through the wall. We were lower, so the bullets flew over our heads.
Rosalia held her ears, as the shots kept blasting, and watched with big eyes as I hit the gas pipe that led into the main cabin with the butt of one of the rifles hanging from the wall.
