Page 78 of The Fall of a Promise

I’m already shaking my head. “Let him sweat.”

“We should hear him out, Nico.”

“I just gave him his time to speak. He didn’t say shit.”

“No, you didn’t. You weren’t willing to listen, and he knew that.”

“Either way, we can deal with this after we take out Caishen.”

Anya opens her mouth as if to argue but, uncharacteristically, just nods.

ANYA

I take deep breaths to shake out my nerves. Sitting in the back of the blacked-out van, I look over at Nico as he inspects each of his weapons before concealing them. Tonight’s the night we take out Goh. We’ve set it up to look like a robbery gone wrong. Who wouldn’t believe it? A billionaire on a yacht with his escort. The story will sell itself.

None of us feel good about this, but what choice do we have? Time isn’t on our side. We’re all here because I was dumb enough to think Grayson wanted a family. I’ll never make that mistake again.

“Hey,” Nico calls, breaking me out of my thoughts. “None of that. We’ll deal with him.” He reassures me as if he could read my mind.

“It’s scary when you do that.” He smiles.

Nico had his suspicions, and I ignored him.

“I know my girl,” he says, leaning in for a kiss.

Dante types away as he accesses all the exterior cameras around the dock to make sure they’re on a loop, so our movement goes undetected.

Nico found out Caishen’s whereabouts tonight. He’ll be spending it on a yacht with a high-end prostitute. I’m not sure if he’s just arrogant, an idiot, or both, but he’s using a prostitute employed by the Cosa Nostra. We paid her off to trade places with me. She couldn’t have agreed faster. I’m certain she would’ve paidmeto swap places. Adjusting the blonde wig on my head, I look into my reflection before sliding my sunglasses on.

“He’s totally going to know it’s me,” I tell my husband.

“You just need to be able to get in front of him and take him out. I’ll be right there outside the room if anything goes wrong.”

“It’s go time,” Dante says.

He and Nico exit first, and I wait the allotted three minutes before I make my move.

Exiting the vehicle, Maya is making a scene, pretending to be drunk as she flirts with the guards at the entrance of the dock. I hated pulling her into this, but I needed someone they likely wouldn’t recognize and someone we could trust. She’s since changed her hair, so I’m hoping it works in our favor. She jumped at the opportunity.

I feel like a spy!she yelled excitedly.

We also brought in one of our drug dealers, Marcus. He’s a fearless son of a bitch, and his gambling debts had him desperate enough to do this, asking no questions. Any of our men would’ve been too recognizable.

The guards see me approach and search my coat, only to find nothing. As they let me through, one guard speaks into a walkie-talkie to let the other guards know I’m on my way.

That’s Marcus’s cue.

“Baby! How’d you get out here?” He strolls up in nothing but his boxers and a robe to Maya, who pretends to fall over. The two guards rush to her rescue as she drops the wine bottle, making a loud enough crash to hide the sound of Marcus sliding a small pouch with my gun and silencer to me. Once it’s in my hand, I see him grab Maya before Tao and Kai run out and subdue the guards.

“First two are taken care of.”

Kai’s voice echoes in my ear.

“There’s three more guards on the roof, so we’re staying back a couple hundred yards,”Nico replies.

Slipping the items into my pocket, I turn the corner to see the two guards at the front. They open the door, expecting my arrival. I walk past them only to turn around and, in one beat, pull the silencer out, attach it to my weapon, and shoot them both in the back of the head before they have a chance to process.

The rest of the plan was simple.

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