Chapter Three
Tank
Bianca drives away, and I don’t like it. Not one bit. It isn’t just that she’s leaving, her slim silhouette tense behind the wheel of her car, and that there’s a part of me that objects to that very fact, wishing I could reel her back before she gets too damn far. No. It’s more than that. I can’t forget who it is I’m dealing with: a Moretti. Everything about her screams suspicious; the way she shut down, and the way she faked that too-bright smile when I gave her back those damn rosary. Hell, the way she seemed like she was about to open up to a damn moment of honesty and then, like a Moretti, she bolted like she was escaping something—or someone. It was almost like I was watching desperation drive her away.
Victor Moretti’s sister, acting all sweet and innocent? Yeah, right.
There’s no way in hell she’s not involved in his shit.
No one related to a monster like Victor Moretti is clean, not with a reputation like his. Not with what he’s done to me and what he’s done to my brothers. I can’t separate the two of them in my mind, no matter how different she appears.
I clench my jaw, watching her taillights get smaller and smaller, disappear down the road, and I know, deep in that place in my gut where nothing but the truth lives, that she’s up to something. And whatever it is, it might just be the ticket I need to get to her brother. She’s the best lead I’ve got.
Decision made.
I turn and stalk back into Sticky Buns, and glare at the customers still lingering in my bakery. All four of them. “Out.” Some guy with a latte and a hat that still has the sticker on it — what kind of grown-ass man wears a fucking sticker — blinks at me. “Excuse me?”
“I said get out.”
A woman with a laptop and a half-eaten scone raises her eyebrows. “Really?” she says, like she can’t believe I’m not her personal damn barista.
I rip my apron off, toss it on the counter, which sends up a cloud of cake flour, and cross my arms. “You heard me. Get the fuck out.”
“But—”
I slam my palm on the counter. “Out! Out! This ain’t a damn Starbucks, so take your fucking latte and your fucking croissant and get the fuck out of here, because I got shit to do!”
They scatter. Like pigeons. Like I just threw a stick of dynamite at their feet. I don’t even watch them go. Just lock up, grab my keys, and get in my car. Time to see what Bianca Moretti is really up to.
She doesn’t make it hard to follow her.
Drives steady, doesn’t look in the rearview. Either she doesn’t know she’s being tailed, or she’s too wrapped up in whatever she’s doing to care. Even though the Twisted Devils dealt a blow to Victor Moretti’s organization, that rat bastard still owns this entire fucking town, and Bianca Moretti has no reason not to be overconfident on her family’s home turf. But, whatever her reason, following takes me to a part of Boise that makes me grimace—which says a lot, because as far as I’m concerned, all of Boise is a damn dump.
Even parts of the city that aren’t supposed to be shitholes have a way of reeking like ones. Maybe it’s knowing it’s all tainted with Moretti blood money. Maybe it’s just because I know exactly how filthy the hands are that run this place. The thought of that snake Victor pulling the strings, everyone dancing like puppets, makes my skin crawl. It’s like the whole town is rotten to the core. I don’t fucking like it, and I don’t trust it.
Bianca finally stops in a neighborhood that’s nothing but sagging porches and cracked pavement. A place where you’re more likely to find a needle in the gutter than a car in the damn driveway. It’s just run-down enough to be perfect for Victor’s under-the-radar shit. I hang back, watch her park in front of a house that looks about one strong wind away from collapsing — peeling paint, busted porch steps, a couple of cracked windows. The kind of place that has seen its fair share of bad nights.
I turn down a side street, kill the engine, and watch from a distance while Bianca gets out of her car and walks toward a woman waiting on the crumbling sidewalk. She moves quick, like she knows where she’s going and who she’s meeting, and it’s more confirmation of what I already suspect. Whatever she’s doing at a place like this, it is not something she does not want to get caught doing.
I squint to get a better look at their dodgy little meetup. I know that woman standing there — Vanessa, a dancer at Club Sin, a shaky little thing, all hair and legs and trouble. I’ve seen her coming and going on some nights that I’ve surveilled Moretti’s club — seen her name on the billboard, too.
Bianca’s head tilts as she approaches, like she’s checking for danger, even though they have the whole damn neighborhood to themselves. Vanessa seems just as on edge, her spindly arms crossed tight over her chest, looking both directions like she’s got spies on her ass. She’s even thinner than the last time I saw her, more strung out than she ever was, with haunted eyes that scream her soul is hanging by a fucking thread, perilously close to snapping at any moment.
They start talking, and I slump down in the driver’s seat, letting the scene play out.
Bianca gestures, Vanessa shakes her head, like they’re having a disagreement. This has to be Moretti business. Maybe Vanessa’s trying to get out, and Bianca’s been sent to haul her back in. Wouldn’t surprise me. Moretti’s got his hooks into everything, but I know damn well that Victor Moretti’s not one for sweet-talking his targets. No, that’s Bianca’s job; that’s how they operate. He breaks people, and she swoops in, whispers lies, picks them up, hugs them tight and holds them together just long enough for him to squeeze every last drop out of them, over and over and over again.
What a fucking team.
The front door of the rundown house swings open, and I’m ready to see more of Victor’s boys. The Moretti crew always hunts in packs, but it’s just one guy, and from the dingy look of him, he’s not who I was expecting. I’ve seen his type enough times to know exactly what I’m dealing with — he’s a dealer and he’s a fucking user, and he’s out of it and antsy, like he’s tweaking bad and half a second away from losing his cool. His complexion is pale and sweaty, his eyes bug out of his skull, agitated and half-mad, and he flexes his hands over and over, like he’s not sure whether he’s still got feeling in his damn fingers. He stumbles down the steps and heads straight toward Vanessa and Bianca, and by the time he reaches them, he’s already yelling.
Vanessa's body tenses as she flinches back, her face contorting in pain as if she had actually been slapped. Her shoulders curl in, protecting herself. The guy points at her, agitated and angry. A word leaves his mouth, and even though I’m no lip-reader, I can tell the dumb son of a bitch has stepped in it. Vanness’s eyes flare, she points back, just as angry, and Bianca steps forward and now it’s a three-way fight that’s too damn heated not to be about money.
I smirk, watching the three of them argue. If Moretti’s people are fighting among themselves, that’s good news for me. Means it’ll be easier to exploit the cracks in their little operation when the time comes to pick them apart.
Then Vanessa says something — whatever it is, I can’t hear it, but I can see the impact in the way the guy’s face shifts and the way Bianca tenses. The man blinks, and his face becomes a mask of rage. One second, he’s pointing in Vanessa’s face, yelling.
The next, his hand flies up and smacks her across the mouth.
My blood goes ice cold.
Everything else falls away—the mission, Moretti, all the calculated shit I was planning.
And then Bianca steps in.
She shoves herself between them, protecting Vanessa. Her stance is defensive, her voice raised, and even from here, I can tell she’s not afraid.
But she should be.
Because this drug-pusher didn’t hesitate in smacking Vanessa; he’s the kind of man who doesn’t give a shit about hitting women.
And a second later, his fist slams into Bianca. Vanessa’s eyes go as wide as her mouth as she screams. Bianca stumbles, catches herself against the hood of Vanessa’s car, and though she stays on her feet, it looks like it cost her everything to do it. The man’s mouth is moving again, and even if I can’t hear it, I know he’s egging her on, his taunts nothing more than a string of worthless garbage that he thinks is enough to break her. I know that type, too; the shithead who wants to see how far he can push a woman before she shatters.
But the mistake he’s making is forgetting that he’s not the only one on the damn street with a temper.
Or fists.
Plans can change in the blink of an eye, or in the space of time it takes for one man’s fist to hit a woman’s face. My hands ball up so tight that my knuckles crack, and I swear it’s the sound of something breaking inside of me. My control, maybe. Or maybe just my patience. I see red.
There’s no hesitation. No thought. Just pure, unfiltered rage.
The car door slams behind me, and I barely hear it over the snarl ripping from my chest.
"Don’t you ever fucking dare hit a woman, you piece of shit,” I roar as my feet pound the pavement, harder, faster, matching the rhythm of my pulse. It’s a straight shot up the street, and with each step I feel myself losing any shred of calculated intention. None of that shit matters, not when I’m this close to the target, and definitely not when the target is a son of a bitch like him. My body is already lunging forward, already closing the distance, and I see the man’s head jerk toward the sound of my voice. He turns just as I reach him, and the last thing I see before my vision goes black with fury is the shock in his eyes, the startled widening of them, like he’s just realized his night is about to get a whole lot worse.