Not exactly difficult to guess what Zorzi calls me. I pretend to pout as I mock him. He clenches his fists.
How the fuck did Vita ever date this hijueputa? Son of a bitch.
I suppose there’s a reason they broke up, and I suspect she dumped his sorry ass. If it were just the two of us, I’d say something obscene about having more money, a bigger dick, and fucking his woman. Instead, I switch to the most patronizing smile I can muster. It pisses off most men and makes women think I’m aloof—and worth the chase.
Vita clears her throat softly. Zorzi and Cosima look in her direction. I know it’s her signal to gain my attention. I drop the rope and launch myself out of my seat as my hands slide into my pockets. I whip out both knives, my muscle memory placing my index fingers over the triggers to release the blades. I slash Zorzi’s throat before anyone realizes my intentions.
Hope Vita doesn’t mind.
I have Cosima in a chokehold with one blade at the back of her neck ready to hack my way to her spine, and the other gripped and positioned to drive it into her sternum.
Vita reaches out for a handful of hertía’shair and yanks the woman’s head sideways, giving me room to move the blade to her jugular. The sound of Vita’s hand meeting Cosima’s cheek rings throughout the cavernous space.
Fuck!
She slapped the womanhardfor it to be so loud in such an enormous area. Sensing my curiosity, Vita pulls Cosima’s hair even harder, making it possible for me to see the scarlet handprint on the older woman’s cheek. My woman isn’t playing.
“I don’t give a shit whether my parents ever forgive you for this. I don’t give a shit if they even sanctioned this. I will kill you for endangering my man.”
Her bone chilling tone warms my shriveled heart.
She cares about me. She really, really cares about me.
I’m having my Wednesday Addams’s goth girl moment.
My lips twitch, then purse as though I’m blowing Vita kiss. Her eyes widen for a moment before she laughs.
“Mwah.”
She makes a smacking kiss sound. I’m certain Cosima believes we’re equally psychotic or just hamming it up. I think Vita and I are a match made in heaven.
“What do you want me to do,chiquita?”
“Hold her.”
My arm tightens around her neck, shifting the blade away from her, favoring making her pass out rather than bleed out if she fights me. I move the knife from her sternum and wrap my long arm around her torso, pinning her arms to her sides. She isn’t moving unless I allow it. Vita releases Cosima’s hair and steps in front of her. She reaches out her hand, palm up. I hand her the knife that’s near Cosima’s neck.
My heart lurches as I watch Vita spin the knife in the air, catching it by the tip. The blade is wickedly sharp. It’s part of my morning routine to clean both knives and run them across a whetstone if I used them the previous day. She flicks it again, catching it by the handle. She pretends to balance it on her palm, as though finding the right place to grip it. Then she turns her hand sideways and places the tip of the blade under hertía’snose.
“It sure would be a shame to mark up your pretty face,Zia.”
“It would be a shame for you to be dead,Nipote.”
“I want her phone.”
I loosen my hold since I know the demand is perfunctory. Vita snatches it from Cosima’s front pocket. She holds it up, prying hertía’seye open wider for the retina scan. She taps the screen before putting the phone to her ear. I wonder why she doesn’t want me to hear whatever the other person says. I assume I won’t understand her since the call’s likely to be in Italian. People say Italian and Spanish are close, but not closeenough for me to understand a conversation well enough to keep up.
“Mamà, what the hell is going on?”
I guess she’s going with English as a favor to me. But I still don’t know what her mother’s saying. Maybe she doesn’t want Cosima to hear, so she can’t interject. I hate being left out, though.
My mother’s still trying to teach me that, as an only child, not everything is all about me all the time. Doubt I’ll ever learn that lesson.
“Do you know whereZiaCosima is right now?”
I don’t know what her mother said as an answer to the first question, but I have the answer to the second a moment later.
“She’s holding my boyfriend and me captive. She had us attacked, beaten, drugged, then tied up.”
