Page 25 of One Last Time

They didn’t touch skin.

He would not sell humans.

They never had.

Everybody had a line—this one was the Marcellos.

Andino hadn’t intended to do business with Mr. Moshka—but he’d been willing to entertain the man’s first meeting just so that he could tell him to stay the fuck out of the Marcello territory while doing his work.

But here they were.

And none of that happened.

It still wouldn’t.

“Daniel Delwalsh, yes?” Andino asked from his perch.

The man’s gaze finally focused through the darkness of the space and landed on Andino at the same time the guns pointed at either side of his head were racked and ready to fire. Outside the space, two muted pops echoed through the thin, crumbling walls. The following thumps were just morbid enough to tell Mr. Moshka’s closest man—who also apparently handled most of his dealings with others, so he didn’t have to be there firsthand—that the men who accompanied him were now dead on the ground.

“You’ll soon follow,” Andino said, voicing what he was sure were the man’s inner thoughts and fears. Good. He wanted him afraid. “It’ll be a well-earned message for your boss, who I am sure won’t miss you all that much. He’ll have you replaced before the week is out, won’t he? Nonetheless, my message will be received as I intend for it to when I return you and your men outside to his doorstep—it took a while for me to find his address, you see.”

“You’re making a grave—”

Andino stepped down from the counter, his first move silencing the man instantly. “I don’t make mistakes, actually. I have too much to lose in that case. Your unfortunate end won’t be seen as an act of aggression against your boss considering the amount of times I’ve made it clear we wouldn’t be doing business—this will simply settle it once and for all. I always do my research on the people who I see as threats, you understand? I know exactly who I am dealing with between you and your boss, and neither of you frighten me.”

Each word he spoke brought him one step closer to the man caught between two enforcers and their guns. Not that they, or their weapons, would be needed.

Not when Andino had his own.

A foot away from Daniel, Andino pulled his own gun—his favorite, an Eagle—from beneath his suit jacket. He pulled back the safety, racked the weapon, and pulled the trigger as soon as it met the man’s forehead. The spray of blood and matter was … unfortunate.

It stained his jacket.

That was fine.

“I have another blazer in the car, boss,” Nate said quietly.

Andino stared at the dead man on the floor. “Good, appreciate that.”

Nate nodded, but said nothing more.

“Make sure Mr. Moshka gets a call to his personal line to let him know what will soon be arriving to his doorstep—we wouldn’t want it to be a surprise. Also let him know this concludes any possible business between the two of us, and should he try to come into my state again, he won’t make it twenty-four hours before he meets the same fate.”

“You got it, boss.”

Andino sighed and tucked his warm gun away. “I’m ready to go home. I have a question to answer for my wife.”

“Car’s warm and ready whenever you are,” Nate said.

“I’m ready, Nate.”

He’d been ready for a while now.

FOURTEEN

Haven’s life wasn’t the same as it had once been in her early twenties—she could no longer afford to stay up until the wee hours of the morning and get up shortly after to start an entirely new day. She had kids, a job, and a whole house to take care of. She tried to be in bed and asleep by twelve, at the latest, unless it was a special occasion.

As the digital clock on the bedside table ticked beyond two A.M., with Haven still wide awake against her mound of pillows with the thought of sleep far from her mind. In fact, she thought about literally everything else but sleep even though that’s what she needed to be doing the most.