Chapter 5
GAbrIEL
This room had no windows—just damp blocks fitted together centuries ago.
One buzzing lightbulb hung over a battered table covered in small, round burns.
A single iron ring was set into each wall, and our prisoner’s eyes flicked from one to the next, then back to me, his face as pale as bleached bones.
Looking, perhaps, for obvious torture devices.
But there was only one he needed to worry about.
Nico Draconi leaned against the far wall, brawny arms crossed over his chest, his stony expression in direct opposition to the sweating, nervous vampire cuffed to the chair in the center of the room.
I rolled my neck, feeling the delicious pop as hours of tension released, some of the ache draining out of my shoulders. One glance told me the prisoner knew nothing. He was a drone, not a player, but sometimes drones contained secrets, too. I just had to find the right motivation to unlock them.
I took off my tailored suit coat, folded and draped it carefully over the back of the second chair, then unbuttoned and rolled up my shirt sleeves.
Unhurried.
As if I had all the time in the world.
Why waste my own precious energy when I could let this fucker’s nerves collapse into a pile of nervous chatter? Which, judging by his reaction, should be in no time at all.
The male tied to the chair—Marco Trevisan—couldn’t stay still to save his life, knees bouncing, eyes skating all over. Door. Me. Floor. Nico. Those iron rings. Like he might find an exit we didn’t know about.
Like he was ever leaving this room.
He wasn’t, but letting him hang onto that slim, nonexistent sliver of hope was a better motivator than shoving splinters of wood under his fingernails. Less messy, too, and I had no wish to get bloodied up tonight.
Dressed in head-to-toe black, Nico looked eternally bored in the shadows, broad-shouldered and silent, the kind of quiet that made frightened criminals confess, just to fill the air with sound other than their screams.
“Name.” I finished rolling up my sleeves, the male eyeing my inked forearms, tilting his head to try to read the words, paling when he finally did. ‘Blood for Blood’ didn’t usually instill confidence when you were walking out of an interrogation.
The prisoner swallowed. “Marco.”
“Full names, stronzo.”
His gaze flicked briefly to Nico, then snapped back to me. “Marco Trevisan.”
I let the name hang between us, letting him sweat and fidget on the hard seat as I cracked my neck again. Even nestled in the heart of the building, the heat of the day still lingered. I couldn’t help smiling, my fangs showing as I said, “One week ago, you were seen on CCTV in Cannaregio.”
“That… I didn’t… I wasn’t…” His voice cracked. “That’s not possible,” he whined.
Impatience rippled through me. Why the fuck did they always lie? And lie so poorly? You’d think if they did it all the time, they’d be fucking better at it.
“Human CCTV,” Nico clarified. “You probably didn’t even know the Polizia installed them recently. Saw the footage myself, unless you’re calling me a liar?”
Marco went dead silent, didn’t so much as blink as I went on, “You were seen near Enzo DiRavello’s palazzo three nights ago. You stopped outside Il Duca di Venezia’s private villa, went up to his front door, waited for exactly five minutes, and...”
“Poof. You dematerialized.” Nico finished, leaning so close, our prisoner jumped.
“Then you ran when my friend found you today.” I took a slow step closer. “Only the guilty run, Marco. So, why would you, cuffed to a chair in the Don’s own home, lie to me? Unless you have a death wish?”
He sucked in a breath through his nose. “I wasn’t there. I swear on my mother’s...”
“Don’t you fucking dare,” I cut in, soft as silk. “Don’t say something that will offend me enough to kill you where you sit. You’re the one who called attention to yourself; you got yourself caught. Tell me who hired you. Give me names, and you might walk away from this. Or…”
I dropped a thin metal pin onto the table with a hollow plink.
Harmless to most eyes. Too small for a weapon, too tiny to do much damage. Most upstanding vampires wouldn’t even know what it was, but Marco… Marco began to shake, the metal cuff rattling, breaths turning to desperate gasps.
Silence widened between us, heavy and ripe with fear.
I reached down into my jacket pocket and drew out a gold cigarette case.
Usually only a prop, but after the day I’d had, I actually needed a smoke.
I rolled the cigarette between my fingers, lit it, and drew the curl of smoke deep into my lungs, savoring the flavor of imported tobacco, the slight bitterness of the paper.
Nico tipped his head to the side, and I blew out a smoke ring in answer.
Yes, you can kill him when we’re finished here, you bloodthirsty bastard.
“I don’t know what you want,” Marco pleaded, tears and snot running down his chin. “I’m a good thief. If you just tell me what you want, I’ll get it for you. Anything you want. You don’t need to keep me tied up, you don’t...”
“These are very simple questions, Marco. You seem like a smart male.” I paused while a chuckling Nico shook his head.
“So you must know the only way out of this room is the truth. Tell me what I need to know, and you’ll walk out of here.
” My smile didn’t reach my eyes. “Lie, and you will never walk again. Nico decides which bones get broken. With that cold iron pin in you, nothing will heal.”
Nico didn’t move from his spot.
All he had to do was smile.
Marco’s voice went thin. “I don’t know anything, I swear. I just… I received instructions to go to that location and deliver a note. Told me to stop at the edge of the canal, wait for exactly five minutes, then go up to the palazzo. Knock on the doors. If no one answered, I could leave.”
The edge of the canal. Right where the security cameras would get a clear shot.
I flicked my gaze to Nico. A silent question.
Nico shrugged. “He didn’t have the note on him.” His low voice turned thoughtful. “But I don’t smell a lie on him. Truth.”
Marco’s shoulders sagged with relief, then tightened when my expression didn’t soften.
“Who gave you this mysterious note?” I prompted softly.
He licked his split lip and winced. “Some vampire I didn’t recognize. Never seen him in the city before. I swear.”
I picked up the pin, the iron burning my fingertips as if it had just come out of the forge. “Describe him.” My voice stayed casual, a wisp of smoke rising from where I pinched the pin between my fingertips.
I liked the pain, actually.
It reminded me that somewhere outside of my head, I existed. That I was made of living flesh, not just a collection of strategy, cunning, and loyalty to a Dynasty I despised and a father I didn’t trust.
“S-Short,” he blurted. “Light hair. He wore a dark, square cap like a gondolier, but he wasn’t dressed like one. His hands were soft; he had a ring on his pinkie. Gold. Some kind of crest.” His throat worked. “He smelled like smoke. Something pungent… cedar, maybe.”
That detail slotted in like pieces of a puzzle. Venice was full of smoke, but cedar… that could narrow down our search.
Out of nowhere, it struck me again how recklessly the DiRavello girl had acted tonight, and I decided to kill two birds with one stone. Once I found Enzo’s killer, maybe the little hot-blooded princess would settle the fuck down.
The last thing I needed was a rogue Dynasty heir wreaking havoc during the Blood Compact.
An heir I would be tasked with silencing if her accusations grew too loud.
“Where did this stranger find you?” I asked.
“San Polo,” Marco licked his lips. “By the mercato. I didn’t ask too many questions, if you know what I mean.” The look he gave me was pleading, as if he expected me to buy into his bullshit. “He knew my name. Paid me in gold. Old gold, like the kind…”
“That’s how I found this idiot. He still had these at the gaming table,” Nico set down a stack of four gold ducats, fifteenth century maybe. The dull sound of them clinking together brought back old memories of my sire, counting out stacks of them in his office when I was a child.
“You received instructions to wait outside the DiRavello palazzo for five minutes and received how many of these as payment?”
I picked one up and inspected it, taking my time.
Only the old families used ducats anymore.
Which meant these coins were either a message or a false trail, the killer wanting me to believe one of the other families offed him.
Either way, this development was neat and clean and had me wondering if poor Marco hadn’t been dropped straight into our laps.
A convenient distraction.
“Ten,” Marco strained at the cuffs, scrawny muscles popping. “I thought I’d try my luck at the tables, but I…”
“Marco here is a terrible gambler, as it turns out,” Nico grinned. “Lost all but these four by the time I found him.”
The prisoner sagged in the chair, all the fight draining out of him.
“That’s a lot of money to do nothing but wait.” I blew out a stream of smoke, then ground my cigarette out on the table. “To pay a nobody criminal for five minutes of their time. So, the note was real, but the rest…” I plunged the pin into Marco’s knee, deep enough, he couldn’t dig it back out.
“Now.” I rose to my full height, casting Marco’s face into shadow. “Let’s start over. What did the note say?”
“Fuck,” Marco screamed, doubling over, “Fuck that hurts.”
“It’s cold iron, what did you expect?” Nico chuckled drily. “In an hour, you’ll be begging me to cut your leg off.”
“The note, Marco,” I prompted. “I know you memorized it, word for word. Any good thief would.”
“Fine, yes, I cracked the seal. The note was for Enzo.” His voice cracked. “For Enzo DiRavello. It… it was an invitation for a meeting. With directions.” This time, when his eyes met mine, they were filled with fear. “Something about your… brother.”
“My brother is dead,” I snapped, temper shredding, even as my blood turned to ice. I shot Nico a pointed look.
“Truth,” he intoned, shaking his head.
Fuck. Besides being a heartless motherfucker, Nico Draconi was a Truthteller, capable of discerning lies from truth. And it would have been in our best interest if Marco was lying right now.
“I…” Marco looked frantically between us. “I know, that’s what I heard, too. The note made no sense.”
The room went colder. Even Nico seemed to pause, one eyebrow rising in silent question.
“Maybe it was another Dante,” I suggested.
Marco shook his head, frantic. “No. No. It was him, I swear. I tried to make the delivery, knocked at the gates, but there was no answer. I waited, then I lost my nerve and ran. I ripped up the note, dropped the pieces in the canal, and went home. Kept my head down.”
“What directions?” I prompted. “Where was this meeting supposed to take place?”
“Six nights ago. Campo San Geremia. One o’clock.”
“Convenient timing,” Nico crossed his arms over his chest. “Once we’re finished here, I’ll check it out.”
He wouldn’t find anything; we both knew that. So did Marco, his eyes snapping open, raw terror in them, the look of a male with no more cards to play.
“I’m telling you everything I know. I swear by the gods.”
I believed him—mostly. Males—petty criminals like Marco—didn’t know how to hide the big lies; they only knew how to trade them away to save their own skin. But he was also a coward, and cowards held onto the truth until it was pried loose with pain.
“Not everything,” I argued. “You could have traded those gold ducats away to any pawn shop that very night and been in the wind. But you stayed… you kept your head down… until you heard something,” I mused. “After.”
His brows knit together. “After?”
“After Enzo died,” I clarified. “You figured no one knew about your side hustle, so you stayed in Venice. Then something spooked you, made you do something desperate, like go to the tables with ten gold ducats that would bring attention to yourself and get you caught.”
His gaze slid away.
Nico leaned in, voice dropping, like the two of them shared a secret. “Tell Il Lupo Nero what he wants to know, and I’ll make it fast, Marco. No need for you to suffer, not if you help us.”
Marco shuddered, shoulders curling down, body trembling in pain. “There’s no proof. I have no proof, and it’s not like I know for sure…” He scanned our faces, hope flaring one last time before fading away.
He had betrayed the Dynasty.
Now, his best hope was that Nico kept his word.
“I heard a rumor that the assassination… wasn’t revenge. It wasn’t some rival family.” His breath came in sharp, desperate pulls. “They said the order came from inside, that Enzo’s own blood…”
“Giovanni,” I prompted.
Marco nodded violently. “Yes. Yes. I heard it twice. Two different sources. Like everyone already knew but was afraid to say it out loud.” His voice collapsed into a whisper.
“I heard Enzo was ready to expose something big. He was going to the Council. Something about Giovanni… and an old arrangement gone sour.”
His eyes swung wildly between us, desperation souring the air. “I heard…” He licked his lips like a lizard. “This secret involved the Don, and your… brother. That if this got out, it would destroy the entire Dynasty. But I thought it was just a rumor… just a fucking rumor.”
Nico straightened, his eyes locking with mine.
Rumors we could keep a lid on.
But if the underground was buzzing with talk of my brother… My gut clenched with something I seldom experienced these days. Fear.
For a moment, there was nothing but Marco’s ragged breathing and that fear, Nico waiting for me to decide what came next, his hand resting on the hilt of his knife.
I replayed the conversation I’d just had with my sire. Marcello’s distrust of Giovanni had never been as obvious as it was tonight. Did my father know for an indisputable fact that Giovanni killed Enzo?
Or, like me, did he only suspect?
Either way, I needed to keep a lid on this information. Giovanni DiRavello was an Ancient. An Ancient with an endless network of spies, six hundred years of influence, and his nephew about to inherit one of the five gilded seats of the D’Immortali Dynasty.
A boy, given a seat of power and influence he wasn’t prepared for.
With his uncle pulling the strings and a sister with revenge in her heart.
And me with a secret that could blow everything wide open.
I straightened slowly, and Nico’s gaze met mine before he dipped his head. It’s done, he might as well have said.
My hand closed around the iron latch, and I pushed the door open. The corridor beyond was hot and humid, lit by lamps and gilded mirrors. Footsteps and voices drifted from upstairs, as if we weren’t down here, performing the dark deeds that kept this Dynasty intact.
I stepped out, and the stone room sealed itself shut behind me with a soft final sound.
Like a guilty verdict.