Page 2 of Veil of Ashes

Fiorenzo snorts. “Just make sure it scans. That kid’s moving product through Heathrow next week.”

“I’m not the weak link,” I say.

He gives me a look like he knows I’m lying. Not about the forgery—about tonight. About the fire in my gut that hasn’t settled since I picked up that photo. He’s been around long enough to smell it on me: the kind of night where something’s about to shift.

“You should get out of town for a few days,” he says carefully. “After the drop.”

“I’m not running.”

He lifts a brow. “Didn’t say you were. Just… if things go sideways with Dante, you don’t want to be here when they do.”

Dante. That name used to mean leverage. Now it tastes like old copper on my tongue.

“I’ll think about it,” I say, already not thinking about it.

Fiorenzo doesn’t push. Just shrugs, grabs the bourbon, and pours himself a shot.

I glance back at the bench. The room is quiet. For now. But that itch in my scar has nothing to do with healed nerves and everything to do with memory. With warning.

With blood that hasn’t been spilled.

Footsteps. Heavy. Confident.

They echo against the metal stairs, dragging me back from the smell of ash and the sound of my mother’s laugh in my ears. I already know who it is.

Only one man walks into a room like he owns the walls. Like no one’s ever dared to tell him otherwise. The trapdoor clicks behind him, boots tapping once on the concrete before stopping. He doesn’t say hello.

Kieran Santoro never asks for anything.

He’s taller than I remembered, all leather jacket and cut muscle, with hands that look like they’ve broken things recently. Probably people. His knuckles are still healing, the skin cracked and fresh over old scars. He's the kind of man who doesn’t walk around a fire—he walks through it.

I stay seated. Let him do the talking.

He tosses a bundle of cash onto my table. Neat. Thick. Rubber-banded like a fucking movie.

“You’re late,” I say flatly.

“I’m here.” His voice is low, clean, too calm. Like steel under pressure.

I eye the money, then him. “You Veyra boys always pay in blood or bullshit. Which is this?”

His mouth twitches like it wants to smile, but doesn’t bother. He pulls a name from his pocket and drops it beside the money. No folder, no details. Just one word, written in marker on the inside of a torn matchbook.

Rizzi.

My pulse jumps so hard my ears ring. But I don’t move. Don’t blink. Just stare at the name like it doesn’t mean a damn thing. Like it didn’t carve a hole in me big enough to crawl through.

Kieran watches me.

“I need a ledger,” he says. “One only you can make.”

I pick up the matchbook. “Tony Rizzi. Why him?”

“I need to get to him. The ledger paves the path for me.”

So it’s personal. That makes two of us.

“You could’ve gone to any backroom forger.”

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