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Chapter Sixteen: Adriana
Ididn’t want to drive for hours, but it seemed like we had no choice. Tristan packed all the stuff he’d bought into the car we used to try to get away from Boston, and I also packed a small bag with essentials for myself – toiletries, some canned food and bottled water. I didn’t have any clothes, and I assumed we wouldn’t be going back to Boston to get my things.
The thought made my stomach sink, but I swallowed down the rising fear. We were alone against an enemy who knew too much about us. And it wasn’t just the two of us; there was a third life now to protect.
The leather of the seats was still cool beneath me, offering little comfort as we sped further away from the city. The radio was on, a low murmur that did little to dispel the silence between us. Tristan kept his eyes on the road, his jaw working. He’d been like that since we left–silent, resolute, focused.
“So did you know him?” I asked as we left the cabin in the distance.
“The dead guy?”
“Yeah.”
Tristan shook his head, his eyes trained on the road ahead. “No, the Callahans and the Rossis don’t move in the same circles.”
“But you obviously have heard of him.”
He nodded curtly. “Not him. He doesn’t ping my radar. Definitely Rico Rossi, though.”
“Carmen told me the Rossis were raided a couple of months ago,” I said, turning down the volume of the radio to nothing. “And you think there’s a power vacuum, right?”
“Not exactly,” Tristan replied, then sighed. “How much do you know about Nicolas Rossi?”
“That’s…”
“Rico’s son, yeah,” Tristan finished for me, his gaze still fixed on the road ahead of us. “He’s next in line. Supposed to take over the reins from his father.”
I paused for a moment, remembering the few times I’d met Nicolas at various events. He’d always struck me as soft-spoken, more interested in scholarly pursuits than the family business. It seemed unnatural that he would step into his father’s ruthless shoes.
“I didn’t think he had it in him,” I confessed, shaking my head. “He was always so…quiet. Reserved. A bit of an oddball among the Rossis.”
A soft chuckle escaped Tristan’s lips. “Nicolas Rossi isn’t an intellectual, he’s a power hungry psychopath,” he said.
“Wait, really?”
“Yes, really,” he said, his grip tightening momentarily on the steering wheel. “He’s the type who’d sit quietly and watch the world burn if he could be king of the ashes. The quiet nerdy guy thing is real, too, don’t get me wrong. Turns out you can be that and a fucking bully.”
“How do you know that?”
Tristan took a deep breath. “Let’s just say I’ve had to cross paths with him before,” he said, his expression turning grim. “He’s smart and cunning. He doesn’t take risks unless he’s certain of the outcome.”
“The perfect strategist,” I muttered, feeling a shiver of unease run down my spine. If Tristan was right, and Nicolas Rossi was as dangerous as he sounded, we were in more trouble than I’d initially thought.
“Yeah,” Tristan agreed. “For a man who prefers silence, he’s got quite the silver tongue. It makes him dangerous.”
I could sense a story behind those words, a story that Tristan wasn’t ready to share. It made me wonder about their past; had Tristan ever crossed paths with Nicolas Rossi on the battlefield of the underworld? Had he come close to death because of this quiet, calculating man?
His face was set in grim lines of determination, his blue eyes flickering like a cold flame in the darkening car. I realized it didn’t matter if he had faced death or not; Tristan would stand against anyone who threatened us.
“But he wasn’t indicted,” I said. “I looked into it; they got his father, some of his capos, an uncle of his. But not Nick or his brother.”
“Yeah, there’s a reason for that,” Tristan replied. He paused, as if weighing how much to reveal. “Nick’s smart. He has a knack for keeping his hands clean. He’s embedded himself so deeply in the legitimate side of the business that it’s almost impossible to pin anything on him.”
“And his brother?”
“His brother Gio is a brute,” Tristan answered with a grimace. “Not as smart as Nick, but just as ruthless. The two of them, they complement each other. Like two sides of a coin. A brutal, terrifying coin.”
I shivered at the image Tristan painted. It was clear he had firsthand experience dealing with the Rossis. His knowledge wasn’t something gleaned from a newspaper article or an internet search; it came from real-life engagements, blood-soaked battles fought in the shadows.
