by Dana Delamar
Yuri’s pale skin reddened. “Cheat? Vilanovich family no cheat no one.”
“That is not enough money,” Cris said, enunciating carefully.
“Is agreement.”
“Cris, why don’t you call your uncle to verify?” Nick suggested.
“Verify?” Yuri snapped.
“It will only take a minute,” Nick said, keeping his tone soothing, placating, while inside, his gut churned.
Cris hissed in frustration and reached for the phone in his inside pocket. Yuri coughed loudly, and that’s when Nick saw it. The grin half hidden behind his glove. One of the Russians fired, the sharp report making Nick flinch. For a moment, no one moved, then Cris crumpled to the ground, and Nick’s stomach plummeted to the pavement along with his friend.
Without thinking, Nick squeezed off two shots at the tall blond behind Yuri, and then dropped into a crouch beside the BMW, his heart hammering, his lungs gulping down oxygen. He scrambled to the rear bumper, where he could duck down and still see the men.
The blond had fallen. Nick went for the stocky man next. He hit the man square in the chest, scarlet streaming down his white shirt.
Yuri pulled a gun of his own and returned fire, squatting near the bumper on the driver’s side. A shot whizzed by Nick’s knees and struck a metal rubbish bin behind him with a sharp ping. Fuck. Yuri was too close. The vehicle wasn’t effective cover.
He had to get to Cris, who lay far too still on the ground, blood spreading in a pool under his head. Please God, please God. Don’t let him be dead. Nick thrust a hand under the bumper and blind-fired several times at Yuri, who let out a grunt and dropped to the ground.
Just the wiry little one left. The man shot at Nick, hitting the lid of the open boot, then sprinted away from the car, heading for the dock. Nick rose, blood roaring in his ears, and fired, four quick pulls, but missed. He wanted to chase the little man down, but first he needed to check on Cris. He hurried forward and bent over Cris, who was lying on his side, his eyes closed. Blood ran from a wound above his left temple. Nick patted his cheek. “You all right?”
When Cris didn’t respond, Nick shook him a little and shouted his name. What if he was in a coma? Had the bullet punctured his brain? “Cris!” No response.
A powerboat started up and zipped onto the lake. Bloody fantastic. There was one alive to finger him.
Nick shook him again. “Cris!” At last, his eyelids fluttered, then he looked up at Nick.
“What happened?” he asked.
“You were shot. The polizia will be here any minute,” Nick said. “What do I do?”
Cris pulled out his mobile. “Get the money and get me in the car. Call Delfina. Not my father.”
Nick checked on Yuri, who was lying still, eyes closed, bleeding heavily from a hole high in his belly. When Nick nudged him with his foot, Yuri’s eyes flew open and his gun arm snapped up, sending a shiver down Nick’s spine. He fired again on reflex, two quick shots, hitting Yuri in the neck and upper chest. The Russian’s arm dropped to the pavement, the gun falling from his fingers.
He checked the other blond, and the one with the suitcase. Neither one was breathing, but Nick’s own breath came in quick shallow gasps. He was dangerously close to hyperventilating. He’d just killed three men. Three. Without a fucking thought, with hardly a pause.
“Hurry,” Cris hissed from his left. Nick forced himself to inhale deeply. He had to hold it together, had to get Cris to safety and medical help. He grabbed the briefcase from the stocky man’s hand, tossed it in the boot on top of the drugs, then slammed the lid shut and helped Cris onto the backseat of the car. Getting behind the wheel, he hit Cris’s contact entry for Delfina as he drove away, careful to keep his speed reasonable. Nothing would attract more attention than a car screeching off.
The phone rang and rang. “Come on, answer,” he growled. Finally she did.
“Cris?”
“It’s Nick. Cris has been shot.”
Her scream pierced him, but he didn’t have time for niceties. “He’s alive. But he’s hurt. Where do I take him?”
“What were you doing?”
“No time to explain. He needs a doctor. And your father can’t know about it.”
“Okay. Someone will call you back.”
He hung up. Nick hit a pothole, and Cris groaned. “Sorry, mate.” He should pull over somewhere. He turned down a dark alley, making note of the cross streets nearby. He stopped the car, but kept the engine running.
“Are you pressing on the wound?” Nick asked, mouth parched, chest tight.
“Sì.” Cris grunted out the word. He sounded bad.
The phone rang. “Hang on,” he said to Cris. The number showed on the display as Private. “Yes?”
“Where are you?” a familiar voice asked.
“Bellagio.” He gave the cross streets.
“Go south on Via Valessina, until you reach a roundabout, then go east on Via per Lecco, until you come to a private road. Turn there. You are searching for this address.” The caller rattled off a location. “I will meet you there in thirty minutes with a doctor.”
Nick hung up and glanced at his watch. After conferring with Cris, he decided to stay where they were for the next fifteen minutes.
“I’m sorry,” Cris said. “I don’t know what happened.”
“I just killed three men, that’s what happened.” Nick slammed his fist against the steering wheel. Cris said nothing, and Nick finally realized what had been bothering him ever since he’d laid eyes on the Russians. “Those fuckers planned to kill us all along.”
“What do you mean?”
“They didn’t bring anything to transport the cocaine to their boat. They meant to get rid of us and take the car.” He paused to let that sink in before he said, “Do you think your great-uncle was in on it?”
Cris’s answer was instantaneous. “Of course not. Damn Russians. They probably thought they could fuck with me because I’m young.”
Maybe. Maybe not. Nick kept his doubts to himself. They waited the rest of the time in silence, the air in the car thick with the scent of blood. Nick thought about calling Delfina back, but he’d wait until he was sure Cris was okay. He was talking and he seemed relatively alert, but you never knew with head injuries.
Finally it was time to go. Nick backed out of the alley. He followed the directions, puzzling over where he’d heard the caller’s voice before. It wasn’t until he turned onto the private drive and saw the flash of blond hair on the man waving him down that he realized. Antonio.
He was with a tall, thin dark-haired man Nick didn’t recognize. Nick pulled up and lowered the driver’s side window. Antonio opened the back door. “Keep the car running,” he said to Nick.
Another man approached, gliding out from the shadows. The bastard from the loo. Ruggero. He motioned Nick out and slid behind the wheel. “There’s cocaine and cash in the boot,” Nick said to him.
“Who do they belong to?”
“The cocaine belongs to the Russians. The cash to his uncle,” Nick said, flicking a thumb at Cris.
A look passed between Antonio and Ruggero. “Which Russians?”
“Vilanovich. Yuri.”
“How many down?”
“Three. All dead.”
“Any others?”
“One. He got away on a boat.”
“So, have you selected your coffin yet?” Ruggero grinned.
Heat flooded Nick’s face. “What are you going to do with all this?”
“Put it in storage.” Ruggero held out a hand encased in black leather, palm up. “The gun.” Nick gave him the Beretta and the spare magazine. “And him?” Ruggero indicated Cris, as Antonio and the other man carried him inside.
“He didn’t fire.”
Ruggero’s grin widened. “You are your father’s son.” Then he put the car in drive and took off.
Nick scrubbed his hands over his face. His legs felt weak. There was no telling what Dario would do once he knew about Cris getting sho
t.
Nick pulled out the mobile Ruggero had given him the day before and placed a call to France. Hope surged in him. Maybe, just maybe, he could minimize the fallout.
Nick’s call had roused Delacourt from bed, but Émile sounded overjoyed to hear from him—at first. After Nick recounted everything that had happened, Delacourt fell silent. Finally he said, “Nicolas, you must come home immediately. Perhaps, if we put you and your grandparents in protective custody, we can save you.”
“I can’t do that. Not yet. But things would be much easier for me if I knew Gran and Grandad were safe.”
“I’ll see what I can do.” Delacourt paused and said, “Do you believe me now? That this was a fool’s errand?”
Nick flushed. He had to prove Émile wrong. He knew he could accomplish something here, knew he could bring down his father and the Andrettis. As long as he didn’t have to worry about his grandparents. “Trust me, Émile. I know what I’m doing here.”
“Do you? Need I remind you that my wife is alive because of your father’s generosity? I hate to think what will become of her if that generosity disappears.”
“You’re asking me to compromise my investigation.”
“What investigation?” Delacourt asked. “Everything you’re doing is unofficial.”
Ice showered over him. “What’s my status?”
Silence. Then: “I put you on administrative leave. Family emergency.”
“You’re hanging me out to dry.”
“What did you expect? I couldn’t very well reveal what you’re doing and why. Difficult questions would come up. Questions you would not want answered.”
“My career is over, isn’t it?”
Delacourt sighed. “I sincerely hope not. If you give up on this madness and come back, all can be as it was. If you persist, I cannot save you from the inevitable questions that will arise.”
“So I’m fucked.”
“As far as staying in Interpol is concerned, yes.”
He’d forced Delacourt to let him go, and here was the payback. “Need I remind you that your career is in as much jeopardy as mine?” Nick snapped.
“I had hoped you would not be vindictive.”
“That’s rich, coming from you.” Nick’s fingers tightened on the mobile. It was all he could do not to throw it.
“Nicolas, you engineered all this. You brought it all upon yourself with your shortsighted impulsiveness.”
How blind he’d been when it came to Delacourt. “The pursuit of justice is never shortsighted.”
“What you’re pursuing isn’t justice. It’s retribution. You would like the world to be black and white. Most people would, but it is many, many shades of gray. It’s time you learned such a basic fact.”
“Said by the corrupt to the righteous.”
Delacourt laughed, but it was bitter. “You know what happens to the righteous, yes? They become martyrs.”
Nick’s stomach sank. Everywhere he turned, people were planning his funeral, even though Dario hadn’t yet delivered the killing blow.
He had to make his case with Fuente, or else everything he’d done, he’d done for naught.
Nick walked inside the clandestine clinic, then wished he hadn’t. The doctor and a nurse were working on Cris, a small mound of bloodied gauze in a pan by the bed. Nick swallowed hard, suddenly feeling woozy. He found a chair next to Antonio and sat. “How is he?”
Antonio ran a hand through his hair, leaving it sticking up in tangled clumps. “Molto fortunato. The bullet did not enter his skull. He has a… crease in the skin?”
“You mean the bullet grazed his skull?”
Nodding, Antonio continued. “Sì. Much bleeding, he needs stitches. The doctor says he has a….” Antonio knocked himself on the skull with his knuckles.
“A concussion?”
“Sì. But he will be okay.”
“That’s a relief.”
Nick’s stomach was just starting to unclench when Cris’s phone buzzed in his pocket, making him jump. Delfina. “How is Cris?” she asked, her voice trembling. Christ, he should have called her.
He filled her in. Then he asked, “What do we do about your father?”
“What were you two doing?”
He sighed, then said, “A job for your great-uncle.”
“Why?”
“Delfi, I can’t tell you more.”
“This is part of Cris’s plan to fix things for me, isn’t it?”
He looked over at Cris, then quickly away. “Yeah.”
She took in a choked breath, then a string of affectionate curses came out of her mouth, a lovely stream of Italian. He caught only a few words. After a moment she stopped herself. “Benedetto is going to want to talk to you—I would be surprised if he’s not here by morning.”
“So, do I tell Dario?”
“No.” Her voice was rushed, urgent. “Prozio must not have wanted Papà involved for some reason. You don’t want to cross him. Trust me on this. He is far worse than my father. And far more powerful.”
Bloody hell. This just got better and better. “So what do I tell your father?”
“Make something up, but keep it simple.”
“Someone tried to steal the car?”
“Perfetto.”
If he could carry out the lie. “How will I explain why we didn’t go to him in the first place?”
“Merda.” She paused for a long time. “Tell him Cris told you who to call. He’ll have to handle it when he wakes up.”
The whole thing was as shaky as a pub crawler after a weekend binge. But it would have to do.
Antonio drove him back to the Andretti estate, an uncomfortable silence lying thick between them. Finally Nick broke it. “I’m sorry I was such an arse to you at the party.”
“It’s not me you need to apologize to.”
“He can rot.”
Antonio glanced at him. “Your father is heartbroken.”
“You assume I care.”
Nick’s words hung in the air as they lapsed back into silence. Resting his cheek against the cool glass of the car window, he stared out, though there was not much to see other than the occasional light where someone had stayed up late. He’d killed three men, but the one that counted was Yuri. Nick had murdered him.
He could argue that it was self-defense, but that was a flimsy excuse for how he’d handled things. He hadn’t tried to disarm Yuri or somehow disable him before approaching, so that he wouldn’t be a danger. So that he’d be alive when the police and medics came. No. If he were entirely honest with himself, he’d wanted an excuse to shoot the man. He hadn’t wanted to leave any witnesses. All he had needed was an excuse, some justification for what he’d done. But that was all it was. A justification.
Hell, he’d tried to murder the other one too. The wiry little guy that got away in the boat. Who the hell had he become, shooting at someone who was running away?
Antonio broke into his thoughts, his words laden with heavy emotion. “I would give anything to have my parents back. Anything. But your father, he has been good to me. He helped me when no one else would. Or could.”
“So what are you? His assistant, or something?”
“His second.”
“I thought you were a guard.”
“I was. Until recently.”
“So I’m kind of the fly in the ointment, yeah?”
Antonio’s brow wrinkled. “I do not understand.”
“You think he’ll replace you with me.”
“Sì. He says he will not, but he would if you asked.”
“Don’t worry. I won’t be asking.”
Antonio’s hands clamped down on the wheel, his knuckles going white. “I almost wish you would.”
Nick felt a tightening behind his eyes. “You would want that?”
“If it would make him happy, yes.”
“I don’t get it. Why do you all kowtow to him?” At Antonio’s puzzled look, Nick added, “You treat him like a king.” Then he sho
ok his head. “No, it’s more than that. Like he’s… I don’t know.” His throat constricted. He did know. “Like he means something to you.” Like a father would.
Antonio didn’t answer. Instead, he stopped the car at the gate and called Delfina, who buzzed them through.
When they reached the front door, Antonio turned to him. “You want to know why? Your father is a good man. A true don. You would see that if your eyes were open.”
Nick started to get out of the car, but Antonio stopped him. “It’s not safe for you here. Come with me. Your father can protect you.”
Shaking his head, Nick stepped out, then leaned back in the open door. “Grazie. For everything.”
“Prego. Think about what I am saying, yes?” Nick shut the door without answering. Antonio shifted the Mercedes into first gear and left in a spray of gravel.
Oh he’d think about it. But it wouldn’t change his mind.
Nick turned toward the house. Delfina stood in the open doorway, silhouetted in the light streaming from behind her. She closed the door and ran down the steps and into his arms. When he caught her against him, her body shook with sobs. Tears pricked his own eyes, though he wasn’t sure of their origin. Everything had gone wrong. Everything. The only thing that felt right was the woman in his arms. The woman he couldn’t have, the woman he’d never forget, supposing he lived long enough for regrets.
Delfina tilted her face up to his, and without thinking, he kissed her, long and passionately, all the blood in him raging.
With a sigh she pulled back, then nestled her damp face against his chest. He stroked her back, murmuring that Cris would be okay, that everything would be all right.
After a time, she looked up at him. “Let’s go to the guest house before someone spots us.”
“But we can’t talk there.”
“Who said we were going to talk?” The lilt in her voice and the smile behind her words called to him, even though he knew they weren’t entirely real. But if she wanted to put on a brave front, he’d let her.
She slipped her hand in his and started toward the guest cottage. He said nothing, just wrapped his fingers around hers and followed. On the doorstep, he stopped her. “Are you sure?”
“I want to.”
