Page 104 of The Woman with the Target on her Back (Grassi Family)

“By what?” Sheryl asked, seeming to enjoy this, judging by the little smirk toying with her lips.

“By your associating with fuck-ups like Stan,” she said. “Who doesn’t even know how to strangle a woman half his size to death,” she went on, and, fuck, was I proud of her in that moment. There was no emotion there, no way for them to know they’d gotten to her, even if I knew they had. She was cool. She was fuckingice-cold. “I never figured you for such a fool,” she added.

That cut through Sheryl’s unbothered facade like a hot knife. All that humor fell, leaving her instantly uglier as her jaw tensed, as her eyes slitted.

“Look who is talking. Someone who had been fooled foryears,” Sheryl shot back.

“Maybe,” Traveler agreed. “But at least I associate with people who know what the fuck they’re doing,” she said, and this time, it was Traveler who smirked. “You might need to be looking for a new acne-covered lackey, by the way,” she added, leaving off that the guy was likely just running for his life when he got free, letting her old friend think I’d killed him.

Sheryl’s eyes flared for a moment before she banked down the emotion. “Yes, you are an interesting development, aren’t you?” she asked, looking at me. “You’re not from around here,” she added.

“No, I’m not,” I agreed, wondering how long we were going to have to have this fucking conversation before it would be safe to shoot.

But Stan was way too close to Traveler’s father, a nasty-looking serrated knife in his hand. Strained relationship or not, I had to make sure that man made it through this night.

“You don’t look like a drug dealer,” Sheryl said, trying to read me.

“Because I’m not,” I said, nodding.

It was Stan’s lifetime on the force that had him putting the pieces together much more quickly.

His gaze cut to the woman who was supposed to be his niece, his family—even if it wasn’t by blood—, who he was meant to care for and protect. Not attempt to murder.

“How’d you get wrapped up with the mob?” he asked, voice low and rough.

Because if there was ever a big fucking wrench in your plans, it was knowing you had just gotten on the wrong side of the mafia.

There were gangs. Then there were crews. There were even organizations.

But way at the tippy fucking top of the criminal food chain was where the mob always had, and always would, sit.

The thing that made the mafia powerful was the very thing no one else could replicate. The loyalty that came from blood. The generations worth of connection-building, or wealth-building, of perfecting the world of crime to get to the point where a capo’s hands were often not even dirty because of the hierarchy in the organization.

Everyone envied the mafia.

And everyone was fucking scared of us too.

Rightfully so.

We’d paid for our reputation in thousands of gallons of blood spilled over generations.

Sheryl’s confidence seemed to falter at that.

It was then I knew.

This wasn’t Stan’s show.

This was hers.

She wasn’t some innocent woman who got wrapped up in the world of drugs and dirty cops.

Oh, no.

She was the queenpin.

The mastermind of this whole operation.

Working right there under Traveler’s nose the whole time, working to create a friendship, so she never got suspicious.

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