“Dad? Dad, are you here?”
Footsteps. A door opening. Then her sharp inhale of horror.
“Oh my god, Dad! What happened? Who did this to you?”
Antonio’s voice is thick with pain and terror, slurred like he’s been beaten badly enough to struggle with speech. Thedescription she gives of his apartment—destroyed furniture, blood everywhere—makes my stomach roil.
This is new information. I knew Antonio had been coerced, but not the extent of the violence involved. I didn’t know that whoever used him had beaten him first, made him understand the consequences of refusal before offering him the deal.
Gigi’s voice on the recording is desperate, pleading for answers. Then her father starts talking.
About the gambling debts. About the men who approached him. About the fifty thousand dollars to clear everything in exchange for information about Marco’s schedule. About how they promised no one would get hurt, that it was just intelligence they needed for their own purposes.
“They said he was a bad man. That he dealt in illegal things. They made it sound like I’d be helping catch a criminal.”
The justification makes rage burn fresh in my chest. Antonio was weak, yes. Cowardly. But not stupid enough to believe that lie without wanting to believe it, withoutchoosingto let himself be manipulated because it was easier than facing the truth.
The recording continues. Antonio’s breakdown. His confession that Marco died, that the plan went wrong, that he’s responsible for someone’s death. Gigi trying to calm him, to understand what happened.
Then, at exactly forty-two minutes in, a phone rings.
My entire body goes rigid.
I know what’s coming. But hearing it—actuallyhearingit?—
“Hello?”Antonio’s voice is small and terrified.
A pause. Then that voice. Smooth and utterly devoid of emotion.
“Antonio. I take it you’ve heard the news.”
Salvatore fucking Romano.
Marco’s murderer.
“I-I did exactly what you told me,” Antonio stammers on the recording. “I gave them the exact schedule, the routes, everything. I don’t understand what went wrong?—”
“What went wrong,” Romano’s voice is ice, “is that Marchetti wasn’t there. Marco was alone, which wasn’t the intelligence you provided. Your information was faulty.”
“I swear, I told you everything I knew! The other Marchetti was supposed to be?—”
My breath stops.
The other Marchetti was supposed to be.
The target wasn’t Marco. It wasme.
Romano wantedmedead, and Marco died in my place because I got called away to handle a territorial dispute at the last minute. Marco, who went to oversee the shipment alone because he trusted the routine. Marco, who died protecting my location during torture because he thought keeping me safe mattered more than his own life.
“This is your failure, Antonio,” Romano continues, his voice carrying that same dismissive tone I’ve heard him use for business complications. “Acceptable collateral damage, perhaps, but a failure nonetheless. Marco Marchetti’s death serves my purposes, but not as efficiently as the target’s would have. You’llneed to provide additional intelligence to make up for this…disappointment.”
The recording continues—Antonio pleading, Romano making threats—but I can’t hear it anymore over the roaring in my ears.
Iwas the target. Marco died savingme. And Salvatore Romano has been sitting across from me at business meetings, shaking my hand,toasting my marriage, while knowing he ordered my death and accidentally killed my cousin instead.
The rage that’s been burning in my chest explodes into something beyond reason, beyond control. I sweep my arm across my desk, sending papers and folders flying. The laptop goes with them, crashing to the floor, but I don’t care. I don’t care about evidence or proof or anything except the white-hot need to destroy something,someone, to make them hurt the way I’m hurting.
“Luca—” Gigi’s voice is very far away.
