I couldn’t find them, so I asked Rita if she’d seen them.
“Hmm.” She looked over her shoulder. “I saw them at the ceremony and after pictures for a bit. They most likely went outside for air or to smoke or something.”
That was entirely possible. “Yeah, that’s likely.”
She stopped dancing and glanced up at me. “What’s going on?”
“What? Nothing.”
“Since when did you start thinking you could lie to me?”
I sighed. “It’s nothing. Benito has been too quiet, and then I saw them acting weird lately…I’m just paranoid.”
“I mean, you destroyed Benito’s reputation, hid his family away, he may begin hurting financially soon enough. I have no doubt he’ll retaliate at some point, but how could he right now?”
Again, she had a point. “I never underestimate desperate people.”
Her head swayed side to side. “I get it, and that’s probably a good…” Rita’s eyes widened at something behind me. “Carajo,” she whispered.
I turned in time to see four men standing by the huge set of double doors, AK-47s in hand. My gaze swept the room. My men had taken notice and were drawing their weapons. By the bar, the bartender lifted what appeared to be a Galil, and I knew he wasn’t one of my men. All around us were guns…and we were in the middle. Like fish in a barrel.
“Rita,” was all I was able to get out before a spray of bullets rained down above us.
I pushed her to the ground, covering her with my body.
“Matteo!” she shouted. When I looked to where they’d been, I didn’t see them. I could only hope they were hiding.
“It’s okay. Stay low!”
The sounds were pure carnage. Screams, shattering glass, ice, and wood. Rita and I crawled off the dance floor to an upturned table.
“Stay here!” I ordered her.
“Where are you going?”
I took out my Colt 1911. “To find the kids.”
She lifted her dress and I saw her leg holster. She had a .380 Bodyguard. “Go, I’ll be fine.”
I peeked over the table, and it was a horrific sight. Bodies lay lifeless in puddles of blood, screams and cries mixed in with the gun fire. I surveyed the room trying to find the kids, my brother, and Penn, but there was no way to see through all the madness.
Fuck it.I stood, aimed at the first guy I knew wasn’t one of mine, and put a bullet through his skull. I ran toward the table where Matteo and Owen had been sitting, hoping they were under it. I lifted the linen, but no one was there.
“Shit!”
“Looking for something?”
I turned and came face-to-face with Lev, Mila’s brother. He had a .50 caliber Desert Eagle pointed right at me.
“What are you doing?”
“What I have to,” he shouted, slightly deranged.
“And what’s that?” Pure violence reigned throughout the room, but no one was shooting at me…it was odd.
“Two birds one stone, isn’t that what you Americans say?” He chuckled.
“Lev, what’s going on? People are dying.” I lifted my gun at him. “This is my family. You’re a fucking idiot if you think you walk away from this.”
