Page 84 of Corrupted Temptation (Mafia Kings: Corrupted 2)

Gabe needed to get his head in the game. Even though I spent the past few hours reciting apology speeches in my head, I was never going to admit that to Gabe. That kind of ammunition just wasn’t something a smart man handed over.

“Don’t you think you have more important things than my personal life to worry about?”

He looked around exaggeratedly as if he was looking for something then shook his head. “Nope. Your personal life is pretty much at the top of my list at the moment.”

Stronzo.“You need to get a life,fratello.”

“I don’t think so. I get all the excitement I need living vicariously through yours.”

Gabe was smiling, but there was something guarded about him—like hewas keeping secrets, but now wasn’t the time to pester him about them.

“So, when are you going to pop the question?” he asked as I slid off the highway and merged into city traffic.

I had a feeling Gabe was watching way too manySex in the Cityreruns.

“You’re going to have to close your mouth eventually, you know?” he said. “And that was our turn, wasn’t it?” He was still grinning while he pointed as I drove right past the intersection.

I clicked my tongue. I watched in my rearview mirror as our men made the turn I missed.

I had to wait to make a U-turn because there was too much traffic. I glanced at my rearview again then did a double take. Thesame black car I saw a few miles back was still tailing us, keeping two cars’ distance between us as it had earlier.

There was about a negative zero chance of it being a coincidence.

I should have noticed sooner. I tightened my grip on the steering wheel.

I’m getting sloppy.

I pushed all other thoughts out of my mind and led the car off the main road. I slammed my foot on the gas to get ahead of them just long enough to bring the Porsche screeching to a stop and get out before the car turned onto the side street behind.

Gabe and I faded into the shadows cast by the tall red-brick buildings that flanked the narrow street. Thanks to the tinted windows on the Porsche, whoever had been following us would have to get their asses real close before they realized no one was in the car.

Their car sat idling for a full minute before all four doors opened and four men stepped out, all of them with inflatable ring arms and bulging neck muscles. It was a wonder they fit inside the black midsize sedan.

They all had their guns drawn as they approached my car. Their eyes seemed to be fixed on the driver’s side door, so much they didn’t even bother looking around. It would have been so easy to take them out. Four quick shots, and they’d be the suckling pigs at the next Costa meeting.

But I needed them alive to know what the hell was going on.

No one in their right mind would be stupid enough to try to get the jump on me. Everyone knew that.

I had a lot of questions that I needed answers to. Fortunately, I didn’t need all of four of them for that. One would suffice.

I signaled to Gabe, and we fired bullets into two of the thugs’ heads. They dropped to the ground as the gunshots reverberated off the building walls of the narrow street. The remaining two spun around at the same time Gabe and I lunged.

I knocked the gun out of the hand of the man nearest me while Gabe cracked the other guy over the back of the head with his gun.

“I want him alive,” I said to Gabe as I grabbed my guy’s arm and twisted it behind his back.

Gabe’s guy swayed as he spun to face his attacker.

“You got it, boss,” Gabe said as he cocked back and connected with an upper cut that sent the guy’s head snapping back. His body followed, and he slammed into the Porsche before dropping to the ground like a two-hundred-and-twenty-pound sack of potatoes. Two blows to the head, and the guy was down for the count.

“Nice work,fratello,” I said as I twisted my guy’s arm back further until his shoulder popped out of its socket.

I probably would have toyed with the guy before—Nico Costa had a reputation to uphold—but I was done. I just wanted it over with, so I pulled the trigger. The guy’s body jolted against my hold while the crack of the gunshot reverberated off the walls, and then he joined his comrade, facedown on the cracked pavement.

I nodded to the Porsche. Gabe popped the trunk before he returned to help lift our one piece of unconscious luggage inside.

It took a bit of bending and shoving, but eventually, the luggage fit.

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