Page 36 of Cartel King

“You promised me, Tommaso. Thanks for nothing.”

“Elodie—”

“I was done with any obligation I had to you. You wrote it down, and Tori notarized it. You’re going to break your word to your sister? Maybe you’ll break your word to me, but you don’t do it to her.”

“It wouldn’t surprise her if I did.”

“But it sure as shit would disappoint her.”

“Maybe so, but she understands business comes first.”

“Tommaso Vizzini comes first. That’s what you really mean. There are other people who can do what I used to.”

“I need you to do?—”

“No, I don’t need to hear you out to know I’m certain I won’t like it. I’m not doing it.”

“All right, never mind. I’ll have Steve go to Brazil.”

My hand clenches around the armrest. I’m barely containing my anger. It’s rapidly moving to rage.

“I will never forgive you, Tommaso. You and Iwill notbe good. You know what that means. If you’re willing to send me down there, it’s because you know I have no limits. If you send my son, I’ll have no limits toward you either.

“I figured you’d see it my way, eventually.”

“What do you want?”

The foul taste in my mouth is one I haven’t had in nearly a year. That’s the last time I spoke to Tommaso Vizzini, the Boston Mafia don. My old boss.

“The Kimuras withheld payment for product sitting off the coast. I refuse to bring it ashore without them paying. They’ve already received payment from their buyers. However, they’re crying foul to them, saying we’re the ones holding out and not bringing in the goods like promised. They think they can keep their own money while also keeping their customers’. They want us at odds with their buyers, so I’ll give in to them to keep the peace. I want you to go down there and look at their books.”

He wants me to use my forensic accounting skills to find out where the money is and where it’s going. If only he needed a pencil pusher.

Oh, no.

There’s a reason they say women are a better shot than men. I can prove it every day of the week and twice on Sundays. That’s how I wound up in this fucking shitstorm.

“How many do you think it’ll be?”

“Start at the top of the pile.”

“You cannot be serious. You want me to go after Ignacio? How the hell am I supposed to get out of there if I carry out a hit on the most senior leader of the Rio cartel? Everydonoswill be after me.”

The Brazilian structure is looser than the Italians and some of the other syndicates. Ignacio Kimura must be out of prison if Tommaso is sending me down there. He oversees a cadre offavelaleaders—donos—slum lords. They’re the ones who’ll be after me.

“Cut the head off the octopus and the tentacles no longer move.”

“In this case, the octopus will sprout another head. Benicio’s a fucking psychopath. Do you want me dead? Is that what this is about?”

Benicio Kimura’s nickname is Pato. Not because he looks like a duck or swims like one. It’s because he can hold his breath under water long enough to drown a man four times his size. That’s how he earned it.

“Of course not.”

“Then why are you putting me in this position, Tommaso? You know there’s a greater likelihood I won’t come home if you send me down there.”

“You’ve always come home from every other mission. That’s why we’re having this conversation.”

“Yeah, and you know how much I fucking resented that.”

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