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And Maddoc?
The calm, calculated demeanor he radiates is one of the reasons I trust him. He knows how to keep his cool in a way that most people don’t, to use his head rather than his emotions.
But this time, there was something brewing under the surface when he looked at her, and I don’t like it.
I force a slow, cleansing breath out through my nose. Then another.
Methodically, I package up the unwanted thoughts and emotions cluttering up my mind and seal them away.Then I turn the lights off in the gym, close the door with a quiet snick, and head up to the ensuite bathroom attached to my bedroom to shower, carefully keeping my mind blank.
Once I’m clean and dressed, I go back down to the main floor. Dante is in the living room, typing out a text on his phone.
“Got a problem,” he says when he sees me, finishing up the text and tucking his phone into his pocket. “I just finished giving Maddoc an update.”
I lean in the doorway, crossing my arms. “The girl?”
“Nah. Mario Ricci.”
A curling heat unfurls in my stomach. Here’s something I can do, a problem I can take care of.
“How can I help?” I say immediately.
Dante snorts, chuckling. “You wanna hear how he’s trying to screw us over before you start planning how to dismember him?”
The question is rhetorical, of course. For one thing, I won’t know if dismemberment is necessary until I understand the scope of the problem Mario has caused us. And even if it turns out that it is, Dante knows me well enough to understand that thepleasureI get out of doling out appropriate consequences to our enemies isn’t based on which tool I use to do it.
It’s about returning things to their proper order.
And all of that is beside the point, because I don’t need him to explain how Mario has attempted to screw us over. I can already slot the puzzle pieces together into a logical conclusion.
“He’s trying to fuck with our money.”
Dante nods. “Yup. He’s fucking stupid, is what he is. He wants to back out of our deal.”
The deal being the fifty thousand dollars that we’ve arranged to funnel through his casino by the end of the month in order to legitimize it enough to put it back into circulation.
“Backing out of the deal isn’t an option.”
Dante grins. “Yeah, that’s what I told him when he said he couldn’t do it. He didn’t seem to believe me, though, so I’m gonna go pay him a visit.”
“Weare,” I correct him.
This is what I needed. Whether we leave Mario breathing after the visit or not, the opportunity to right this wrong should be the outlet I need. The one that pushing myself in the gym didn’t prove sufficient for.
We enter the garage, and Dante grabs a set of keys from the lockbox by the door, tossing them in his hand. The Escalade.
I clear my throat.
“Oh, come on,” he says, throwing me the charming smile he usually employs to get into women’s pants. “It’ll be fun.”
I don’t bother answering. I’m not getting into a vehicle with him in the driver’s seat, and he knows it.
I did. Once. And hated it.
Dante drives like he has a blindfold on: wild, reckless, and with a sloppy disregard for anything resembling economy of motion or the strategic use of the roadway.
“Fine.” He groans with a put-upon sigh, replacing the keys to the Escalade. “Worth a shot, though, right?”
“Never,” I deadpan, plucking the keys to the Audi RS7 from the lockbox. It’s the car I prefer when I’m behind the wheel. The one Dante laughingly called “the pinnacle of understated rage” when we bought it and that neither of my brothers ever disrespect me by driving themselves—even though, like all of our vehicles, it’s the property of the organization.
