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“I know. Ti voglio bene, Zio. Tell Zio Filippo I said the same.”

“I will, principessa. Ti voglio bene. A presto.”

“Her Italian,” he said to Filippo after he disconnected. “It is getting much better.”

“She has been working on it.” Filippo leaned against the table and folded his arms. “Allora, she doesn’t want him dead?”

“No.” Nico put his phone away. “Humiliated and broken, not dead.”

“She is very smart.”

“She is a Marzano. What did you expect?”

Silence descended as they both stared at Sewell. This was new. Nico was good at violence. Torture and execution? Of course. Extortion and blackmail? Like breathing.

But humiliation? They did not have much experience with this.

What would be most personally humiliating, permanent, and lasting? Castration was a good start. Sewell would find it impossible to maintain an erection and he’d lose his sex drive. Nico and Filippo had done this years ago to an enemy before killing him.

So yes, castration. Then he remembered watching reality TV shows with Sofia . . .

Quickly, he unlocked his phone. When Sergei answered, Nico said, “I need a few things.”

CHAPTER 27

The video hit the internet the next day. The league’s legal team got it taken down quickly, of course, but it was too late. The entire world saw Alex Sewell, naked and clearly drugged, confess to giving women GHB in clubs, taking them home, and raping them. A tattoo on his forehead read I rape women.

Before the video faded, words across the screen promised that all of Alex’s money had been withdrawn from his bank account and donated to a Toronto rape crisis center.

The Reign team chat was full of stunned silence. The club immediately cut ties with Alex, putting him on unconditional waivers. When no other team signed him in the next twenty-four hours, as Bennett suspected they wouldn’t, his contract would be canceled. His pro career finished.

The league, for their part, handled it like any PR crisis, meaning they put out one statement and then ignored the problem altogether.

Bennett had given a brief statement to the police after Alex went missing, but once the video surfaced, the investigation died. Alex had disappeared and presumably fled the country, with internet reports coming out almost hourly about his whereabouts. Some claimed he’d been shipped off to a Russian gulag. Someone else said he was spotted in Argentina. Then grainy photos appeared online of someone fitting his description in Thailand.

Bennett was relieved. And, weirdly, proud of Nico.

Sewell hadn’t been murdered.

Did Nico do this as a gesture for Bennett? He might know the answer if Nico would bother to return any of Bennett’s texts or calls. Were they finished? Now that Alex had been discovered and dealt with, was Nico done with Bennett?

Over the next three days, the not-knowing filled Bennett with crippling anxiety. Nico had gone silent and pride demanded Bennett stop trying to chase him. Bennett was a multi-millionaire, a pro athlete at the highest level, with his face on billboards and cereal boxes and magazines. He would not make a fool of himself pining after a man who clearly didn’t want him back.

So that was that. Except the idea of living without Nico, never seeing the man again, was agony, like a blade being driven into his sternum.

Shit. I might be in love with Nico Marzano.

God, he was so stupid. How had he let this happen? He’d fallen for a mob boss, a criminal. The absolute worst person he could’ve chosen. Except Bennett hadn’t “chosen” Nico—it had just happened. Against his better judgment.

Bennett tried to put all of it behind him. They had a quick overnight to Philadelphia, where they lost 3-0. Bennett played the worst game of his life, as did most of the boys. The other team chirped them mercilessly about Sewell, as if the Reign players had known and approved of such heinous behavior. It was sloppy and ugly, with Singh losing a tooth in a tussle with one of Philly’s d-men. Thankfully, that was the worst injury any player suffered, which Bennett considered a minor victory.

By the time he walked inside his apartment, his body felt one hundred years old. His knee felt even older. After he disabled the alarm, he flicked on a light—and nearly jumped out of his skin.

A figure sat in the leather chair across the room, an unlit cigar clamped between his lips.

“Jesus Christ, Marzano,” Bennett breathed. After he recovered, he tossed his bag onto the floor and lowered himself into a chair.

“You seem surprised to see me.”