“Don’t you know?” I spit out blood, watch with satisfaction as it splatters across her feet. “Renzo is dead.”
She calls his phone again, her face contorted in confusion. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. He’s out there”—she points in the direction of what must be the road—“making his way back here. As we planned.”
“He’s dead,Mom. I watched Shkodra kill him, kick his body out of a moving car.”
“You’re lying.” She’s gripping her phone to her face, which has gone deathly pale. “He’s not dead. He can’t be. Renzo never got in the car. He wasneversupposed to be in the car.”
“But he was. He was in the car with me and Shkodra.”
“No!” she shouts. “He wouldn’t have deviated from the plan. It was simple—Renzo gets you to the Albanian, the deal is done, our debt cleared, then he leaves. I crash the car, killing the Albanian. You too, if we’re lucky. But, if you survive, I bring you here for a little extra, cathartic fun before finishing you off. Then Renzo and I vanish for good. Our debt wiped off the books. We’re finally free. Of you, of this city. Of all of it.”
She’s staring at me, an unearthly gleam in her eyes. Howthis woman could have given birth to me, I’ll never know. “He’s alive, and he’s coming for me, and we’re free. Together, at last.”
“He’s not.” I tell her, praying I can manage one last tug. If I do it hard enough, I should be able to tear the anchor free. “Renzo is dead. You’ll never see him again. You’ll never be free of what you did.”
“Lies!” she screams at the top of her lungs.
“The truth,” I promise. The fire in my arms is almost unbearable, but I suck in a breath, willing my muscles to hang in just a little while longer. “Your life with Renzo is over.”
Martina’s retort is lost when the door swings wide, a new voice joining the mix. “It’s all over.”
Black spots are starting to blot out my vision, but I swear I see Alik step into the cabin, followed by another man. If I squint hard enough, I think I can make out two very large guns pointed at the back of Martina’s head.
“You die tonight,suka,” one says. He really does sound like Alik.
Then both men pull their triggers.
38
ALIK
Sera folds to the ground as my shot severs the rope binding her to the ceiling. Gio’s shot is carefully timed for a half-second later. His aim is perfect—irritatingly on-brand for him—and he sinks his bullet in Martina di Salvo’s shoulder. She whirls under the impact, twisting on her heels and pitching forward too fast to catch herself. Her nose breaks when she hits the ground and any other time, I’d grin like an evil motherfucker when she shrieks in agony.
This time, however, I don’t give a fuck as long as she’s incapacitated and in a world of hurt. I step over her writhing form and drop to my knees next to Sera.
“Sera.Milaya. Serafina!” Knife in hand, I cut her wrists free and carefully shift her until she’s lying flat on the ground. One side of her face is black and blue, the eye on that side swollen almost completely shut. There are matching bruises on her torso, only bigger. I gently shift her, trying to get a better look, when I see streaks of dried blood on her back.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck. Sera. Baby.” I touch her face. Her eyelids barely flutter. Frantic, I feel her back, try to find the source of the bleeding. Each time I touch her, Sera moans faintly. She’salive, breathing. I repeat those two facts in my head, over and over, but I can’t stop looking for the source of all that blood.
I feel something against my face. Stop dead when I realize Sera’s touching me. I lean over her, pressing her fingers to my cheek, desperate for the sensation, desperate to drive away the numbness gripping me.
“It’s not mine,” she whispers.
“It’s not?”
She shakes her head, drawing me closer. “It’s Renzo’s. From when Shkodra shot him. It’s not my blood.”
In that moment, I say a million prayers to the God I stopped believing in so long ago. “But the car wreck. You were in the car. I saw it get hit. I saw it crash. How did you get out?”
Sera’s expression is dazed. She fights to sit up. I catch her by the shoulders as she sways. With a shaky arm, she points over my shoulder at the woman cursing up a storm as Gio keeps a gun trained at her head. “She pulled me out of the car. After she caused the accident. Shkodra—is he dead?”
“Yes,” I answer.
“You’re sure? Martina, she said she killed him, but I can’t trust anything she says.”
“The Albanian is dead,moya voitelnitsa. After I came to, Gio and I checked the car. We had to make sure you weren’t still inside. That’s when we found his body. He’s gone, Sera. We don’t have to worry about him anymore.”
“Thank God,” she says. “Renzo too. Shkodra killed him.” Sera is studying my face, frowning. “Wait, how did you know about the accident?”
