Page 34 of Veil of Smoke

“No—you don’t get to decide that alone.”

“You want him gone, or not?”

“That’s not the point and you know it.”

He stops. His grip on the thug doesn’t loosen. He turns halfway, eyes cold.

“This isn’t the time to fight me.”

“You didn’t even move until I fought him off myself.”

“I was watching for the right opening.”

“No,” I say. “You were watching to see how it played out.”

Ignazio doesn’t deny it.

He pulls the guy up the steps. I follow, stopping at the top landing, fingers clenched around the stair rail.

“You let him walk down here like it was nothing.”

He turns back. “I told you to wait.”

“Because you already knew who he was?”

Ignazio’s jaw works once.

“I’ll handle it,” he says. Then he’s out the front door.

It slams behind him.

I lock it. Twice.

The bleach stings my throat. Makes it hard to think straight.

I stand behind the counter, eyes scanning the glass shards, the scuff marks on the floor.

I spend the next hour picking them up.

Not because I care about the mess. Because I need to feel control again. I need something I can hold.

I scrub the bleach streak off the floor. Wrap the metal pipe in a towel and wedge it behind the register.

Then I sit on the stool behind the counter and stare at the door.

He didn’t shoot.

He had a gun. A clear view. And he didn’t raise it until after I fought.

He didn’t run to shield me. He stood back and watched.

Waited.

Judged.

And when the thug saw him—he smiled.

That wasn’t surprise. That was familiarity.

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