“Ready?” His voice carries that subtle rasp that always makes me think inappropriate thoughts.
The question hangs between us, loaded with everything we both know is about to change.
Once I walk out this door, once I go through with this trial, I’ll have crossed a line I can never uncross.
I’ll be someone who’s taken a life, someone who’s proven she has Giuseppe’s capacity for violence.
I should be terrified. I should be having second thoughts, moral crises, some kind of normal human reaction to what I’m about to do.
Instead, I feel calm. Focused. Ready.
“Yes,” I say, and I mean it. “I’m ready.”
The social club sits on Northern Boulevard like a relic from another era—brick facade, small windows, the kind of place that screams “mind your own business” to anyone walking by.
As we pull up in Alessandro’s car, I feel my stomach clench with nerves again.
I take a shaky breath, and Alessandro immediately notices.
“You okay?”
“I’m fine,” I bite out, probably sharper than necessary. But I can’t show weakness now. Not when we’re this close.
I force myself to breathe deeply, pushing down every emotion until I feel that familiar cold settle over me.
It’s like flipping a switch—all the nerves, the voices whispering in the back of my mind, the human parts of me that might hesitate, they all get locked away behind a wall of ice.
When I look at Alessandro again, I know my expression has changed.
Become emptier.
More dangerous.
“Now I’m fine,” I say, and my voice is steady as granite.
We move according to the plan we spent hours perfecting.
Alessandro enters through the service entrance in the alley, his role to secure the back exit and neutralize the minimal security—two guys who think they’re guarding a simple card game, not a target for family justice.
I wait exactly three minutes, then walk through the main entrance like I own the place.
The interior is what I expected—dark wood paneling, the smell of cigars and old whiskey, men in expensive suits hunched over poker tables.
The kind of atmosphere that’s remained unchanged for decades because it works.
Vincent Torrino is exactly where our intelligence said he’d be, at a corner table with four other men, cards in hand and a stack of chips in front of him.
He’s in his fifties, gray at the temples, wearing an expensive Armani suit.
He looks successful, comfortable, completely unaware that his world is about to end.
The room goes quiet as I enter.
Not silent, but the conversations shift, become more muted.
A young woman in a place like this draws attention whether she wants it or not.
Perfect. I need witnesses.
