Page 29 of Duke of Ruin

“What the hell is going on?” I ask.

“I guess your undercoverfriendcame clean, since you came back to us,” my father says without looking at me. I narrow my eyes at him, but I don’t answer. They know about Noah? “I wish this could be different, Eli. You had so much potential.”

“What? You wish what was different?” I ask. I start reaching for the handle, but my father turns to me.

“You weren’t supposed to survive,” he says again.

“Survive what?”

“We had a fucking deal, Eli,” my father says, and my chest constricts. I know I won’t like where this ends. “We were working with the Chief of Police to bring down the Russians. They’ve been shorting us for a while now, and we wanted to send them a message.”

“What does that have to do with me?” I ask, inching closer to the door.

“You did exactly what you were supposed to do. You lead the narc right to the weapons, but you were supposed to die. If you survive, then the Russians will know we were working with the cops.”

I shake my head as the pieces fall into place. They weren’t worried about Noah being undercover; they were worried that I’d figure it out before they could pull off this bullshit raid.

“So you have the cops doing your dirty work,” I whisper. I shift in my seat. “So what? I’m just collateral damage?”

“Yes,” my father says, and looks back down at the gun in his lap.

“You’re willing to kill your own son for a business deal?”

“It’s more than that,” he says as he finally looks at me, his eyes dark and calculating. “This raid secured much more than just getting the attention of the Russians. Now that they know how hot the market is they’ll be willing to pay much steeper prices for our products, most of which are supplied by the PD. It also secures the Chief’s alliance with us. We won’t have to bother with keeping our heads down if the cops won’t touch us.”

“And you get all this for the low, low, price of Eli Carbone,” I growl. Suddenly, I wish Noah was here. It looks like he was just as much a pawn in all of this as I was. The thought of a cabin in California suddenly feels very enticing.

“I didn’t want it to be this way,” my father says, and it almost seems like genuine pain in his voice. I pull in a deep breath. Noah lied to me, my own family used me as an expendable playing chip, and my whole world is crumbling around me. I lean back in resignation. This is it. This is the end.

“Fucking get it over with, then,” I say, and close my eyes.

“Get out of the car,” my father says. I should have expected that. He wouldn’t want to have to clean my blood out of his fucking car. I do as he says. There’s really no point in fighting anymore.

He gets out behind me and trains the gun on my back. I lift my good hand into the air and walk toward the waterfront. I step up to the edge and close my eyes, waiting to welcome the darkness.

I hear a loud pop and flinch, but the anticipated pain doesn’t come. I open my eyes when I hear a heavy splash and look down to see a body floating on the water…my father’s body. I gulp for air as I look around. A man stumbles out from behind a cargo trailer and trains an unsteady weapon on me.

“Where’s Sorrento?” the man growls at me. His clothes are torn and bloody, and he looks like he’s taken more than one gunshot. I narrow my eyes at him as he stumbles toward me. I take a few tentative steps away from the water’s edge. “Don’t move or you’re next,” the man gasps, but he can barely stand.

“I don’t know where he is. Who are you?” I ask, keeping my hand in the air. I take a few more steps, distancing myself from the black water.

“I’m his fucking handler, the guy he’ssupposedto be working for,” the man says.

I blink a few times in confusion.

“You.” He stumbles and drops to one knee. “You fucked up everything. He actually called you ‘innocent,’ the fucking halfwit.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say as I put more distance between us.

“He blew the whole damn operation,” the man continues, though I think he’s talking more to himself than me. “I guess you know him as Noah Andriotta.” I narrow my eyes. “I had all the fucking Carbones dead to rights. You were all going down, but he had to go and catch feelings for a fucking thug!”

He pulls the trigger and I drop to the ground, my injured shoulder screaming. He misses three shots before the gun starts clicking. The man drops to his hands and knees and tries to fumble around in his pockets for a new clip, and I take the opportunity to run. I scramble to my feet and zigzag through the cargo trailers until he’s lost behind me. I can hear him shouting incoherently, but I keep moving, even though I have no idea where I’m going.

When I finally get my bearings, I realize that my apartment is close by. I have no idea if it’s safe anymore, but it’s the only place I can go right now. I quickly get inside and bolt up the stairs until I’m safely locked behind the door. I pull a picture off the wall to expose a small safe, the only secret I have left. I pull out a few stacks of cash and the keys to a car that’s been parked in the garage for months. It might not even start, but I have to run. I put it all into a small bag and look around, then grab a couple changes of clothes and shove them into the bag, too.

Dizziness rushes over me, so I sit down on the bed, then fall down onto it. The pillows still smell like Noah, and emotion overwhelms me. Tears flood my eyes as I bury my face in Noah’s scent. This is all too much. I can’t even bring myself to believe it’s worth the hassle to run. The Carbones will never stop looking for me, and neither will the police. Noah is gone, my father is dead, and my uncle is a heartless bastard. Nothing is as it should be. The world has shattered and I don’t know why I should bother picking up the pieces.

Pain stabs at my shoulder as I cry into the pillow. Even though I know he’s a lying asshole, I’d give anything for Noah to be here with me right now. Darkness starts to close in around the edges of my vision, and I know I won’t be awake much longer. If I’m lucky I won’t wake up at all. The dark finally envelops me completely, and I fall into a dreamless sleep.

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