Page 40 of Assassin's Obsession

He pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs. "The difference is we already reconned this alley for listening devices and cameras earlier tonight."

"That doesn't mean there's nothing at my boss's end," Freddy says, proving he would make the perfect himbo. Pretty to look at but not a lot going on between his ears.

"Do I tell him, or will you?" Mario asks.

But it's kneeling guy who says patronizingly, "What are you? Stupid? Putting your boss on speaker ain't got nothing to do with what gets heard at his end."

Freddy grimaces and I almost feel sorry for him. Except,willing to kill me.

"Doesn't matter. Don't mean I want you listening in on my phone call," Freddy says belligerently.

Mario sites Freddy down the barrel of his gun. "Do what Derian says or I shoot you and we make the call."

Freddy glares, but he makes a production of calling his boss and then putting it on speaker while it's dialing.

"Is it done?" a harsh voice asks without saying hello, or anything else.

"Not yet." Freddy pauses. "There's a complication…"

"What kind of complication?" his boss asks in a tone that would make me worried about keeping my job.

In the mafia, I don't think that means just getting fired either.

"Well, first…this broad came out into the alley where we had the mark on his knees, ready to do what you ordered."

"Yeah, so?"

"She overheard too much to let her go." Freddy gives me an apologetic look.

Nowhe's sorry?

"So, take care of it."

Take care of it.Kill her, he means. Jerk.

I cross my arms over my chest and glare around the group of men. "I'm not disposable."

"Is that her? Why the fuck is she still breathing?" his boss demands.

"About that—"

"Let me talk to Gino. He should have been the one to call me."

Freddy tugs at his shirt collar. "Uh, you can't, Mr. Bianchi."

The other man slips into Italian, but I don't care that I can't understand what he's saying. Only one thing registers: the name of the man on the other end of the line. There's only one capo by that name in the Genovese Family.

Stefano Bianchi. The sperm donor.

My biological father.

I tune back into the phone call as Freddy says, "Gino got on the wrong side of Death's crew."

Stefano barks a single word that triggers a torrent of them out of Freddy's mouth.

"Derian and Mario showed up when I was chasing after the strip…" Freddy looks at me. "Dancer. They said we couldn't waste her and Gino didn't like hearing that. He, uh, he called her a bitch and she says, just shoot him already and Mario did."

"Mario shot one of my men?" Stefano asks in shocked fury. "Where?"

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