Page 47 of Killer Love

I spin around to stare him down. “I agreed to send you home. Until then, you will be useful.”

“By killing dozens of mafia guards?”

“That’s what you do, isn’t it?”

“Not anymore.”

“What do you want?” I ask. “You want money? I’ll pay you. Fifty-thousand American for every kill. Easy money for a guy like you, yes?”

“I’m escaping Snake Eyes because I never wanted to be a killer,” he says, furrowing his brow. “This isn’t about money.”

“No, you’re right,” I say. “It’s about family and I’m not leaving mine behind to be slaughtered in their sleep by a fucking rat like Giovani Zappia. You want to go home? This is how you get there.”

Fox exhales, releasing the tension in his face. “Fine,” he says.

Yuri passes around us with his head down.

“Yuri,” I say.

“I won’t take part in this.” He keeps his eyes low. “You do what you want. Leave me out of it.”

I follow him to the car. “Brother—”

“Don’t call me that,” he says. “No, you don’t get to be my brother right now, Luka.”

He yanks the car door open, but I slam it closed. “You’d take Gio’s side over mine? After everything he was planning to do to us?”

“You got in bed with the Zappias first.”

“And I’d do it again,” I growl. “It might not look like it, Yuri… but I did the right thing.”

“For who?” he asks. “The way I see it, what you did helped nobody but yourself. You betrayed their trust, you betrayed our family, and, in the end, every drop of blood shed over this will be on your hands. Did you even consider that?”

“Yes.”

“Then, why do it?”

“You saw how he treated her — how they’ve always treated her.”

“So, what? That wasn’t your problem.”

“I made it my problem.”

“You certainly did.” He scoffs as he pulls the door open again. “And here I thought you were the smarter brother.”

I let him lower himself into the car and he jerks the door closed behind him.

There was only one way this could end. Gio may have been content with whittling the Lutrova influence down in the beginning, but now…

Sofia said she wanted to start a war and that’s exactly what this is.

Still, I meant what I said. I’d do it all over again if it meant looking into that boy’s silver eyes one last time.

I look over my shoulder at Fox. He stands there, calm and silent, with a blank expression on his face.

“You have something to say?” I ask.

He shakes his head once.

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