Dante doesn’t answer that which is answer enough.
My hand presses harder to my stomach. “Dante.”
“I’m here.”
The steadiness of his voice is almost enough to keep me from breaking apart.
“What if Lorenzo doesn’t believe me?”
Dante is quiet for a beat too long.
Then he says, “He will.”
The certainty in his voice makes my throat tighten.
“How do you know?”
“Because men like him can forgive the woman they love for lying long before they forgive a man they trusted for betraying them.”
The words hit in a place I don’t want to examine too closely. I look toward the windows, the blazing city beyond them, and all I can think is that everything is narrowing again. Funneling toward something I can’t yet see.
“I don’t know what Francesca wants,” I whisper. “I don’t know if she came to help me or to warn me or to use me again.”
“You don’t need to know that right now.”
“I feel like I do.”
“No.” His voice hardens. “Right now, you need to stay alive.”
I nod before I remember he can’t see me. “Okay.”
“Good.”
I close my eyes for a second, then open them. “If Lorenzo calls you?—”
“I won’t lie.”
That surprises me enough to make me still.
Dante continues, “I’m not interested in playing games with this. If Cesaro did what you say, then I want him dead almost as much as Conti will.”
A shiver runs through me.
“Birdie,” he says more softly, “stay on the phone with me until he calls back.”
I glance at the screen. No missed call or text.
I exhale. “I will. Be safe.”
I end the call and then I pray. Because that’s all I can do for now.
29
Dante
I turn to my men.
“New mission. We find Conti’s second-in-command and kill him. Tonight.”
