Vito exhales through his nose. “We had four confirmed inside Northstar. Two outside. One spotter in a vehicle half a block out—we took care of him on the spot.
We have Vanni’s team on the board and CEO, but there hasn’t been a sighting of any of them in the area since.”
“Which means the focus isn’t on any of them.” Luca’s gaze flicks to me.
“No, it’s on Elsa,” I say quietly. “Whatever they have planned has to do with her.”
“They were already denied the acquisition,” Giovanni says. “What’s the point in continuing to come after her? You said you heard them talk about getting rid of her because she’s no longer useful, but all this for what? Revenge? It seems like a stretch.”
“They obviously have something else planned,” I say. “I’ve been thinking about it. Elsa made the recommendation notto go ahead with the acquisition with Bellandi. She can still change her mind, though.”
“How is shooting at her going to make that happen?” Vito asks.
“It wasn’t just her in that car,” Nico says. “It was you two as well. Maybe they were hoping to grab her and take you two out as well. Two birds with one stone.”
Giovanni’s fingers curl into his palm. “Elsa will never be safe as long as they think she can swing the outcome.”
“Then we need to take it out of her hands,” I say.
“How? Northstar chose her for a reason, and Bellandi knows how highly they regard her opinions,” Nico says, his voice a bit scratchy from unstable service.
Thinking out loud, I murmur, “We sour the deal.”
“What?” Giovanni asks, leaning forward.
“We sour the deal,” I repeat, louder.
“How do we do that?” Vito scoffs.
“Legally,” Roberto says, sitting up, having the same realization I just did. “Ah, Antonio. See what happens when you use the head on your shoulders and not the one in your pants?”
“The head in my pants is the reason I’ve got a supermodel in my bed, so I think I’m doing all right,” I say smugly.
Giovanni frowns. “What are you suggesting?”
"What can we do to them, that they can't do to sour Northstaron us?" Vito asks, unimpressed.
“We didn’t put a team inside their building to try to take a key player off the board,” Roberto says. “That’s not just competition. That’s criminal conduct.”
“And we’ve got a couple of idiots in a hallway who made it very easy to prove,” I say, turning to Vito. “Tell me you recorded the comms while Elsa and I were escaping Northstar.”
Vito smirks.
“What doyouthink?”
Chapter Forty Two
Elsa
I’m sitting on Antonio’s couch with a cannoli in my hand, and for the first time in days, the apartment doesn’t feel like a holding cell.
It feels… alive.
Stephano is on the floor with a little car he’s pushing back and forth with solemn focus, like it’s serious work. Alessandra toddles between Elena’s knees and the coffee table, patting at a throw pillow, then deciding the fringe on the rug is the most fascinating thing she’s ever seen. Bianca watches them both with the kind of half-attention mothers have mastered—present even when they’re talking, ears tuned for the exact sound of trouble.
Bianca’s cannoli is ridiculous. The shell is crisp and flaky, the filling sweet without being too sweet, and there’s powdered sugar on my fingers, damning evidence.
I take another bite.
