Page 89 of Fall Before Her Throne

Her lips pursed together like she were holding back a laugh, but she pushed up from the table and stood. At the same time, the door burst open. Shouts echoed through the open door until a moment later, Samuel Achebe pushed into the room.

“Samuel!”

“Leona, there you are,” he said once he caught sight of me. He looked around the room and then frowned deeply. “What kind of interview is this? Where is water for my client? Why is she handcuffed in such a way? Why is it so cold in this room? This kind of treatment from such an esteemed agency is absolutely unacceptable. I demand that she be released. At once.”

Greer poked back into the room. “She is under arrest for a slough of crimes. She’s not getting out of here anytime soon.”

“Unbelievable!” Samuel scoffed. He crouched down in front of me and placed his suitcase on the table. His hands went to my wrists. “Her hands are freezing! What is this? A torture chamber?”

I held back my smile and instead played up his dramatics with a heavy shiver of my own. Then I added some chattering teeth for good measure.

“Oh, this poor, sweet girl! Look at what you have done to her!” Samuel exclaimed. “This treatment is unacceptable. I will write a formal complaint against both of you.”

Badawi suddenly looked concerned.

Greer spluttered. “Sit down, Mr. Achebe. Now that you’re here, we can start the interview. No one is going anywhere until we’ve talked, and then once that is done, Leona Vero will be processed into the jail system.”

I nudged Samuel with my knee and gave him a look. He leaned forward so that I could whisper in his ear. “Where are my men? Are they okay?”

“I got them out of police custody first. It took a while, but with some bribes, I bought us some time. They are…upset,” he whispered back. I snorted at the massive understatement. “They’re waiting outside the building. Don’t worry, I will get you out of this.”

“They’re trying to pin the RICO case on me,” I whispered back. “Can you get me out of that?”

“I’ll certainly try,” he said, squeezing my shoulder. I gave him a stiff nod of understanding, and he stood. “What do you want with this farce of an interview, Special Agents? I demand to see the evidence against my client.”

Greer and Badawi took their seats again. Badawi started pulling files and pictures out of her folder. Crime scene photos, witness testimonies. All of it from places where my men and I had been before—whether that was fighting the South Americans and their tainted drugs, or going after the Albanians and their trafficking. But there was more than that—pictures that were at least a decade old of crime scenes I didn’t recognize. Dead bodies I didn’t know. Phone records. Call lists. Pictures of our Family’s underground casinos. Pictures of Max.

Dozens and dozens of pictures of Max. Walking in the streets. Phone to his ear. In meetings at the VCI building. Sitting in his car.

They had surveillance of him for years.

Shit.

“And what is all of this supposed to mean?” Samuel asked. “I see nothing in here that implicates my client.”

“Miss Vero gave the orders,” Greer said. He pulled up a photo from tonight’s debacle at the casino. I stood in front of my men while they crowded around, clearly protecting me. He pushed it in front of Samuel. “She is the ringleader. Controlling it all behind the scenes.”

Samuel rolled his eyes. “My client is young. Some of these pictures date back a decade or more. Are you implying she was some criminal mastermind at the age of ten? No jury will believe that.”

Greer shrugged. “There’s plenty here. Enough to establish that she’s simply walking in her father’s footsteps. Mafia families are a generational thing.”

Thanks, dad. You really set me up for success with this one.

“My client had nothing to do with any of her father’s alleged crimes. If you believe her father had connections to criminals, perhaps you should interview them.”

“Oh, we will.”

“All of this is circumstantial at best,” Samuel said. “If you say there’s enough to establish my client is following in her father’s alleged footsteps, you must have either proof or a witness testifying to that fact.”

Greer shrugged as he sat back in his chair and crossed his arms over his chest.

“Who is your witness?”

“You know I can’t discuss that, Mr. Achebe.”

So they had found someone else. Was it one of Greco’s men? Sandrini’s? Maybe Ciel could try to hack into their evidence files.

Badawi leaned across the table and locked eyes with me. “Leona, it doesn’t have to be this way.”