Page 74 of Tortured Hearts
I arch an eyebrow and fold my arms across my chest. “I think you’re becoming obsessed with me, Marcello.” An unnecessary dig, but I’ll take every opportunity to take a swing at his ego. “However, I’m intrigued by this so-called storm. Considering you’ve been dragging your feet since lining up backup plans for your backup plans, it must not be too powerful.”
“We both know that’s not true.”
“What makes you so confident?”
“Nothingmakesme confident, Gianni. I simplyam,” he says, eating up every ounce of attention as he tilts his glass toward me. “Something you could learn a thing or two about.”
The only one about to learn a thing or two is you, asshole.
Holding his icy stare, I cross the floor, my hands vibrating with restrained energy. “I’ll admit, as convoluted and full of tripwires as your plan was, it was rather ingenious. At every dead end, there was a trigger hammer ready to snap my neck.” The corners of my mouth tighten. “But you set the biggest trap when you put all three shell companies in my name. With all the recent deaths and chaos in Providence, you knew I’d have no defense. After all,” I say, gesturing my palm toward him, “you werein jail.”
Sinking his teeth into the cigar, he sets the glass down and gives me a slow clap. “I’ve underestimated you.”
“A mistake I thought you’d learned not to repeat.” I can tell by the way his eyelid twitches I’ve hit a nerve. “So you finally admit it?”
“The only way to stay at the top in this business is to admit nothing and take credit for everything. However, I will say you’ve impressed me.”
“I didn’t come here to be insulted.” Scowling, I redirect the conversation. “However, I have to ask… Why bother with the theatrics? Keeping Becca locked in your basement was more than enough to keep me walking your crooked line. The whole truce thing seems like a pointless side plot loaded with a lot of unnecessary risk.”
“Isn’t it obviouswhy? I enjoy toying with you.” He chuckles to himself, the sound as deep as his pockets. “You knew how this was going to end from the moment you stormed uninvited into my poker game.” Pulling his cigar from his lips, he blows out a cloud of smoke. “As Henry said, you heard what you wanted to hear.”
I’m so fucking tired of that goddamn phrase. All I want to do is skip to the end, but Becca’s life is riding on me staying in control. Bottling my rage, I glance over his bald head to the ornate grandfather clock standing tall behind him.
11:49 p.m.
My pulse syncs with the second hand of the clock, each tick a cocked gun. “And how long was I supposed to go along with your delusion?”
“It’s all a moot point now, isn’t it?” He rubs his chin as if there’s anything between his ears but a bloated ego and questionable intelligence. “Once again, you threw everything away over a woman.”
I check the clocka third time.
11:52 p.m.
Not as long as she keeps her promise.
Marcello pushes away from his desk and stands, two slow strides bringing us less than five feet apart, his wide smile begging for a bullet. “I’ve always warned you women make a man weak. Treat them like the expendable holes they are, and you’ll live longer.”
His words sever the last thread of my patience. He’s the only man so inadequate he has to flaunt his misogyny like a goddamn technicolor coat. “None of this was about Victoria or Becca. It’s about you thinking you’re smarter than everyone. For twelve weeks, you’ve followed every move I’ve made with a smoking gun.” I hold his stare, anticipation rising like a pot of boiling water. “But there’s one thing you didn’t count on.”
“And what’s that?”
I step forward until we’re face-to-face, anticipation drilling through my skin. “A wolf hiding among your herd of mindless sheep.” The taunt is vague and open-ended by design.
“Your desperation is showing.”
“And you’re really digging your heels into the role of dumb asshole, so let me expedite this for you… In all your self-congratulation, did you ever stop to consider the source of my information? That the walls of your inner circle had to have cracked for me to walk into your club already knowing about your little Providence sideshow?”
“You’re bluffing.”
“Then explain how I know that all the shell companies were put in my name the day you got out of jail. What broken link in your chain of command do you suppose could’ve given methatkind of information?”
“Saddler,” Marcello hisses, his face hardening. “That fucking traitor.”
I smile, the ironyin those words too poetic. I wasn’t going there, but his assumption presents an opportunity too tempting to pass up. As satisfying as it would be to watch him die with the shock of Anton’s mutiny smeared across his bloated face, letting him lay the blame on Henry seems like a more appropriate ending for two men who played both sides.
The ace of spades may be the ultimate fuck you, but denial of truth is the final one.
“It turns out Henry’s secrets went on the auction block pretty quickly when he started losing a game of ‘truth or torture.’ What do you say you and I play our own game?” Drawing my gun from its holster, I level it between his eyes. “It’s called, ‘What Happens Next’.”
