“You’ve made a mistake,” he says to me.
“Wrong,” I say. “I didn’t end her when your order came. I don’t take orders from you, and I don’t make mistakes.”
He steps in, slow and careful, like the room might break if he hurries. I clock the second guard in the hall before I hear him. Weight on the carpet. Expensive soles that grip wrong. I point to the print over the bar with my chin.
“Behind it,” I tell Isabella.
She peels the city off the wall. A small safe stares back. She grins at the model number like a woman recognizing an old enemy.
“Two one four. He never changes it.”
“Cute,” I say.
She drops her shoulder, works the dial, and opens the box. Inside is a stack of black cards, two passports, cash, and a small recorder the size of a matchbook. She holds it up like a relic.
Adrian moves then. He’s quick when he needs to be. His hand comes up with a compact pistol he shouldn’t bring to a meeting like this if he believes in tomorrow. I’m already moving. The pry bar meets his wrist. The gun clatters to the carpet. Isabella has a handin his suit, and her knife kisses the soft skin under his jaw before he can collect himself.
“Stay,” she says, holding the blade against his neck.
He stays, breathing through his nose like a man who’s never been told no in a room he pays for.
The second guard makes his mistake at the threshold. He leans to see. I kick the door into his face and pull him through by the lapel so he bleeds on the inside and not the hall. I put him down with a knee and a short jab that breaks a nose with a clean sound. He curls. He’ll remember us in his mirror for a month.
“Take the drive,” I tell Isabella. “The recorder. The cards.”
I want her away from him. She retreats from Adrian. I take a step towards him as a warning. She tucks the items into the bag, keeping the recorder in her hand. She presses play. The room fills with the sound of Adrian’s voice speaking like a man who believes wires are for other people.
“Clean hit. But make a spectacle. During the truce. Use the other heir. I want her dead. He kills her, and Vittorio will kill him. Two brats with one truce.”
My hand balls. Isabella stops the recording with a thumb and her eyes meet mine. She isn’t surprised. She’s satisfied.
“You will give that back,” Adrian says. His tone tries for soothing. It lands on threat.
“No,” she says.
The desk mic chirps. A voice from security asks for a status he’ll regret wanting.
“You won’t make it out of here alive. They're dispatching an army that won’t stop to listen to recordings,” he says, with a smug grin.
I step over the first guard and pick up Adrian’s gun. “You’re not making it out of here alive, first.”
“Kill me, and my boss gets what he wants. The Vendetta. Blood for blood. You dead by a Valentine’s hand.”
“He’s right,” Isabella says, clearly.
Her words stop me. I strip the magazine and pocket the slide. I toss the empty handle back to him so he can feel the shape of losing.
“You’ll live long enough to suffer at the hands of both families.”
He looks past me to Isabella with the eyes a man uses when he’s run out of lies. I take a step that puts my body between them. The message lands. He swallows.
“Vittorio’s out for your blood. You took his daughter. You won’t live to convince him otherwise,” he retorts.
“Father will listen to me,” Isabella speaks to the room. “He’ll believe me.”
“Will he?” Adrian smiles like he knows something we don’t.
I can hear his little crew coming. He tries to make a move. I kick him in the teeth.
