Chapter 9
NINE
Marchello
Fear.
This was the second time Lissia had made me deal with such an emotion. It was becoming a bad habit. One I didn’t care for.
“Where the fuck is that doctor?” I shouted as I held Lissia’s hand.
Milo and I had moved her to a private room once we were sure we were no longer under attack. Lorenzo had a doctor on staff who tended to these particular matters.
“Lorenzo went to get him,” Milo said. “Are you sure you don’t want to take her to the hospital?”
Of course I wanted to take her to the hospital, but if I did that, we would have to involve the police. And if the police got wind of this, I wouldn’t be able to take care of it my way.
“You know we can’t do that.”
Most of the people on the terrace were on Lorenzo’s payroll or associates of his. No one was going to breathe a word of what had happened up there tonight. That gunfire could have been meant for anyone, but I knew better.
“Keep pressure on that injury,” I said to Milo. “Is the bleeding slowing down at all?”
“It doesn’t look that bad.”
“You’re not the one who was shot.” I wiped Lissia’s sweaty brow with a cool washcloth.
“Not this time, but I’ve had enough experience that I could be a doctor.” Milo examined Lissia’s hip. “I think it grazed her. That’s why she’s so uncomfortable.”
“Or she could be in pain because the bullet shattered her hip.” I needed to get out there and find the bastard who did this.
“She’d be in a lot more pain if that happened.”
“She’s pretty tough.”
“Marchello,” Lissia moaned.
“Shh, baby.” I rubbed her arm. “Don’t talk.”
“I want to tell you…” She closed her eyes. “I…”
“You can tell me later.” I pressed my lips to hers. “The doctor will be here any second.”
“Fuck!” she cried out. “Sorry.”
“Under these circumstances, I’m going to let you express yourself any way you need to.”
“Good, because this fucking hurts.” She leaned back into the pillows. “I’ll just rest for a minute.”
“Get Ricardo here,” I said.
“Really?” Milo looked as surprised as I felt, but it was the only thing I could do for Lissia in this helpless moment.
“We’re going to be busy hunting down the motherfucker who did this. I don’t want her to be alone.”
“You don’t think she’d rather have Rosalie with her?”
“No.”
“Why not?” Milo asked.
“Because we don’t know what’s going on here. We have to keep this quiet until we figure out who the bullets were meant for.”
“We can both guess who tonight’s target was supposed to be.”
“If that’s true, they made a grave mistake when they hit Lissia instead.”
Lorenzo and two men—one I assumed was the doctor, and the other I wasn’t sure—entered the room.
“Marchello, this is Doc Vingroni. I trust him with all of these matters.” Lorenzo joined me by the bed. “How is she?”
“How do you think she is?” I snapped. “She was shot.”
“I need everyone to back up and give me some space,” the doctor said. “I need to see what we’re dealing with.”
The other man, who had a black bag, backed Milo away from the bed so he could get closer to Lissia. He replaced Milo’s hands with his, applying pressure to her bleeding hip. Lissia groaned.
“Marchello,” Lorenzo said.
“I have to stay here.” I pointed to Lissia. “She needs me.”
“Right now, Mr. Accetti, I’m sure she needs me more.” Doc Vingroni, a man four inches shorter than me and who I was quite certain didn’t have a gun, ushered me out of the way.
“He’s right.” Milo looked up from his phone. He was probably making arrangements for Ricardo to get here, and he didn’t seem to mind that Lissia’s blood was all over his hands. “Get out of his way so he can do his job.”
I glared at the doctor before leaning down and kissing her drenched forehead. By the time I stepped away, he’d already taken a syringe from the black bag.
“It’s okay.” Lissia smiled at me. “I’ll be okay. It doesn’t even hurt that much.”
“I don’t believe you.” I shook my head. “Try to relax.”
“My dress,” she said. “Is it ruined?”
“I’ll buy you a new dress.” Of all the things to be concerned with.
The doctor approached her with the syringe.
“What is that?” I asked.
“Just something to relax her,” he said. “She’ll appreciate it.”
I stepped back and joined Lorenzo and Milo, but I couldn’t keep my eyes off Lissia. I’d vowed to keep her safe, but every time we were in public, she stepped into danger.
“How did this happen?” I asked. “Your security failed.”
“My security is stellar, but I’m looking into it. I’ll find out what happened, but there’s something waiting for you in the basement of the hotel,” Lorenzo said. “My guys caught two men fleeing the property about ten minutes ago. They were armed.”
“You have the shooters?” I tightened my jaw. “You’re sure?”
“My security team is verifying the shell casings against the weapons they recovered from the men, but I’m sure we have the right people.”
“That was fast,” Milo said.
“No one comes onto my property and takes shots at my guests.” Lorenzo glanced at Lissia. “This needs to be dealt with swiftly. I trust you can do that.”
“You’re going to let Milo and me do that?” This was his territory and his men apprehended them. “Not that I’m complaining.”
“I realize we don’t know who the target was, but your girl was caught in the crossfire.” Lorenzo clasped his hands. “I trust you’ll get as much information as you can before you eliminate the problem in the basement.”
I looked at Milo. “This is time sensitive.”
“I can take a few of our guys and handle things,” Milo said. “You should stay with Lissia.”
Milo was right. Lissia shouldn’t be alone, but if I didn’t address this myself, I wouldn’t be able to rest. I had to be the one to avenge the shooting. Even if the bullets weren’t meant for me, they were fired in my direction and Lissia got shot.
“I have to be there.” I ran my hand along my jaw and turned to the doctor. “How is she?”
“Very lucky,” he said. “The bullet grazed her. She’s not bleeding as much as she was. I’m going to clean and bandage the wound, and I’ll get her some antibiotics.”
“How long will she be out?” I stood over her, hating that she was in this position at all. When I found out who was responsible for this, there would be no mercy.
“A few hours,” he said. “She’s going to be fine, but I suggest you keep her out of the line of fire in the future.”
He went back to tending to Lissia with no regard for how he spoke to me. If I didn’t need him to help her, I would have put him in the line of fire for treating me with such disrespect.
“Ricardo will be here in a few hours.” Milo checked his phone. “The guys in the basement aren’t going anywhere. If you want to wait, we’ll wait.”
“No.”
As much as I didn’t want to leave her, time was of the essence. Whoever these men worked for needed to be discovered. They’d already had a big enough lead on a job they botched.
“We need to get answers,” I said. “We have to find out who those bullets were meant for and who ordered that hit. None of us are safe until we know.”
“I have to put out fires with the men I answer to,” Lorenzo said. “They’re going to want to know what happened here.”
“I understand.” I glanced at Lissia. Her breathing had calmed. The sooner I got this done, the sooner I could get back to her. “I want a full team outside that door.”
“All of my resources are at your disposal,” Lorenzo said. “I’m having the property swept again, and I’ll make sure your suites are secure.”
“Thank you.” I nodded. “Milo, let’s get this done.”
When we got down to the sub-basement of the building, the temperature dropped and the lighting dimmed. This was not the typical hotel basement. Lorenzo had used this dark, isolated space for other purposes.
The fact that this building even had a basement was impressive, with it being so close to the ocean. It reeked of mildew and old sea water.
I took in the low ceilings and damp corridor, searching for any potential problems. It wasn’t in our nature to trust people so quickly. We didn’t know much about Lorenzo, but the fact that Juan had put us in contact helped the vetting process.
“There are no cameras. That makes things easy.” Milo motioned for the security team behind us to keep up. “Whatever we uncover down here, we’re going to have to be rational and not jump the gun.”
“Seriously?” I sighed. “We were the fucking target.”
“I’m pretty sure of that too, which is why it’s imperative to keep calm and get as much information as we can before we take care of the shooters.”
“I’ll get the information.”
We reached the end of the hallway, and two of Lorenzo’s men opened the doors to a small room.
“Mr. Garcia said don’t hesitate to ask if you need anything,” one of them said. “We’ll be right outside the door. They’ve been frisked. They’re clean.”
“I took this off one of them.” The other guy handed me a cell phone. “It might be useful.”
“Thank you.” I stepped into the room and stared at the two large men standing in the corner of the room. They were dressed in black, covered in tattoos, and not afraid to look me in the eye. Garden-variety hitmen.
Milo entered the room without our team as Lorenzo’s men closed the doors behind us. Milo drew his gun and trained it on the one standing in front of him.
“My brother will blow your head off if you try anything.” I shrugged. “He might do it even if you don’t try anything, so I wouldn’t make any sudden movements.”
“What do you want?” The taller of the two spoke.
“Who hired you?” I asked.
“We don’t know.”
“You don’t know or you won’t tell me?”
“Maybe if I shoot one of them in the foot that will speed up this process.” Milo squeezed his trigger and shot at the floor.
Both men jumped back.
“What the fuck!” one yelled.
“My brother didn’t miss by accident.” I grabbed the guy standing in front of me and shoved him against the concrete wall. “You have thirty seconds to tell me who you work for and who your target was.”
“And if we don’t?”
“My brother won’t miss next time.” I slammed his head against the wall, then threw him to the ground. “Is this your phone?” I showed him the one the guard had given me.
He didn’t answer.
“Maybe you didn’t hear me.” I withdrew my gun and aimed it at his head. “Is this yours or his?”
Still no answer.
I pressed the barrel to his temple. “I’m not going to ask again.”
“Okay.” He held up his hands. “It’s mine.”
“Who sent you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Milo.” I nodded toward the man my brother held his weapon to. “Make an example of him.”
“No!” the man shouted. “We came here with a man named Collins.”
Why am I not surprised?
“Shut up,” the man standing in front of me said. “You’ll get us killed.”
“You’re going to get killed if he doesn’t keep talking,” I said. “It’s your choice.”
Milo’s target said, “Collins fired the shots with us.”.
“The shots you fired at me and my brother?”
“You were the intended targets,” he said. “But when one of us hit the girl, we stopped. Collins kept shooting, but you and your brother had already taken cover, so it was too risky to continue.”
“Where is Collins now?” I asked.
“He fled with the guards.” His eyes widened as he started into mine. “Let us go. They left us behind.”
“I want to know who you work for,” I said.
“I told you we came here with Collins.” He nodded. “That’s who gave us the location.”
“Well, that’s unfortunate for you.” I pressed the gun to his temple.
“Wait! I have a contact on that phone.”
“No!” The man who was spilling his guts a few seconds ago didn’t seem as forthcoming now. “We can’t tell you who he is.”
“Why not?” Milo asked.
“We don’t know who he is,” he said. “He and Collins work together, and we’re only supposed to call him in an emergency.”
“Hmm…” I nodded at Milo. “I would say this qualifies as an emergency.”
“For you it does.” Milo cocked his gun and pulled the trigger.
The man dropped to the floor in a lifeless heap.
Now only one of them drew breath, but not for long.
“What the hell!” the survivor screamed. “Why did you do that?”
“Because I don’t need both of you.” I shoved the phone at him. “Call that emergency contact.”
With shaky hands, he did what I told him to do. After he dialed, I grabbed the phone from him.
On the third ring, a familiar voice answered. “Is it done?”
“Hello, Gian,” I said. “It’s been a while.”
“Who is this?”
“You call me your daughter’s captor, but she might not agree.”
“Accetti?” He raised his voice. “What do you want?”
“Well, since I’m calling you on your emergency line, you probably figured out that I’m not dead and neither is Milo.”
Milo shrugged and smiled at the failed assassin.
“What are you talking about?” Gian asked.
“Let’s not play games.”
“Where are my men?” Gian’s voice was raspy and irritated.
“Let’s see.” I paced in front of the man who was staring down Milo’s barrel. “One of your gunmen is lying at my feet, so he can’t come to the phone.”
“You son of a bitch.”
“Hmm…the other is awaiting his fate. It’s not looking good for him.”
“Mr. Gallanti,” the panicked man shouted.
“I think he wants you to negotiate for him, and maybe I would have considered that because Collins and the rest of your incompetent team left these two assholes behind to get caught.”
“Why would I negotiate for a man who can’t carry out a simple order?” Gian asked. “You’re right. He is incompetent.”
“We agree on something.” I laughed and waved my gun around, then put Gian on speaker before handing it to Milo. “But I have a feeling that you and I think he’s an idiot for two different reasons. You see, you think your men failed the mission, and they did, miserably. It was the worst attempt at a hit I’ve ever seen.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Gian said.
“Unfortunately, they did hit someone,” I said.
“One of your people, I hope.”
“I’d say she’s one of my people.” I handed Milo the phone so I could press my gun to the lone hitman’s head.
“Oh God,” he whispered as perspiration poured down his face.
“She?” Gian grunted. “Who was shot?”
“Didn’t you think your daughter would accompany me to Miami?” I asked. “Didn’t Collins bother to check to see if she was by my side before he started shooting?”
“Where is Lissia?” Panic rose in his voice. The same horror that ripped through me when I saw her on the ground bleeding out. “Is she okay?”
“Define okay .”
“Marchello, where is my daughter?”
Making him sweat was a bonus. The sheer terror in his tone gave me great pleasure. He didn’t deserve to know that Lissia would be alright. I wanted to torture him.
“Listen up, old man,” I said. “Your days are numbered.”
“Don’t threaten me.”
“I don’t make threats.”
“Marchello!” Gian shouted. “Is Lissia alive?”
“If she isn’t, it’s your fault.” I wanted him to suffer with the pain of not knowing Lissia’s fate.
I stared into the man’s eyes whose bullet might have been responsible for hurting my girl and pulled the trigger without warning and without regret.
When he fell to my feet with a loud thud, I stepped away. No need to ruin my Italian leather shoes.
I took the phone from Milo and spoke into it.
“I’m coming for you next.”