Page 21 of Wicked Mafia Sinner

“Da, moy brat. I’ll call. This is probably nothing.” I pass the wish to him and let him read it.

He hands it back and nods. “Go.”

I walk to the elevator and the doors close behind me. Less than forty-five seconds later I'm in the car and hitting late Chicago traffic.

The address from the wish glows on the navigation screen. The city opens around me. I press the accelerator and the engine responds. The fear of that sweet angel getting hurt guts me. I swerve around a pack of teens joyriding and hug the corner as I turn off the main drag and gun it toward her house.

Like hell Cora Vale is going to die tonight. I break every traffic law this city has to prove fate wrong.

Five

Cora

Yesterday morning I was in Heaven. Now, this is pretty much hell.

I count the heavy thudding against my hardwood flooring.

Three? No. Five sets of boots.

My wet fingers tighten around the chef's knife on the counter. The rolling pin sits on the toilet lid where I left it before I got in the shower. A quick glance tells me my gardening boots are kicked against the baseboard next to the tub, where I left them but I don’t dare make a move for them. Not when I have more important things to cover than my feet.

I yank the towel off the rack and wrap it around myself with zero grace and all desperation. I found it on clearance sale and didn't mind that it couldn't cover my top half and my lower half at the same time.

Tonight, it’s a big issue.

What a surprise. Nothing else has gone right for me, so why should it now? I tuck the bunched up end between my breasts and shoot up a prayer that it stays put.

My feet find the boots and I shove into them, wet skin squeaking against plastic. I pause, hoping no one heard me.

Wiggling my toes, I push my heel the rest of the way into the boot. The folded paper in the right one presses into the arch.

As plans of not dying tonight goes, I have my rolling pin in my right hand and the knife in my left. Soap suds run down my neck from the shampoo I will apparently be wearing for the rest of my tragically short life.

I catch a glimpse of myself in the fogged mirror. I look like an asylum escapee. A soaking wet, towel-wrapped, boot-stomping asylum escapee armed with kitchen implements and enough fury to power a small city.

Good. Maybe I’ll scare everyone to death.

The boots squelch on tile as I press my ear to the door.

Footsteps move through my apartment, heavy and deliberate.

“Where the hell is she?”

One of the men grunt out from down the hall and in the direction of my bedroom.

“How the hell should I know, man? Keep lookin’.” Another voice barks from the living room.

“Both of you shut the fuck up and listen.”

I immediately jerk away from the door. All the air in my lungs turns solid. I can’t inhale or exhale. I’m too scared too because that voice came from right in front of the bathroom door and he sounds wickedly huge. If a boulder had a voice that was it. And in my limited experience with mafia men and their hitmen, there's no way he’s a manageable size.

I death grip my weapons. I got this. I came home knowing I would be facing a death squad. I should have Home-Aloned my apartment and set some traps, but hindsight and all that.

I flip the knife over in my hand and make sure I have the razor thin edge pointing outward. Maybe next time I’m up for an early grave I’ll do better, but this time around I’m going to work with what I have.

These fuckers are expecting a scared girl huddled in a closet or under a bed with her hands over her mouth.

They have not met this girl.