Page 143 of Kings & Chaos

“I asked if you know what you’re going to say,” he said. “To your mom.”

“I’m just going to tell her the truth. I’ll tell her about the cabins and the holding company named Genarro.” I thought about the last three months, trying to gather evidence I could use to convince her she was married to a killer. “I’ll tell her about the packages, the hair.”

“I thought about that too,” Rock said, shaking his head. “Fuck.”

“Yeah.”

The first package had been one thing. I’d dropped my earring in or near Dean Giordana’s office. I’d guessed someone had been watching me come or go, but I’d been wrong about that. Dean Giordana had probably found the earring and told Roberto, who’d pieced it together as mine. Not difficult considering I’d bought the earrings in India and had worn them constantly once I got back.

But the hair had stumped me. Assuming it was really mine — and it looked like it was — I couldn’t figure out how someone could have gotten some of my hair for the second package.

Now I remembered my stuff piled into the bland guest room at Roberto’s house. My mom had clearly packed everything up from the old house and had it brought to Roberto’s. Had there been an old hairbrush in there?

Knowing me? Probably.

“If she tells him, he’s going to come for us,” I said. “All of us.”

The odds of my mom blowing me off and ratting to Roberto were high. She’d finally found the security she craved. She wasn’t going to walk away.

But if I didn’t try to warn her now and something happened to her later, I’d never be able to forgive myself.

I had to try.

“We know,” Rock said, reaching over to rest his hand on my knee. “It’s okay. We understand that you have to do this.”

I chewed on my thumbnail. “I don’t want anyone to get hurt because of me.”

And it was starting to seem like no matter what I did, someone was always going to get hurt.

“Hey,” he said, squeezing my knee. I looked over at him. “None of this is your fault. Roberto is a fucking psycho. He likes to hurt people. He always has. Youknowthat. Don’t let him fuck with your head.”

I nodded and took a deep breath.

“We’re going to figure this out,” Rock continued, his eyes on the road. “The good thing about targeting a Mafia boss is that he has a lot of enemies. It’s not going to be hard to find someone to pin his murder on.”

I rubbed my forehead. “You’re making it sound easy.”

“No,” he said firmly. “I know it won’t be easy to pull it off. We’ll have to be careful. Really fucking careful. But in case you haven’t noticed, kitten, we’ve been really fucking careful for a while now.”

I breathed in a breath and nodded. He was right. The Kings had obviously made a lot of money, had set up both the house in Blackwell Falls and the one on the island, and they had contacts who could help them, like Aloha with the Blades.

They might not have Roberto’s power, but they’d had the luxury of operating under the radar, and from the looks of things, they had a lot of resources at their disposal.

“It’ll be okay,” Rock said. “Let’s just take this one step at a time.”

His eyes darted to the rearview mirror and he hit the gas. The Audi accelerated, and Rock cursed under his breath, his eyes still on the mirror.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“I think we have a tail.”

“A tail?” I turned around in my seat. A black SUV with tinted windows was behind us. I watched as it accelerated until it was right on our ass. “They’re following us?”

“Your seat belt fastened?” Rock asked, his voice tense.

It was, but I pulled on it anyway to make sure it was secure. “Yes.”

“Hang on,” he said. “This might get rough.”

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