Page 59 of Burn this City

The complex had decent security, and neighbors included future tech tycoons, affluent couples, and scions of wealthy families who went to college or university in style here. Above all, though, there wasn’t any Lo Cascio or Dommarco money tied into the development—his uncle had carved this piece of the city out for himself and reserved a few floors for his use and that of his family. All Sal had to do was pay for the interior design and the configuration he wanted. He’d installed some very secure doors whose specs vastly exceeded the kind of thing that was normal for these places.

The security guy didn’t even blink when Sal, Enzo and Spadaro stepped into the elevator—Enzo was a frequent visitor, and Spadaro moved with a confidence that said he had every right to be here too.

Upstairs, Sal showed Spadaro the guest room, and the hitman dropped his backpack at the foot of the bed.

“Come out when you’re ready.” Sal gestured around. “There are a few locked doors. Those rooms are not in use.”

“Keep your dungeon in there?” Spadaro asked without even looking at him.

Sal laughed, surprised. “You think I have a dungeon?”

“Just a vibe.” Spadaro shed his jacket and hung it up in the empty wardrobe. He quickly slipped into the shoulder holster and pushed one of the Berettas inside.

“Takes one to know one, in my experience.” Sal leaned in the door frame, watching Spadaro stash away his purchases.

Spadaro gave him another one of those uncanny stares. “Battista said your wife was a ‘liberated human being’ and considering I’m here to help you place the heads of the whole Lo Cascio clan on her grave, you are too. Liberated. Means kinky.”

“I gathered that.” So Gianbattista Falchi knew a hell of a lot more about Catia than expected. And that, too, placed Falchi into a different light. To his credit, he hadn’t even hinted at it, but it seemed his right-hand man and executioner had less delicate sensibilities. “What about you?”

Spadaro bared his teeth. “Plenty liberated myself.”

Oh. Sal couldn’t sort Spadaro into any preference. Considering how little he gave away, a session with him would be unnerving as fuck. It didn’t make him want to compare notes with Spadaro, that was certain. Not that anything was wrong with him—he was more striking than attractive, but Sal liked to have more of a working idea how to approach the other person and decide together what they liked. Spadaro’s only preference, as far as he could tell, were Beretta weapons.

“While we’re at it, we’re going to kill all members of the Lo Cascio except for one. Jack Barsanti, the consigliere.”

“Any reason why?”

“He’s my guy on the inside.”

“You turned Andrea Lo Cascio’s consigliere?”

“Took some effort, but yeah. I’ll need him alive to complete the takeover.” Wishful thinking, maybe, but if Jack had recovered and was now debriefing Andrea, he’d still want to deal with him in person; he wasn’t going to outsource that part. “Turns out, he wanted to live.”

Spadaro nodded. “I’m ready. Let’s see what you have.”

33

Your password has been changed. Please notify us immediately if that wasn’t you.

Sal saw the alert pop on up the laptop screen. He’d been restless after briefing Spadaro with Enzo until deep into the night. It was somewhat pathetic that he’d kept Jack’s laptop close, telling himself that if the man got any important emails, he should be aware of it. But apparently one of the first things Jack did to reestablish his life was to log into his favorite porn site and change his password.

Sal pulled the laptop closer. Yep, he’d been logged out. Same with email. That meant Jack was online, and Sal had a good idea where he was right that minute. He closed the laptop, pulled up the site on his tablet and logged into the business end of the site. He’d flagged Jack’s account immediately, and yes, there he was, browsing new recommendations to help him relax after the weekend he’d had.

Torn between just glancing over Jack’s shoulder and telling him he was watching, a third option won out. The “social” features of the website were strictly opt-in and limited, enough to have people recommend videos to each other and allow them to take part in bidding and buying the special content.

And as “admin”, Sal could do pretty much whatever the fuck he pleased—including manipulate what videos Jack got to see on the site. So he uploaded one of his private videos for Jack alone. Nobody else would get to see it, and it would be deleted off the site after playing. He pushed the video into Jack’s “recommended for you” sidebar and sent him an alert. There was always a small chance the site might be hacked at that very instant (though Sal could almost rule out that Jack knew how to do it), and the download function was blocked. He sat up in bed, grinning to himself while he waited for his favorite subscriber to take the lovingly prepared bait.

And he did. He’d been sampling a few short videos, but apparently nothing had quite appealed to him, because he went to the top-rated recommendation. And watched all fifteen minutes of it, which pleased Sal enormously. He’d gotten a lot better at blowjobs since then. Despite the tagging, it hadn’t been the first one he’d ever given. But a bit of play-acting had spiced things up, and the man he’d blown had been happy to play along.

The video and the making of it were perfectly consensual in every way. He’d moved from pretending to be hesitant, to truly enjoying it, to downright greedy over those fifteen minutes, and the fact that the man’s cock was absolutely beautiful certainly hadn’t hurt. Sal looked a little younger in it—he’d been clean-shaven because Catia had complained about beard burn—but he hadn’t changed that much.

As far as online flirting went, it wasn’t quite “dick pic” level, except it totally felt like it. Sal reached for Jack’s phone and used it to text Jack’s new number:Glad you liked the show. I have a lot more, and plenty of fresh ideas.

A text buzzed:How?

I know my way around computers. Also, I have a backstage pass to that site.

Nothing. Jack was still logged in, but marked inactive. Probably getting his head around the new situation, and Sal couldn’t help laughing. He shouldn’t be so gleeful about these games, but he was, and he did have plenty of ideas, and Jack hadn’t told him to stop.

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