Page 86 of His Savage Ruin
"Tell me you found something," I say without preamble.
"Working on it." Enzo's voice is tight with concentration. "But Matteo, we might have a bigger problem. I'm seeing gaps in multiple camera feeds tonight—not just at the Southside club. The downtown warehouse, the Eastside club, even the shipping depot all show brief outages around the same time frame."
My blood runs cold. "Same time as the murders?"
"Within a thirty-minute window. Could be coincidence, could be coordinated." A pause, then Enzo's voice drops lower. "Someone with access to our security systems could pull this off. Someone who knows our protocols."
The traitor—has to be. No outside operator would have this kind of detailed knowledge about our infrastructure, wouldn't know exactly which cameras to disable and when to do it for maximum coverage.
"Pull everyone in," I order, making the decision quickly because there's no time for careful deliberation. "I want every soldier we have checking our properties tonight. Full security sweeps, nothing left to chance. If someone's hitting us, I need to know where and how bad before dawn."
"Understood. What about the bodies?"
"I'll handle cleanup here." I glance at the three dead men, at the blood still spreading slowly across concrete, and feel rage building hot behind my sternum. "Get me names of everyone who had access to security systems in the last seventy-two hours. Cross-reference with anyone who knew the Southside fight schedule."
I end the call and turn back to Rafael, who's finished examining the other two bodies and is standing now with his fists clenched at his sides. His face is carved from stone, but I know him well enough to see the fury barely leashed underneath.
"Same method on all three," he reports.
I spend another twenty minutes going through the equipment room looking for anything the killer might have left behind, but there's nothing—not a hair, not a fingerprint, not a single goddamn clue except the staged corpses.
By the time we leave, dawn is starting to gray the eastern sky.
"This is connected to Alessia," Rafael says quietly as we pull onto the highway heading back toward the estate. "It has to be."
"I know." The admission tastes bitter. The thought of her vulnerable while I'm out chasing shadows makes my hands curl into fists. I should have left more men at the estate, should have anticipated that sending everyone to secure the clubs would leave her exposed.
The estate appears on the horizon just as the sun breaks fully over the trees. Rafael pulls up to the front entrance and I'm out of the SUV before it's fully stopped, my legs eating up the steps to the main door.
Marco is waiting in the foyer, looking nervous and exhausted in equal measure. He straightens when he sees me, his eyes flicking to the blood I know is still visible on my clothes.
"Boss." His voice is careful, like he's not sure how to deliver whatever news he's holding. "A letter arrived forSignoraMoretti about an hour ago. And given everything that's been happening, I thought you should know before we delivered it."
Every muscle in my body goes rigid. Another letter. Another piece in whatever fucking game someone is playing with Alessia's secrets and my patience.
"Where is it?"
Marco produces an envelope from his jacket—cream-colored paper, expensive quality, Alessia's name written across the front in that same looping script I've seen before. "We checked it for physical threats. No poison, no explosives, nothing dangerous."
I take the envelope and turn it over in my hands, feeling the weight of whatever is inside. No return address or postmark. This was hand-delivered, which means someone got close enough to my home to leave this without being seen.
"Double the perimeter guards," I tell Marco without looking up from the envelope. "No one gets within a hundred yards of this house without being stopped and searched. I don't care if they're delivering flowers or taking out trash—everyone gets screened."
"Yes, Boss." Marco nods once and disappears down the hallway, leaving me alone in the foyer with nothing but the envelope and the rage building in my chest. I break the seal with my thumb and pull out the single sheet of paper inside.
The message is short, written in that same looping script:
Have you told the man you sleep with what you do to your lovers when you don't need them anymore?
I read the sentence three times, feeling something cold and dangerous settle in my bones.
What the hell is this letter talking about?
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Alessia
The door opens and Matteo stands in the doorway with blood on his clothes. His eyes find mine across the room, and I can see that he looks angry but most of all—confused.
