His phone rang again. Richard, probably with updates. I let Emilio answer this time but kept my arm around his shoulders. Anchoring him.
"Yes?" Emilio's voice was steadier now. "I understand. Thank you for letting me know."
He hung up and turned to me. "It was a hoax. No explosives. Just a box filled with shredded newspaper and another printed note. 'Last warning' it said."
"Last warning." I pulled out my phone and called Vincent. "You have a name yet?"
"Just came through. Angelo Moretti. Low-level enforcer for the Costellos. Two priors for assault, one for extortion. Address in Queens." Vincent rattled off details. "You want me to grab him?"
"No. I want you to watch him. Follow him. Find out who he's reporting to. Then we grab everyone involved in the chain of command." I paused. "And Vincent? When we bring them in,I want it quiet. No witnesses. No evidence. Nothing that comes back to us."
"Understood. I'll call when we're ready to move."
I ended the call and found Emilio watching me with an expression I couldn't quite read.
"You're going to kill them," he said. Not a question.
"I'm going to handle them." Careful phrasing. Plausible deniability. "What happens after that depends on how cooperative they are. But yes, Emilio. If they don't give me very good reasons not to, I'm going to make sure they never threaten anyone I care about ever again."
"That's murder."
"That's justice in my world." I stood and pulled him to his feet. "You knew what I was when you agreed to defend me. You knew what I'm capable of. This shouldn't surprise you."
"It doesn't surprise me. It should horrify me." He looked at our joined hands. "But it doesn't. That's what scares me. That I'm standing here listening to you plan someone's murder and all I can think is 'thank you for keeping me safe.'"
"Then you're learning." I kissed his forehead. "Welcome to my world, Emilio. Try not to let the moral compromises destroy you."
He laughed. Bitter and sharp. "Too late for that."
Maybe. But he was still here. Still standing with me despite knowing exactly what that meant. Still choosing this path even as it led him further from everything he'd built his identity around.
My phone buzzed. Text from Luca:Heard about the situation. Need anything?
I typed back:All handled. Keep your eyes open. Costellos are getting desperate.
His response came immediately:Always am. Let me know if you need extra security.
The four of us—Sandro, Matteo, Elio, Luca—we'd built this empire together. Survived impossible odds. Trusted each other with our lives and our secrets. When one of us had a problem, it became all of our problem.
And Emilio was my problem now. Which meant he was under all of our protection.
"Come on," I said. "You need to eat. Then we're going over every detail of the assault case. If the Costellos want to play games, we'll destroy them in court instead of just threatening them in alleys."
"You're still planning to handle them personally."
"Of course I am. But the legal victory will hurt them more than anything I do in private." I pulled him toward the kitchen. "They wanted to scare you off because they know you're going to eviscerate their case. So let's make sure you're prepared to do exactly that."
We spent the next three hours going over witness depositions, timeline inconsistencies, evidence that didn't match testimony. Emilio was brilliant when he focused. Found connections I'd missed. Pointed out weaknesses in the prosecution's narrative that we could exploit.
By the time we finished, he'd filled six pages with notes and built a strategy that would make any prosecutor nervous.
"This is good," I said, reviewing his work. "This is exactly what we need."
"This is circumstantial at best. We're still missing the key piece—proof that the Costello family planted those witnesses." He tapped his pen against the legal pad. "Without that, we're just arguing that their story doesn't make sense. That's not the same as proving they're lying."
"Leave that to me. I'll get you proof." I already had ideas about how to accomplish that. Ideas that involved Vincent andsome very persuasive conversations with people who owed me favors.
"Legally obtained proof? That I can actually use in court?"
