Page 34 of Brutal Queen

I run my hand across his chest and place my palm high on his collarbone, leaving me room to feather my fingers along one side of his throat while my thumb rubs the other side in slow, deliberate strokes.

He hums softly with each brush of my touch against his skin before kissing my forehead. “I love you,mia guerrierotta.”

“I love you too,mio re.”

“Yours, always.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

AURORA

The call came in two hours ago and I gave the order to go in thirty minutes after that. Sinclair and Benedict are with Leandro’s team at the safe house, and Enzo took some convincing to sit this one out and stay at the house. He’s coordinating the back up teams should we need them.

Nico and I are on our way to a new lock up Etta has been getting ready for our guest. She’s been flexing her creative muscles, designing some more discrete and easier to clean wet rooms for us around the city. When she was describing the ones she already had up and running, this one seemed like it had an element of poetic justice about it.

It’s in the bones of an old small-scale chop shop. Bigger than a garage and smaller than a warehouse, it’s in the arches of an overpass on the South side. The area is rough as fuck, but we’re still the scariest things here, so we’ll be left to our own devices by the locals.

As we drive, my calm has slowly dissolved and beenreplaced with a rage that flows through my veins like molten lava, elevating my temper to pressure levels of volcanic proportion. And Manny will bear the brunt of my wrath.

His betrayal was absolute and the penalty will be his slow and painful death.

We pull up and see Etta waiting for us with the shutters open. Driving in, we park off to the side, leaving room for Leandro’s team when they arrive. There’s nothing else to do other than wait for what’s coming.

I turn to Nico. He’s driven in silence the whole way. He knows me well enough by now to know when I can be pushed and when I need space. “You’re going to help me get everything we can from him. You have free rein to hurt him for as long as is necessary,” I say, with a gravel in my voice I barely recognise, “but that man's life is mine to take. Tell me you understand, Nico? I need your best work and your most solemn promise.”

“I promise, phoenix. I’ll make sure you can bathe in his blood if it’s what you need,” he replies, bowing his head like he’s some steadfast knight bound to my command. The air between us is heavy and I feel like it’s wrapping itself around me in slow, undulating currents.

I reach out and fist his shirt as he pounces on me. He presses his lips to mine and runs his tongue along the seam of mine to tease them open. He nips and bites until I relent. It’s staggering how quickly he can undo me. I’m panting as I pull away from him. “There’s time for this later. Right now, I need your game face on. Go open the tailgate so we can unload the toys.”

“Only you would call G-clamps and a baseball bat full of rusty nails, toys,” he chuckles as he pops his door open and heads out of the pick-up. I have to hop down from the runningboard along the side. While this car is practical, it’s a bitch to get in and out of if you’re not six foot tall.

I take the file Sinclair provided me from the footwell and head to the back, where I find Nico already retrieving what we need. I decide to leave him to it since I know he likes to have his tools laid out in a specific order. Instead, I go to find Etta, flipping the pages of the file as I go, scanning everything we dug up on Manny.

“Welcome to the chop shop, boss,” Etta says with a smile.

“You’re liking that name a little too much, Etta,” I reply with a soft chuckle.

“Well, in my defence, you’re the one who approved my designs for a custom disposal suite.”

“True. And you’ll get to use it to its full potential for the first time today.”

“The sooner this dog is put down, the better. It will be my pleasure to dispose of his body when you’re through with him,” she says, venom dripping off every syllable she utters.

“Are you going to wait? We may be some time.”

“I need to head to the house he was holed up in and supervise the clean-up there. Can’t leave anything for the De Luca’s to find. We have eight hours till the next shift change, so we have time to be thorough.”

She bows her head, and I reciprocate. While I’m completely comfortable in my position as don, the gestures and marks of respect take a little getting used to. After years of being a second-class citizen in my own home, I never dreamed I’d be back in the heart of the Bianchi family and honoured in this way.

The sacrifice I made marrying that monster was worth it.

The living hell I suffered bought the Bianchi organisation four years of peace, and despite the price we’ve paid, we’re now in a position to wipe our biggest threat off the map.There’s no way I’ll let my cunt of a husband live to see another year. I’m the organisation’s best chance at wiping the De Lucas out of existence, and my capos are backing me all the way.

It doesn’t take more than a few minutes after Etta’s car leaves for the truck we’ve been waiting for to pull in. Benny and Sinclair jump out of the back and pull the chop shop shutters down. It doesn’t matter if it’s minutes, hours, or days, my heart always pounds a little harder when any of them return to me. Now’s not the time or the place to smile and jump into their arms, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to.

Leandro emerges from the cab of the truck and heads straight towards me, hitting me with the same deferential head bob. “Gabriella’s information was faultless. We were in and out within ten minutes, with one hundred per cent accuracy. There were no runners, we contained all the guards on the property ready for Etta’s team.”

“Impressive. Your father was right to recommend you for this position, cousin.”

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