Page 331 of Niccolo

Then Sofia walked out into the gauntlet.

Every eye in the room was on her.

She was a great curiosity – mostly because she was the first femaleconsiglierein the history of theCosa Nostra.But she was also quite beautiful, in her sexy librarian way.

Plenty of the old farts either sneered at her disapprovingly or leered at her. But none of them looked away.

Though the Widow was on our side, I detected a hint of approval on her face at Sofia’s performance – which was steady and clear, if rhetorically unspectacular.

But when you considered the fact that Sofia was a civilian speaking to a room full ofmafiosos,murderers, and criminals, she did amazingly well. She never once betrayed a hint of nervousness.

When she finished, she went back to Fausto’s side.

Our eyes met across the room.

I bowed my head very slightly to her.Good job.

She narrowed her eyes at me.Don’t fucking condescend to me.

I smiled.

What a woman.

“Niccolo Rosolini,” Don Severino said, “you may call your first witness.”

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My first witness was Dario.

Not because he had any evidence that directly incriminated Fausto, but because I wanted to lay out the timeline of everything that had happened.

His taking the fall for our family…

His incarceration at San Vittore…

Our father’s death while Dario was still in prison…

His ascension to Don and eventual return home…

The Turk’s attack…

Mezzasalma massacring the Agrellas in Florence and his attempted murder of Adriano…

And finally, the assassination attempt on Dario’s life.

Throughout, I refrained from blaming anything on Fausto.

All that was about to change.

“Don Severino,” I announced, “for my next witness, I would like to call the assassin hired to kill my brother: Rachel Bauer.”

The room murmured in shock.

Sofia called out, “I ask that the witness NOT be allowed inside this chamber.”

“And why is that?” Don Severino asked.

“Because she is an agent of the British Intelligence Agency MI6.”

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