“That bastard deserved what he got after everything he’s done to this family. You should know that better than anyone,” Pyotr hisses.
“Perhaps. But you’re the only one who has a debt to pay today. And I’ve come to collect.”
Michelangelo is across the room in the blink of an eye, his long, jean-clad legs carrying him to Pyotr before my bumbling, half-drunk, hungover husband can get the gun out of his waistband and raise it.
I gasp at the gut punch Michelangelo delivers, seeming completely unconcerned about bullets as he doubles my husband over with ease.
Clapping my hands over my mouth to avoid drawing unwanted attention, I watch with wide eyes from beneath the table as Pyotr tries to recover.
Despite his initial clumsiness, he does manage to regain his footing, swinging the butt of his Makarov to use like a club.
But the Italian behemoth is too fast, and he swats the gun away like a fly before landing another powerful blow to Pyotr’s ribs.
“No guns today, Novikov,” he taunts as Pyotr tries to block the flurry of punches coming at him. “That would be far too quick of a death. I want to enjoy every last excruciating second of your end. And I’m going to enjoy knowing that, while you might have killed Don Augusta, the Chiaroscuros will carry on. But your family is finished. Your line is done. And I will crush the Novikov name into dust.”
My stomach turns, my heart hammering at the sound of cruel enjoyment in his voice.
He’s relishing this violence, savoring it.
And a cold shiver races down my spine as I realize it doesn’t matter who wins this battle.
These men are all cut from the same cloth. Michelangelo might have a beautiful smile, but I know better than to think that makes him any less of a monster.
I don’t know if Pyotr’s too drunk to properly fight back or if he’s used to taking men’s lives from a distance, but I can’t help but notice just how one-sided the fight is.
And no one’s coming to his defense as Michelangelo Chiaroscuro uses him first as a punching bag—then pulls out two cruel-looking knives to turn him into a pincushion.
By now, Pyotr’s face is a bloody pulp, one eye swollen shut, and he spits a mouthful of teeth and blood onto our floor as he wheezes through his clearly broken nose.
“You’ll never make it out of here alive,” Pyotr taunts, searching for a false bravado as he raises his fists like he has a chance of protecting himself.
The low, dark chuckle that Michelangelo releases turns my blood cold, and I curl more tightly in on myself as I realize this is it.
I’m about to watch him kill the man who vowed to protect me.
Not that he didn’t do more harm than good—but when Pyotr dies, I will be trapped inside a room with a cold-blooded killer, a man who clearly wants revenge and might not stop at my husband.
“I don’t intend to leave, Pyotr,” he promises darkly.
Then he lunges.
For a man his size, Michelangelo has almost catlike grace and speed. Faster than my eyes can track, he’s punctured holes all up and along my husband’s substantial torso.
I can count them by the red dots that grow and spread across Pyotr’s shirt, turning the fabric into a macabre Rorschach test.
There’s a sickening squelch as the blade finds Pyotr’s chest, and my husband stiffens. His fists clench around the fabric of Michelangelo’s henley, desperately trying to hold himself up even as he releases a horrible burbling cough.
I can see him struggling for air, choking on the blood that paints his lips, before gradually—as if time were put in slow motion—he slides off the blade.
His eyes are wide with shock as he looks down at his chest in confusion, then they travel back up to the avenging angel’s face.
Or perhaps devil would be the more accurate label as Michelangelo sneers down at him.
Pyotr collapses to his knees in a heap, blood seeping from the open wounds too deep to patch.
But he’s clinging to life with surprising tenacity, and as he looks up at Michelangelo with shock and fury, he looks like he wants to stand back up.
“You don’t mess with the Chiaroscuros,” the colossal Italian growls, swinging his arm in an arc that opens my husband’s throat in a garish crimson smile.
