Page 98 of Tainted Love

“That morning, Marty came knocking on my door. He told me that he wanted to take over the family. That you were a thug like your father and his father before him.”

“You’re lying.”

“He ordered the hit on the restaurant. When it failed, he asked me to kill you. I said no.”

Zappia pauses and his eyes drift over to Enzo. They share a look of apprehension and doubt. “You got proof?”

“My word only,” I say. “I understand your hesitation, Mr. Zappia. He is your son. But if you ask me, I’ll be doing you a favor.”

He leans back in his chair and gives his beard a quick, dry rub. This doesn’t seem at all surprising to him meaning he’s already suspected it of young, ambitious Marty. The black sheep of the Zappia clan.

“If I can confirm this…” he begins, “then I’ll take care of it myself.”

It could mean a thousand different things but the only thing it doesn’t mean is that I get to pull the trigger.

“I’m sure you can imagine that confirming his death is very important to me.”

“If that happens, I’ll be sure to drop you a postcard,” he says. “But this is my family and we have our ways of dealing with this.”

“Not good enough.” I keep my calm. “I didn’t come here to negotiate his life. I came here to put a bullet between his eyes, just like he did to Terrance Vaughn, and I’m not leaving here until I do. It’s up to you whether or not the rest of you go down with him.”

He fidgets back and forth and his chair squeaks beneath him. I see his eyes drop to his desk, no doubt searching for some sort of weapon to take us on with. There’s nothing worth using and he knows that if I don’t shoot him first, Lilah or Elijah will.

Finally, he sighs. “All right…” He spins to look over his shoulder at the monitors and his eyes scan the crowds downstairs.

I look with him and I instantly catch sight of Marty at the poker table in the same chair he sat in every Friday night for six months. There’s only one other player at the table. A girl who looks almost like—

Lucy.

I lunge closer, accidentally bashing my knees into his desk. Zappia lurches from fear and follows my eyes to the monitor.

“Turn up the sound,” I tell him, keeping my eyes locked on her face.

“Dante…” Lilah crosses the room and pauses behind me, her eyes bugging out of her head like mine. “What is she—”

“You have something I want…” Her voice cuts me to the bone. It’s her. It’s really fucking her. “And I have something you want. It’s pretty simple.”

“What do you have that I want?”

“Dante Hart.”

Goddammit, Lucy.

I roll my hands into fists. What the fuck is she doing here? How is she here? She can’t be here right now. She—

“Where is he?”

Marty’s voice is just as grating as ever. I fight the fantasy of ripping his throat out with my bare hands.

“I can show you where you can find him… if you win.”

“And if you win?”

“You die.”

She came out here to confront him herself. Not only that, she’s offering me up as bait.

No. I don’t think so.

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