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When I said not a word, when I continued to only stare at him, Rocco grew still. “What do you want? If you wanted me dead, I’d be dead already, so you have to want something.” A minute passed, and he grew irate. “Well? Care to fucking tell me what it is?”
I cocked my head at him, letting my gaze travel along his body slowly, all the way down to his feet. He still wore the outfit he’d chosen for the Black Hand party, scuff-free shoes and all. Of course, being attached to a chair, so helpless, did not make him look like a mafia king.
No, he looked like a pathetic man, nothing more.
“You fucking bitch,” he hissed out. “Are you going to talk, or you just going to keep staring at me like that?”
“What was the plan, Rocco?” I spoke, and my voice came out so smooth and calm that I didn’t even sound like myself. I sounded like another girl, one who knew exactly how games like these were played. “When you and Miguel got on the Hand, what was next?”
Rocco chuckled. “Ah, so that’s why, eh? You want to get the deets from me so you can try to stop it from happening. Think I’ll really betray your father that fast?”
Ah, so he was still under the assumption Miguel Santos was my father, and that meant Miguel did not tell him everything. It was quite possible Rocco didn’t know the whole plan. Either way, it wouldn’t really matter. Even if he didn’t know shit, he still would never see the light of day again.
“I think, besides power and money, the most important thing to a man like you is your life,” I spoke with a shrug. “I think you’ll do—or say—anything to keep it. Am I wrong?”
“If you think you can kill me without the entire fucking city turning on you, you’re dumber than you look,” he growled out, though the effect of the threat was certainly lessened due to his current position.
I got up from the stool and gave Rocco my back as I went to the counter where the shiny silver utensils sat. Metallic and bright, even in this shitty light, and as sharp as cutting tools could be.
My fingers grabbed the one that caught my eye the most, and I held it against my chest as I turned around. Rocco’s eyes fell to the knife in my hand, and unless I was mistaken, he paled. The impending threat of death tended to do that to people.
“You know, I hated you for so long. Just you. I blamed myself and you for what happened. It took me so goddamned long to see the truth—it’s Miguel. It always has been. He ruins everything he touches, and he’ll do anything to fulfill his ambitions. He doesn’t care who he kills, who he steps on and destroys… he’d start a war if he could, as long as it got him where he wanted to be.”
Rocco’s mouth was nothing more than a thin line, and he couldn’t take his eyes off the knife.
“I hate him more than I hate you now, so you should consider yourself lucky that you’re the first pawn I’m pulling off the board. You don’t have the right to live to see another day, if I’m being honest here.”
I circled the chair slowly, a vulture in this room of torture and death. “I have nothing left to lose, Rocco,” I whispered, “so I suggest you think long and hard before answering me.” I stopped when I stood near his left shoulder, and I brought the tip of the knife to his face, just beneath his eye. “What other dirt do you have on the Black Hand?”
The tip of the knife dug into his flesh, pricking him enough to draw blood. The man winced, but he said not a word, daring me to do more. It was the question of the year, and it seemed he would continue to refuse to answer.
Right. Time to bring in the backup.
I removed the knife from his face, watching as a thick drip of red blood oozed from the tiny wound. “Ah, Rocco, you being silent right now? Not good—for you. You see, as much as you and Miguel think I’m alone, I’m not. I have my own crew beside me, and they’ll do anything I want them to. If I don’t want to get my hands dirty? I don’t have to.”
I did not tear my eyes off Rocco when I added, “You can come on in. Maybe you can help me get this asshole to talk.”
Ezekiel came in on the ready, pushing a small metal cart that held his own chosen items. He still wore his priest uniform, all black with that tiny square of white on his neck, so given the circumstances and what was about to happen, he appeared quite devilish.
My heart did something funny when he waltzed in, almost like my heart was reminding me: that devil belongs to you.
Rocco appeared unimpressed. As Ezekiel pushed his cart to his right side, Rocco growled out, “I’m not afraid of you or your demented priest, girl. If you think you can get away with this—”
“Luca sends his regards,” I said, causing him to stop talking, at least for a little while. “He couldn’t be here to watch you die, but he agrees with me: you have to go. After everything you did to me and to probably countless other girls out there, you’ve gotta go.”
His hesitation made it clear: he didn’t think I’d told Luca about any of it, and he didn’t want to believe me. But, in the end, he settled with saying, “Fuck you.” Ah, the bravado of a man who believed he was untouchable, even while kidnapped and restrained.
What a fool.
Ezekiel took a small scalpel and cut into the fabric of Rocco’s arm, tearing the suit and the sleeve of the shirt below to reveal his skin. Wide open until the fabric hung off his body.
“What are you—” Rocco stopped when Ezekiel grabbed a long rubber strap from the cart. In place of the scalpel, it looked almost ridiculous, but not if you knew what it was for. He tried to scoot away from him, but he couldn’t, so he was helpless as Ezekiel wrapped that rubber around his bicep and tied it so tightly the skin around it turned white.
Ezekiel flicked the vein in Rocco’s inner elbow and then looked at me. His sapphire gaze wordlessly told me he was ready to do whatever I wanted him to, that he would be my personal avenging demon.
As Ezekiel’s gaze dropped to his cart and he searched for something, I decided to offer him what I was holding, right over top Rocco’s chest: “Here. You can use this, if you want.” I did not flinch when his hand grazed mine, but I did smile when I turned back to Rocco.
“What… what are you—” It seemed Rocco could not get out a full sentence, not while he stared with abject terror at Ezekiel and the knife he now held. He tried to struggle, sought to pull his wrist from its restraint so he could free his arm of the blood-stopping rubber around his bicep, but alas, he could not.
