She pauses before speaking again. “I’m saying, consider a cost-benefit analysis. If you can’t hold your own organization together, you can’t protect her. And if Kolya is willing to gun down apakhanin Midtown Manhattan to prevent this alliance, what do you think he’ll do next? He’ll come for you at the mansion. He’ll come for your people. He’ll come for her.”
“I know what he’ll do. And that’s why we have to stop him—now.”
“Then act like the leader of an organization, and not like a goddamn Rambo. You’re not a sole operator here. Shore up your captains. Reassure Russo and Bianchi. Give them something concrete to go on.”
“But that will take time. I need my men to do their jobs now. Kolya’s going to take advantage of what he’s just done.”
“But you can’t rush into things. Give it a day or two, at least. Then when you make your move and do it with full force.”
She’s not wrong. And that’s what worries me.
Amanda Reed is brilliant. She’s been with the family for decades. She knows the organization’s pressure points betterthan anyone, except me. And she’s telling me exactly what I need to hear at the moment I need to hear it.
That’s loyalty.
Or positioning.
The words come into my mind unbidden. I want to push them away, but they linger all the same. Could she have an angle? If so, what would it be?
I watch Amanda as she pulls out her phone and starts texting. She’s efficient and composed, showing no signs that, not twenty minutes ago, she was at the scene of a triple homicide.
She’s always been like this, always been good at her job. She’s unflappable to a fault.
It’s what made me end things between her and me. There’s a difference between composure and coldness, and she lives right on the line between the two.
“Who knew about the meeting?” she asks, not looking up from her phone.
“Myself. Max. Alexei.” I nod toward the driver, the partition up. “Dante. And you.”
Her thumbs stop moving. She looks up.
“What?” I ask.
“You’re not suggesting?—”
“I’m not suggesting anything. I’m stating facts.”
“I just found out about Fedorov,” she says. “You told me yourself.”
“I did.”
“So if there’s a leak, the window is twenty-four hours. That’s not enough time to?—”
“It’s plenty of time. One phone call. One text. That’s all it would take.”
Her jaw tightens. “I’ve given you ten years of my life, Gabriel. Ten years of keeping your secrets, cleaning up your messes, and protecting this family in ways that would get me disbarred if anyone ever found out. And now you’re asking me if I sold you out to goddamn Kolya Sokolov?”
I say nothing at first. She makes a good case—that is her job, after all. I don’t want to believe that she would do such a thing, but the message my gut sends is clear.
Don’t trust her.
All the same, an accusation with nothing backing it wouldn’t accomplish much.
“I’m running on adrenaline here.”
She narrows her eyes a bit, giving my words consideration.
“It was a hell of a thing that happened. Makes sense you’d want to get to the bottom of it ASAP. Water under the bridge.”
