Inventory was for accountants, not pseudo-princes of the underworld. Which is what Devin and I had become in the wake of Anthony Butera’s unfitness to lead.
Devin leaned forward beside me, elbows braced on his knees, eyes cold in that way that made men twice his size shut up fast. “I’m gonna say this one more time,” he told one of the newer lieutenants, who’d been running his mouth about territories and succession. “You don’t get to decide who’s fit to lead.”
“He hasn’t been around,” the guy muttered. “How’re we supposed to?—”
I cut him off with a sharp look. “You’re supposed to do your job. Jonathan’s handling more than any of you can imagine. You think dealing with Anthony’s possible death is some kind of vacation?”
Silence snapped through the room. No one liked to talk about Anthony like he was mortal.
Across the table, two soldiers were quietly arguing over how shipments had gone missing. I didn’t bother stepping in yet. Let them panic. Panic made people tell the truth.
Devin shoved his fingers through his hair, sighing like he was physically restraining himself from punching someone. “And someone better start giving me reliable intel on fucking Ferrara. I’m done hearing rumors without fucking names attached.”
That struck a nerve in the room. Some shifted. Some looked at the floor. The Ferrara family had been circling for months, vultures waiting for the exact moment Anthony Butera slipped.
We all felt that moment getting closer every day. With his connection to Frankie, however tenuous these days, we couldn’t afford to let Robert Ferarra catch any of us out of line.
I opened my mouth to demand answers when the door swung in without a knock.
Jonathan stepped inside.
Or rather, it was something that looked like him but hollowed out. Gray and drained and almost smaller, though he was still of an impressive stature. His suit was wrinkled. His tie hung undone. He had that shell-shocked haze I’d only ever seen on men who’d survived bombings or gunfights they shouldn’t have walked away from.
Everyone straightened. Even the idiots knew this wasn’t normal.
“Jon?” Devin said, already rising.
Jonathan swallowed, slow and mechanical. “He’s gone.”
The words echoed through the room, sucked all the oxygen out of it.
Anthony Butera. Dead.
Some men crossed themselves. Some whispered. Some swore. Some looked at each other with wide, greedy eyes, already seeing opportunity.
Then chaos erupted.
People talking over each other—Who’s in charge now? What about territories? Who controls the hospitals? Who’s going to speak to Ferrara? Should we call some kind of strategy session into order? What does this mean?
“Shut the hell up!” Devin slammed his palm on the table hard enough to rattle the guns in their cases.
I was already moving toward Jonathan, gripping his shoulder. “You’re the head now,” I reassured him quietly, firmly cementing his place where he belonged, on the Butera throne. “And we stand with you.”
His eyes finally focused on mine. Pain, fear, duty all knotted together. And then, like the three of us shared the same thought in the same instant, he whispered, “Frankie.”
My chest went tight. Devin’s jaw clenched.
I didn’t have to say it. We all knew.
A power vacuum this size would draw every enemy out of the dark—and the first thing they’d go for wasn’t territory.
It was leverage.
“We need to get to her,” I said.
Every man in the room felt the shift, the storm forming.
Because the Butera empire may have had a new king, but our queen was still our number one priority, and she wouldn’t even know it if she was in danger.Again.
