It’d be more efficient if you stopped being so stubborn. Everyone here knows sign language. You’ve had more than a decade to learn.
Sebastian scoffs. “I’m not learning a new language just for you. That’s inefficient. And get your damn feet off the table.”
The assassin swings his feet off and shakes his head.
Ren
You were working on your obsessions.
“The key word is ‘obsessions,’ plural. This isn’t one. Cleanliness and hygiene are common sense.”
A low growl ripples from Ren’s throat.
Ren
Mob lawyers. I hate mob lawyers. Twisting words. This is why I don’t talk. Bullets are more efficient.
“Gentlemen,” I say. I’m one second away from emptying my clip into these idiots. “Shall we begin?”
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Rafe murmurs, stepping out from a hidden panel, his black clerical shirt and white collar the only things that make sense in this place of holy worship.
The church was built after the Great Chicago Fire of 1871. Tunnels were dug to store valuables and bodies, and later, during Prohibition, bootleggers expanded them for smuggling between major drop points in the city.
It’s perfect for us now—a gang of miscreants aside from Father Rafael Mancini, or Rafe as we call him—out of sight of prying eyes, deep underground where surveillance is difficult.
“Come on, let’s see that pretty face,” Aleksei says gleefully.
He reaches for Ren’s mask.
A gun barrel answers him.
“One more move and I’ll drop you,”Ren signs.
Ren doesn’t like to be touched, and he has an unhealthy attachment to his mask.
Aleksei laughs. “Foreplay. Too bad I don’t swing that way.”
I sigh. In New York, I have the bickering Anderson brothers. In Chicago, I have these lunatics.
Had. I correct myself, a dull ache flaring in my chest.I’ve sacrificed my friendship with the Andersons.
“Pray more. That may calm your bloodlust,” Rafe murmurs, his lips twitching. He clearly senses I’m at my wit’s end. “May even improve your relationship with your wife.”
Despite his marrying us, he disapproves of the forced arrangement.
“Starting without me?” a soft, smoky voice interjects.
Sofia.
She peels off her black domino mask, her black hair falling loose. Her perfume today is incense, which means she’s in a foul mood.
“You okay?” I ask.
Sofia’s smile doesn’t reach her eyes. There’s a shadow in them, the same darkness haunting her since our parents’ deaths.
Guilt punches my solar plexus.
I was the eldest. I should’ve protected her and little Beatrice. But I didn’t. Instead, I chased a beautiful princess—someone I had no business being with.
