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Bang!
The man’s head slumps from a faraway sniper shot.
Sal…
We run up the ditch as fast as we can. My frozen feet are like lead. There’s too much chaos for us to be pinned.
I have no more breath, but I keep going anyway.
I trip and nearly tumble. My nails scratch at the dirt to stop me from rolling, and a huge force stops me entirely.
Donny hauls me upright with one arm and drags me to level ground. “Run, Ellie. Don’t stop. Not for a second.”
Sal screeches up in the car, and the doors fling open. We all dive in.
My hands are over my head. I’m piled with Scar awkwardly over me, and the whiplash of acceleration throwing me every which way in the back seat.
Gunshots are exploding farther and farther in the distance.
We made it.
We survived.
Chapter 19
Donny
Ellie is my ride or die. It’s as simple as that. She’s saved my life twice now, without a fucking hitch. We’re riding away from the most intense scene I’ve ever been a part of, and the shock of it all is still sinking in.
“We lost Vinny tonight. And I don’t know if all the Sicilians made it,” I say solemnly.
“I saw an Escalade pull out behind us and head the other way,” Sal says. “I think our snipers might’ve bought them some time to escape.”
“Good. We have to have some faith.” I pull down the overhead mirror to try and wipe the blood out of my eye, except my whole face is bloodied and beaten.
“Marty Rigiano is dead.” I drop my hand on Sal’s shoulder – it hurts to move with the adrenaline wearing off, but it’s a small price to pay. We’re alive. “And at the hands of this family’s newest member.”
Scar and Ellie are situating themselves in the backseat. I focus on her. She’s shivering now, crying into her hands.
Poor rabbit.
Scar puts his arm around her, being comforting for the first time in forever. “You did good, kid. Loophole was a cancer like Gio. We did the world a service by ridding it of them.”
She nods weakly.
As much as I want her to be my ruthless mafia queen, she’s soft inside at the end of the day. And I don’t fault her for it. She did what she had to do when the time came. That’s all I can ask for.
“Stallion, for the love of fucking God, can we stop with the Jack Bauer shit?” Sal says. He’s still looking in the rearview mirror to see if anyone is hot on our tail. “I’m going to have a heart attack at thirty-four if I keep this up. Fuck!” He hits the steering wheel. “Vinny…”
“I know, Dice.” I look down at my scraped-up hands. “His fat ass saved our lives. He blocked the bullets at our backs.” I take a long breath, internalizing the events that went by in a flash. “Fuck!” I lose it and punch the dash. “We can’t let his death be in vain, Dice. If we don’t move carefully, an all-out war is coming. Who knows how the other families are going to spin this. And Vladimir… if he sees me alive after a blowout like that, I don’t know how we’re going to get his trust back.”
“How about you worry about getting your face down to a normal size again. You look like the Elephant Man.” Sal scoffs.
I blow out some blood from my nose and grab a napkin from the glove compartment. “Your brother was something,” I call to the back. “Turns out he’s really the one who sold you to us, knowing it would lead you here. The man had no code or boundaries.”
Ellie sniffs and smiles. It’s angry and riddled with pain. “That was my lovely brother.”
She looks at me, and I hold her eyes. We both share something terrible now. We killed our own blood. It weighs horribly, no matter how rotten the demons inside them were. I can’t show it as a boss or as a man… but Ellie can. A part of me is jealous she gets to let it out.
