Page 94 of The Beast Who Begged Me

“Who?” Dami barks.

Ricky is digging into his jacket, his hand shaking so badly it takes him two tries. “One of them threw this at me.”

He holds it out. A business card in heavy cream stock. Dami grabs it and I look over his shoulder. Embossed in the center is a single black column. An obelisk. And beneath it, one name in raised letters.

DANIEL KING.

No threats scribbled on the back. No demands. No instructions, even. They took Sammy and left a calling card behind, serenely confident that we would know where to deliver ourselves, because it isn’t a message at all.

It’s an invitation.

As I stare at that thick cardstock with a priapic obelisk stabbing up through the center, I know one thing for sure. Daniel King is my enemy.

And I do not forgive my enemies.

CHAPTER 30

DAMIANO

Daniel King.

Rage seeps through me like blood staining a bandage. But before it soaks me completely, I see how this played out. I see who’s to blame.

Me.

Pep Pardini used my worry for Sammy against me without even knowing who Sammy was; just suggesting he’d been taken was enough to get me plowing straight into his trap. And in the time between the syringe and when I woke up, I bet he was crowing about it. Not just to his sidekicks, but to Big Gee, who would have wanted an update.

And Big Gee is a storyteller. He likes to talk. He would’ve shared it with Daniel King: You know how easy it was to get Orsini’s head out of the game?

I grab my coat and my gun just as the rage becomes unmanageable. “Everyone stay in the fucking house,” I grit out. “You included, Benedetti.”

“Stop,” says one cool, calm, and very fucking collected voice. “You’re not thinking, Dami.”

I round on Caligula, who doesn’t shrink back, though the rest of them do. “If you think I’m gonna stand by while that sick fuck has Sammy⁠—”

“You are not doing this alone.”

“I don’t need backup. I need a body count.”

“We need Sammy home alive,” he says, as though I never said a damn thing. “We’re not rushing in blind. We need a plan. And we need help.”

I give a disbelieving laugh. “Ferraro, Giordano, the others—they’re decent men. But how many do you think we can put up against King?”

“Let’s sit down at the table and talk,” Caligula says, and the cold in his voice finally breaks through the hot haze of my fury. “Rosa, perhaps you could make some coffee?”

He turns to lead us all into the kitchen, the very place I knelt and swore obedience. Every part of me wants to go the other way, straight out the front door. Every second feels like another second I’m leaving Sammy there.

But I swore obedience to my Don. So I put the gun back in its holster and follow Caligula.

I pace the kitchen, prowling, because I can’t keep still. Benedetti’s sitting at the kitchen counter, shaking and wrapping both hands around a glass of water. Rosa is making coffee, like this is some goddamn social gathering, but I can tell by her thinned mouth and red eyes that she’s taking this as hard as I am. Vito stays near the door, shotgun leaning up against the wall as he watches the CCTV feed of the outside streets.

“Where are we getting this help from?”

“We’ll start at the top and work our way down,” Caligula says. “Finch can put me through to Luca. Let me get the phone he gave me.”

While he’s upstairs, I make Ricky go over what happened. Sammy was already in the car when they came for him. I ask about the men, their vehicle, which way they went. He answers in bursts, stopping to swallow between them, and I have to keep reminding myself that shouting won’t make him remember any faster.

Caligula comes back with the burner and sits at the table. First he calls Ferraro on his own phone, sends him to check the scene and find out what’s happened to Nino’s body.