Chapter Forty-four #2
Both girls nod. Dahlia’s lips twitch in a faint smile, like this is just another Tuesday for her. Clara, though… Clara looks back at me one last time, her glare cutting through me, but she doesn’t say a word. Her silence is worse than her fury.
The door swallows them, leaving me in the alley’s shadow.
I adjust the Glock against my hip and roll my neck, every muscle thrumming with rage and anticipation.
Tonight isn’t just about power plays or leverage.
This is about blood. About my father. About ripping answers out of two men who thought they could kill Giovanni Moretti and sleep soundly afterward.
They were wrong.
The bass from the strip club rattled through the walls like a second heartbeat.
Neon lights bled across the smoke-filled air, masking the stink of cheap perfume, sweat, and liquor.
The perfect cover. Our balaclavas blended seamlessly with the masks of the partygoers; no one questioned us, not when everyone inside was too drunk or too desperate to care.
“Go with Clara,” I told Andres, my voice clipped, calm. His eyes flashed with understanding, and he slipped into the crowd behind her. I would take Beaumont myself.
Thomas Beaumont. The man who thought he could own Serena’s future. The man whose shadow still stained my family’s past.
He sat with his bloated frame spilling over a velvet chair, whiskey glass trembling in his hand as Dahlia swayed into his lap.
His eyes lit up like a starving dog thrown fresh meat, pupils wide and filthy.
He couldn’t even keep his hands still, pawing at her thighs as she danced.
Dahlia pushed him back each time, teasing him, stringing him along until he leaned in closer, drunk and pliant.
She bent down, whispering something against his ear.
His grin widened. When she stood and beckoned, he hauled himself up instantly, stumbling after her like the pathetic pig he was.
I followed at a distance, four of my men ghosting at my back. No one noticed us in the haze of alcohol and bass. Beaumont barely kept his footing as he trailed Dahlia down the hallway, muttering promises he’d never keep.
The door closed behind them in the private room we had prepared. I lingered just beyond, ear tuned to the muffled laughter and murmurs. Then Dahlia’s voice, sultry, smooth: “Just one drink with me, baby.” The sound of liquid pouring, the clink of glass. A pause. Then his gulping, greedy, desperate.
Silence followed.
The door cracked open, Dahlia sliding out, lips curled into a smirk. “All yours,” she whispered, brushing past me. “That’ll be ten grand. Cash.” She winked like this was just another Tuesday and vanished into the neon-lit haze.
I stepped inside.
Beaumont was sprawled across the velvet sofa, head tilted back, snoring softly, the glass slipped from his hand. Out cold. Drugged and drooling like the worthless piece of shit he was.
I crouched beside him, checking his jacket. His phone. His wallet. All mine now.
“Sir, are you okay?”
The voice was thin, uncertain. A man’s silhouette filled the doorway, young, nervous, wearing the badge of hired muscle in the cut of his suit. His eyes flicked from Beaumont to me, widening with horror. He raised his radio, panic spilling across his face.
“Help! They got Mr. Beau—”
My Glock barked once. The bullet tore through his skull before he finished the sentence. Blood sprayed the doorframe, painting the wall crimson as his body crumpled in silence.
“Kill them all,” I growled into my comm, cold steel in my tone.
And then chaos erupted.
Gunfire snapped through the bassline as my men moved through the club, efficient and merciless.
Suppressed shots to the head. Throats slit in shadows.
Snipers from the rooftops picked off guards one by one as the crowd below stayed oblivious, too drunk, too distracted by flashing skin and neon lights to notice the silent war overhead.
By the time Andres arrived, dragging John Archibald between two masked men, the floor was already littered with bodies hidden in corners, blood soaking into carpets, lives erased before they realized they were in danger.
We hauled Beaumont and Archibald out through the side window, tossing their dead weight into the waiting van. They were still unconscious, limp like cattle ready for slaughter.
Inside the club, my snipers finished off the last of their security detail with surgical precision. Not a single one of mine had fallen. Over-prepared, over-armed. Exactly as I wanted it.
Ten minutes later, the convoy thundered back into the lot at Cursed. The bassline from upstairs pounded through the concrete, the sound of Alisa’s distraction working perfectly. A party so loud no one would ever suspect the monsters screaming below their feet.
We dragged the Attorney General of the United States and the Chief of the fucking FBI down into my basement. Their wrists bound, their heads lolling from the drugs, their power stripped clean.
I peeled off the balaclava, the bulletproof vest, running a hand through my sweat-damp hair. The air in my lungs felt heavier than lead.
Because here it was. The moment I had been waiting for. Revenge. Answers. Closure.
But the thought of Serena clawed its way back into me, sharper than any bullet.
Would she ever forgive me? Would she still look at me with those soft, trusting eyes once she knew I had dragged her father into my hellhole, ready to bleed him for answers?
Probably not.
But it didn’t matter anymore.
Because I’d already made my choice.
The bass was pounding so hard it rattled in my ribs, a steady, obscene thud-thud-thud that made the floorboards quiver under my boots.
Neon light bled across the smoke, bodies grinding, laughter spilling over the music.
A Tuesday at four in the afternoon, and the place was already full of old, sweating men stuffing bills into thongs like their lives depended on it. Pathetic.
I was halfway to the bar when my entire body froze.
Blonde highlights. Bronze skin. Toned legs wrapped in heels that looked like they’d been made for sin. A dress so short it was barely fabric, clinging to her hips. Her cheeks flushed pink, her hair swinging loose and wild.
Serena.
On the fucking table.
Dancing.
With Sienna.
And Lev.
For a second, I thought the music cut out, because all I could hear was the roar of my blood in my ears. Then “Go Down Deh” by Spice, Sean Paul & Shaggy blasted over the speakers, filthy and raw, and as soon as the word down dropped, my girl bent over and started twerking.
My girl.
My princess.
My jaw clenched so hard it hurt.
“What the fuck is he doing?” Andres hissed, suddenly at my side. His voice was tight, low, like he was two seconds from ripping Lev off that table himself.
Lev stood in the middle, shirtless, still wearing his balaclava like this was some kind of twisted game.
His tattoos flexed with every movement, his massive frame towering between the two girls.
He was grinning like the fucking lunatic he is, his hands locked on their waists as they moved against him.
And Serena, my Serena, was letting herself get pulled close.
She saw me. Of course she did. Her eyes locked on mine across the crowd, and instead of stopping, instead of stepping away from that brute, she slowed her movements, hips rolling to the rhythm, her body swaying like temptation itself.
My cock throbbed painfully at the sight, rage and desire colliding so violently I could barely breathe.
“Down,” I growled across the noise, my voice low but sharp enough to cut through the music.
She just smirked. Winked. And then, like she wanted to watch me burn, she turned her back to me and bent deeper, grinding down on the beat.
“Fuck,” I hissed under my breath.
The men around the table were devouring her with their eyes, their mouths open, bills trembling in their hands. I felt my blood ignite. One by one, I glared at them, and one by one their gazes snapped away, heads ducking like prey spotting the wolf in the dark.
Andres stood like a statue beside me, face carved from stone, but I caught the vein in his neck pulsing, saw the storm brewing behind his blank stare as he watched Sienna.
She had her hands tangled in Lev’s balaclava now, laughing, yanking it down over her own head as she ground against him.
It looked less like dancing and more like a fucking porn show.
My hands curled into fists at my sides. I wanted to snap Lev’s neck where he stood, watch that wicked grin vanish forever.
I knew Serena was flexible, but seeing her body bend, move, arch in ways I’d never demanded of her, it made me burn.
Mad that she was doing this here, madder still that I hadn’t asked her for more dances like that when she was mine.
Lev finally tears himself away from the stage, swaggering toward us like he hadn’t just been grinding between my woman and her best friend.
The girls are still on the table, hips swaying, but now my men form a wall around them, guns hidden beneath tailored suits, making damn sure no other bastard gets within reach.
“You’re early!” Lev calls out, grin feral under the club’s flashing lights.
I step in close, my voice a growl meant for him alone. “We’re not fucking early, Lev. It’s ten. We’re late.”
He tilts his head, mock confusion flashing in his pale eyes. “Ten already? Shit. Time flies when you’re having fun.”
I bare my teeth, every muscle in my body begging me to snap his neck. “Go. Now.” My tone leaves no room for argument.
He smirks wider, because of course he does, feeding off my fury like gasoline to a fire. “Relax, honey bear,” he purrs, clapping me on the shoulder like we’re old friends instead of two predators circling the same prey.
I shove his hand off me. “Remember the plan. You go in first. I’ll be behind the glass.”
Because that’s how this game works, the glass in the basement is one-way.
They’ll never see me, never know I’m there, but I’ll see everything.
Every twitch. Every flicker of fear. Every time Thomas Beaumont tries to lie through his teeth.
And I’ll know, in the smallest movement of his face, whether he had his hands in my father’s death.
Lev’s eyes glint with excitement, like a wolf who’s just scented blood. “Don’t worry. I’ll warm him up nice for you.”
Andres steps forward, cold and steady, sliding into place beside him. “I’m going with you.” His tone makes it clear it’s not a request.
Good. Lev without a leash is a hurricane. At least Andres can drag him back if he decides to rip out Thomas’s throat before I get what I came for.
I turn, leaving them in the pulsing chaos of the club, and head for the stairwell that leads down to the basement. The music muffles as the heavy door slams behind me, the pounding bass replaced by the thrum of blood in my ears.
I reach the observation room, the thick pane of reinforced glass stretching across one wall like a mirror. On the other side, the chair waits under the stark white light, bolted to the concrete floor. Shackles dangle like hungry jaws, waiting to snap shut.
I rest my palms on the cold metal ledge, leaning in, my reflection fractured across the glass.
“The game starts now,” I murmur to myself.