Page 140 of Mafia King’s Dangerous Vow

The driver opens the door. Mikhail steps out first, scans the street with that lazy stillness he uses when he wants people to underestimate him, then offers me a hand.

I take it this time.

Maya reaches us before the car door closes. She nods at Mikhail, takes in the second SUV idling behind ours, and decides to let it go.

“Malcolm is upstairs,” she says.

“I gathered.”

“He says the opening looked too narrow once framed.”

“Of course he does.”

“I brought the signed scope.”

“I knew there was a reason I kept you.”

She hands Mikhail the roll of drawings without looking at him. He takes it, an easy grin widening. “You’re very comfortable giving orders to men you should be cautious around.”

Maya looks him over once. “You’re very comfortable pretending that bothers you.”

His smile changes. She turns toward the entrance. “Make yourself useful, pretty boy.”

“Missed you, Maya.”

Her step catches, and I start toward the entrance before either of them can make whatever this is becoming into my problem.

Mikhail speaks to the building manager for less than thirty seconds. I don’t hear the questions. I hear the building manager answer three of them.

I step inside the elevator and press twenty-one. My hands are steady. I notice because last week they were not. In my father’s office, I had held them still through force and fury and the terrible discipline of not reaching across his desk to claw the truth out of his mouth.

Today, I have limestone to reject.

It feels almost merciful.

Amelia Healy’s apartment smells of fresh plaster and expensive impatience. Plastic sheeting cuts across the salon entrance. The parquet is protected. The crew has already framed the foyer opening, but incorrectly.

Malcolm Price stands in the foyer with a pencil behind one ear and the tight expression of a man prepared to defend a bad decision with vocabulary.

I stop in front of the framing.

The mistake is subtle enough to be irritating. Sixteen inches too wide on each side. Not catastrophic to anyone who doesn’t understand the point of the room. Enough to ruin it.

“This is not the approved dimension,” I say.

“We made a field adjustment.”

“No.”

His jaw tightens. “The original revision felt compressed.”

“That was the purpose of the revision.”

Maya pulls up the signed scope on her tablet and turns the screen toward him. Malcolm looks at it. Then at the wall. Then back at me.

“It can be corrected.”

“It will be corrected.”