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“The fuck are you doing?”

“Just putting ‘loser control freak’ right underneath ‘psychopathic murderer’ on your character sheet.”

I exhale tightly. “I don’t think you’re quite grasping what went wrong here.”

“You did, motherfucker,” she spits. “You went wrong. I had things ticking along nicely and you fucked it up⁠—”

“There’s more to this than you cosplaying Harley Quinn, Murder Muppet!”

Bella immediately bursts into peals of laughter. “Murder Muppet?! Did you seriously just fucking call me Murder Muppet?!”

“If the shoe fits,” I hiss.

“I am so stealing that,” she cackles.

“Steal whatever you want!” I snarl. “But Carl Bigsby was part of a bigger fucking picture⁠—”

“Kasper Sorel, yeah,” she says flatly, shrugging.

I frown.

“Uh-oh…” Bella grins devilishly at me. “Looks like you’re not the only one who did his homework, shitweasel.”

Shitweasel?

“I know all about Sorel,” she says coldly. “And he’s on my list.”

I bark a laugh. “Your list. What are you, the Unabomber?”

“It’s called manifesting, Lamiano.”

I bite down on the sour taste of annoyance in my mouth.

“Pro tip,” I snap. “The guy at the top might get a little spooked when you start burning down buildings to get to his underlings! You little. Fucking. Psycho⁠—”

It happens faster than I can blink. There's a glint of darkness in her blue eyes before suddenly, something sharp is jamming into my neck. My hand flies up, and my mouth falls open as my fingers wrap around one of the darts from my tranquilizer gun.

Oh fuck.

“Sorry,” Bella pouts exaggeratedly. “Were you saying something? I was only half listening. But it was real patronizing, made you sound like a whiny little bitch, and you used a word I asked you nicely not to!”

My legs give out, dropping me to my knees.

Shit.

I’m not able to move a muscle as she crouches down and takes my hand.

“Wow. That’s a really nice ring.”

My eyes swivel down to the signet ring my father handed down to me on my eighteenth birthday. It has the Barone family crest carved in blood-red stone and set into obsidian, and has belonged to four generations of Barone men.

Murder Muppet is currently slipping it off my unmoving ring finger.

“What can I say, Lamiano,” she grins. “I do love me a good trophy.”

Sirens wail in the distance.

“Hey, so, great hang,” Bella sighs, “but I think that’s my cue to leave.” She pats my cheek and winks at me before she whirls and starts to skip—literally skip—into the shadows.