Section 33
The Reveal
Gia
Frank leans back in his chair like he’s just played his best card. Bellini watches me with naked interest now, curiosity sharpened to a blade. The Morozovs sit very still, eyes flicking between faces, recalculating loyalties in real time.
I don’t move.
“Say it plainly,” I tell Frank. My voice is level. “I don’t have time for theatrics.”
He smiles, slow and satisfied. “Your man,” he says. “Matthew Luckett. Or whatever name he’s using this week.”
I feel the weight of the room shift—not toward me, but waiting on me.
“He worked for Valenti,” Frank continues. “A good soldier, by all accounts.”
I tilt my head. “Valenti employed half the city at one point. You’ll need to narrow it down.”
Frank chuckles. “Oh, I will.”
Morozov One clears his throat. “This is true?”
Frank waves him off. “It’s documented.”
“Ain’t that… lucky,” Bellini smirks.
My pulse ticks once. Steady.
“And,” Frank adds, voice almost gentle now, “he was involved in the incident with Sylvie Hart.”
Oh, now it’s personal.
“He was there. Snatched her from her apartment before Lussari saved the day like a knight in shining kevlar.”
I keep my gaze on Frank. I do not look toward the door. I do not look for Lucky.
“That was before,” Frank continues, “Valenti fell apart. Before you. Which makes it interesting, don’t you think?”
“Interesting,” I repeat.
“Yes,” Frank says. “Because men like that don’t change sides out of nowhere. They wait. They embed. They earn trust.”
The implication crawls through the room like smoke.
Bellini’s eyes narrow. The Morozovs exchange a look and mutters in Russian.
“He shows up at your club,” Frank says. “Wears a helmet. Plays loyal. Plays useful. Plays… charming.”
His smile sharpens. I’m almost surprised he doesn’t grow fangs.
“And suddenly he’s in your home. In your confidence. In your bed.”
One of the Morozovs shifts. Bellini leans back, studying me like he’s watching a performance reach its third act.
I finally stand.
Deliberately.
“Is this your long con theory?” I ask. “Because it’s thin.”
Frank lifts a shoulder. “Or it’s patient.”
I walk to the end of the table and rest my hands lightly on the wood. I look at each of them in turn.
“Here’s what you’re not going to do,” I say calmly. “You’re not going to use Sylvie’s name like a lever. And you’re not going to frame speculation as evidence.”
Frank’s smile tightens.
“Lucky’s past,” I continue, “is not news. Valenti poisoned entire ecosystems. Anyone who survived his orbit carries contamination.”
I look back at Frank. “Including you.”
The Morozovs grunt approval at that. Bellini doesn’t smile, but his interest deepens.
“You think this makes you look like a whistleblower?” I ask. “It doesn’t. It makes you look like a man who waited too long to say something because it only mattered once he lost control.”
Frank’s jaw sets. “You’re dismissing this.”
“No,” I correct. “I’m contextualizing it.”
I straighten, already done with the room.
“This meeting is over,” I say. “Any further discussion will go through my lawyers.”
Frank laughs softly. “You’re not even going to ask him?”
I pause.
Just long enough.
“No,” I say. “I’m not.”
The silence that follows is different. The kind that comes when the expected explosion doesn’t happen.
I turn and walk out without looking back.
My pace is precise, I don’t run nor do I linger. I don’t look for Lucky. I keep walking, heels clicking like a metronome on the concrete, then I’m outside and the car door shuts behind me.
The sound echoes longer than it should.
When I pull away, the city blurs past the window like it’s trying not to look at me.
I hold it together for three blocks.
Then my hands tighten on the wheel.
Valenti.
Of fucking course it’s Valenti.
That’s the poison Frank thinks will rot me from the inside out. Not that Lucky worked for him—everyone did, at some point—but that he was one of the orphans. One of the men who survived long enough to be reshaped.
One of the ones nobody wanted afterward.
I exhale sharply through my nose.
I should have known. No—worse. I chose not to ask.
Anger flares hot and fast, finally uncontained. At Lucky, for not telling me. At myself, for letting it matter, for letting him sleep in my bed. For trusting the steadiness instead of interrogating the silence.
I slam my palm against the steering wheel once. Hard.
Stupid.
I don’t make that mistake. Ever.
I vet accountants more thoroughly than I vetted the man sleeping in my bed.
That’s the part that makes my jaw lock.
Not that he might have played me.
That I let myself believe he wasn’t.
Of course Frank waited. Of course he saved it, to poison something before it could stabilize.
He knows me well enough to aim for the moment I let my guard drop.
The city opens up ahead of me, streets widening, buildings giving way to iron gates and stone walls.
The Lussari estate looms into view.
Impenetrable. Old. Loyal to its bones.
I slow at the gate, pulse still running too fast.
I can’t go back to Red.
I can’t go back to Lucky’s apartment.
The gates open.
As I drive inside, the fury cools into something denser.
Resolve.
Frank wanted me destabilized.
Instead, he reminded me why I survive.
Because I don’t pretend betrayal doesn’t hurt.
I absorb it.
And then I decide what it costs.