The glass I’m holding explodes into shards. A red-hot line of fire streaks across my forearm.
There are several more cracks, and some of the restaurant windows splinter and shower pieces of glass all over us. I grab Lucy and pull her beneath the table.
We’re being fired upon from the outside.
“I knew it, it’s an ambush,” Vincenzo roars, somewhere above my head. “I’ll fucking kill you, Barone.”
There’s the sound of him and the others returning fire. In my arms, Lucy is chalk white, but she’s not panicking.
“Stay down,” I tell her, and reach inside my jacket for my gun.
I can hear Antonio and Giovanni shouting outside, then more swearing in Italian in voices I don’t recognize that must belong to Vincenzo’s, Rafiel’s, and Cristiano’s men. I sit up slightly to get a look at what’s happening, and something red and flaming hurtles through a smashed window. It’s a glass bottle filled with clear liquid with a burning rag stuffed in the end. Molotovs are not the weapon of choice for any of the Malus families. We’re under siege by Sokolis.
The bottle smashes, setting the white linen and chairs alight. Several more Molotovs are thrown inside from different locations. The fuel from the smashed bottles spills everywhere and instantly ignites.
Cold sweat breaks over me. Screaming fills my head. The Sokolis keep using fire against me like they know my personal fucking trauma.
As smoke fills the restaurant, the flames roar, driven higher and higher by all the fresh oxygen coming in through the smashed windows.
Heat scorches my face. We have moments until we’re suffocated or burned alive.
Beside me, Lucy whimpers in fear, and the sound rouses me out of my panic. For years, Lucy has soothed my nightmares and brought me back from the brink. She saved my life when the Sokolis blew up the warehouse. Now it’s my turn to save her. I brought her into this danger, and I’m the one who has to get her out.
The smoke has rimmed her eyes with red, and we’re both coughing. I seize her hand and pull her toward the back of the restaurant. “This way, quickly.”
She nods and squeezes my hand, her other arm shielding her face.
Both of us keeping low through the sparks and smoke, I lead her through the kitchen and toward the back door. My gun is in my hand, pointed straight ahead, when the exit is yanked open. I see a man with a spider tattoo and a gun. Before he can aim at us, I shoot him in the head, and he goes down. Lucy and I step over his corpse.
Out in the parking lot, the Sokolis are already turning tail and running. But the damage is done.
“Antonio!” I shout, scanning the chaos. Where is he?
Giovanni appears through the smoke, blood streaming down the side of his face from a cut. “Damiano! Antonio’s hit.”
My blood turns to ice. I race toward where Giovanni is pointing, Lucy right behind me. Antonio is slumped against his car, clutching his chest. Blood blooms across his white shirt, spreading fast.
“No, no, no.” I drop to my knees beside him. “Antonio. Antonio, look at me.”
His eyes are glazing over, his breathing labored and wet. The wound is high on his chest. Lung, maybe heart.
Fuck.
“We’re going to help you,” I tell him, pulling his arm across my shoulder to support his weight. “Stay with me.”
Lucy is there, her gun in hand, eyes scanning for threats. “We need to get him to a hospital. Now.”
“They knew,” Antonio whispers, his voice barely audible. “They knew we’d…be here…”
Dread settles in my gut. He’s right. This wasn’t random. The Sokolis knew exactly where to find us.
Someone talked. Or someone was watching.
“Save your strength,” I tell him as Giovanni helps me get Antonio into the car.
Behind us, Cristiano and Vincenzo emerge from the burning restaurant, weapons still drawn. Rafiel is with them, his white shirt stained with soot and blood—not his own, from the looks of it.
“We got two of them,” Vincenzo reports grimly. “The others scattered.”
