Page 42 of Wrong Pawn. Right Capo.

“Adrian, stop!” I scream, but Adrian cocks his gun again. “Please just stop!”

Without thinking, I wedge myself between the two of them.

“Bastard!” Adrian growls, a deadly haze in his eyes. He looks possessed… consumed by a revenge too sinister, and as he looks at me, it seems to intensify.

“Get out of the way, Elena.” His voice is strained, like he’s barely holding back.

“No. No, please.” My plea is a mixture of sobs and snot. “Please, Adrian, you’ll…you’ll kill him. He’s the only man who ever cared about me. Please.”

“Well, he killed everyone who ever cared about me. And now, he’ll rot in hell.”

“Your father, Marco Bellandini…” Enzo croaks, snapping our attention to him. “He was in a secret association with Dean and Valente. You know them both.”

As he tries to speak, sweat gathers rapidly along Enzo’s forehead and starts to trickle down.

“T-They formed it t-to… ahhh!” He groans as blood spurts from his shoulder.

“He’ll die. He’ll die, Adrian. If you want answers, he has to fucking live!” I sob.

He grits his teeth, hesitation flickering in his eyes before he grabs a towel from the desk and tosses it at me.

“Apply pressure to stop the bleeding. He’ll live long enough to say what he has to.”

I’m angry at his words, but I quickly grab the towel and press it against his wounded shoulder, eliciting a low curse from him. When I look at his foot, I see it’s also still bleeding profusely.

“I need another towel.”

“That’s enough,” Adrian hisses. Then he cocks his gun at Enzo again. “Start talking.”

I rip the hem of my dress and quickly tie it around his foot before reapplying pressure on his shoulder.

“…They formed it to build a private laundering network, with the goal to create a system that allowed them to clean money discreetly without relying on the bigger, more dangerous syndicates.” Enzo coughs violently, the sound a mix of pain and exhaustion. I press down tighter.

“But one day, a deal came in from the ex-commissioner. He said they had to protect a man, Victor Caughn, promising political immunity in return, which the three families needed at the time. But your father, Marco, wasn’t comfortable with it, even though the pay was huge.”

“Dean ordered my father to be killed over non-compliance to a deal?” Adrian frowns.

“No. Marco tried to dig into this Victor Caughn guy, but he was a ghost. The officer said Victor was a federal witness in a billion-dollar corruption case, and there was a mole in the system, which is why the police couldn’t protect him.” He coughs again, this time longer, then his voice grows weaker as he continues. “But Marco said he searched, and the guy didn’t exist. He smelled something fishy, so he pulled out of the deal,” he explains.

“…Valente first told Dean of Marco’s intention to rat them out to federal agents. When Dean didn’t believe him, Valente presented hard evidence. Knowing how greedy Dean was, he prompted orders for the massacre. Dean couldn’t afford any sabotage in that deal just when it felt like they were at the edge of a breakthrough.”

There’s silence for a beat. Enzo’s eyes flutter open and close, and I see the wheels turning in Adrian’s head.

Shit. There’s no time.

“We need to get hi—” I start, but an angry Adrian cuts me off.

“Lies,” he growls. “My father would never rat them out just like that.”

In a split second, Adrian is before us, yanking Enzo from my hold and fisting his collar. “Is that how cowardly you are? Dishing out lies to avoid death?”

Enzo winces, struggling to keep his head upright. “The massacre happened years ago. What use is lying to you now? Trust me, son, every day since that day, I’ve drowned in guilt. It didn’t feel right to me to murder Marco and his family, but you already know that in our world, an order is an order.”

Adrian sneers in his face. “Why should I believe you?”

“Because I’m already a dead man.” Enzo coughs. “You want more answers, find Valente.”

With that, he slumps.