Page 42 of A Bride for the Mafia King

A muscle ticked in his jaw. He looked at me, then back at them.

“We’re not just cutting out a traitor tonight. We’re making a statement. And the man who deserves to end this” nodding toward me “is the one who’s helped to build this alliance and end the sex trade in our city with his own hands.”

He stepped closer, placing a hand firmly on my shoulder.

“Don De Mello is Tolya’s to kill,” Nico said, voice ringing clear in the alley. “That’s not a request. That’s a fucking order.”

The silence that followed was deep and final.

Nico didn’t look at them again. He just looks at me with a grin. All teeth and trouble. “Let’s go get us a monster.”

We move in relative silence. The only sound is our boots crunching against gravel and wet concrete as we slip through a side door at the back of the building. Inside, cages line the aisles. Steel and wire. Each row seeming longer than the last.

All of them are empty. A few still carry the scent of piss, sweat, the sickly sweet tang of perfume in an attempt to mask the rest. Ghosts of girls already long gone.

Then I hear it. A soft whimper. Muffled. Then another. And another.

We’re getting close.

Voices drift through the space, low and confident. One of them I recognize as Don De Mello. Arrogant. Cold. Commanding.

“Put that one in six. The blonde in seven. She’ll fetch more upstate.”

My spine locks as another voice chimes in, fainter. Maybe a handler. “This batch is cleaner than the last. They’ll be easier to sell.”

A laugh follows the statement and something cold and sharp shoots through my chest. I force it down and keep moving forward. When I round the corner of the far aisle I can see them.

Nine girls—no, ten—lined up, wrists zip-tied, clothes torn or missing altogether. Being herded like cattle toward the open cages nearest the front of the building. One’s already inside, curled into a corner like she’s trying to disappear. Another is fighting, her breath coming in heaves, eyes wide and wild until a guard backhands her hard enough to drop her to her knees.

A shudder moves through me. Not because of the girls. Because of the memory. This—this exact nightmare—is what my parents walked into eighteen years ago. Not as buyers, not as handlers. As a voice of diplomacy in a war that didn’t want peace.

Tonight isn’t about vengeance though, it’s about elimination. Because I learned from their mistakes.

You don’t walk into the lion’s den and try to make it purr. You feed it poison and watch it die. And you make damn sure when it dies, it dies with its mouth full of blood.

Nico moves in beside me, dark eyes scanning the scene laid out in front of us. He’s grinning like a man two steps from getting everything he’s ever wanted.

“Are you still sure about this?” he whispers, almost giddy.

“I was never unsure,” I murmur.

He nods once, then raises his hand—a silent signal to his men stationed on the opposite side of the warehouse. I glance back toward the cages. One girl catches my eye. Brunette. Young. She’s not crying—just staring.

Blank. Hollow.

I tighten my grip on the pistol holstered at my side.

“Let’s end this,” I whisper.

Men shift around me, silent shadows flanking my sides. We move like a single unit, in synchronized motions.

Behind us, Nico’s soldiers take the left. Mine take the right. All armed. All lethal. All waiting for my signal.

I lower my hand and the world erupts. Gunfire cracks through the warehouse like thunder. Screams follow. Not the girls we've swept past them, shielded them, but the Don’s men, scrambling in panic.

They weren’t ready for this.

We push forward fast, covering each other, moving with precision. I drop two near the cages, both headshots, quick and clean. One tries to flank from behind a stack of crates, but Nico puts him down with a double-tap to the chest before I even turn.