Panic flared across his face. “No—No, I don’t know anything. I’m just a foot soldier. They don’t tell me shit.”
“Really.”
My cold indifference seemed to piss him off. The fear vanished, replaced with a snarl. His last attempt at saving face. “You don’t find the Snake,” he said, laughing like a madman. “The Snake finds you.”
Something about his words makes me snap. I toss the flat pliers back into the box, snatching up the needle-nose. The man had only seconds before his last breath was stolen just as the pliers punctured his face. His screams rose before abruptly being cut off with a quick twist of his head. The body went limp.
I stepped back, admiring my work. My chest rose and fell with each heavy breath as my brain went static. This feeling always overtook me after a kill. It was exhilarating, especially when my heart was already numb to death.
This man didn’t deserve my pity or my sympathy. They’d killed my mother without ever questioning why crates of weapons had shown up on their doorstep, a hit the only payment needed. They were the lowest of the low, without honor. And so, I would never give them an honorable death. They deserved to die in the street like the rats they were. Actually, I wished I would have drawn it out more. I would have liked nothing more than to slowly torture him. To watch the light fade from his eyes just as it had my mother’s. By my standards, these men’s deaths had been quite painless compared to what I had pictured for weeks as I hunted them down.
I held no remorse as I stared down at the body. This man probably had a family. Maybe he even had kids, someone who loved him. But he’d been part of the plan to take out my mother, and she’d had her own family, her own people who had loved her. He’d taken everything from me, even if he hadn’t been the one to pull the trigger.
I felt nothing for him. He was just another dead body I’d need to get rid of. Another death I could chalk up on my long list of revenge. I stepped back, my hand swiping down my face, across my jaw. I could feel the warmth of the man’s blood staining my skin, but I didn’t care.
And then I heard the sound of a slow clap from behind me. Whipping around, I froze, my eyes locking on the slight figure just at the opening of the warehouse. A red umbrella was resting over her shoulder, her hair perfectly dry despite the rain outside. She was dressed in all black—from her leggings to the tight sweater that clung to her curves.
Sienna had finally found me.
NINETEEN
SIENNA
While Dante had been out hunting others, I’d been hunting him. It had taken me a few days to figure out the method to his madness, a few days just to guess where he might go next. Instead of dealing with everything I needed to at the office, I’d let Mateo take over while I scoured the lowest of the low bars, clubs, and dinghy restaurants just to hear a word about where Dante might be or where he’d go next. I’d even tasked Gemma with helping, just in case Dante had moved to higher, more wealthier grounds to hunt. Killian had been hard to get a hold of, and once I had, he knew about as much as I did.
“Sienna,” his voice hesitated over the phone, “when you do find him, tell him to come home. Without our mother….” Killian’s words caught in his throat. “Just tell him to come home.”
“I will,” I promised. “I’ll bring him home, Killian.”
I couldn’t imagine what Killian was going through right now. His father, I knew, probably didn’t give two shits about where Dante was or what he was doing as long as it didn’t come back on him. But Killian wasn’t like his father, just as Dante wasn’t either. When I’d met Killian these few times, I could see the pain he hid beneath the women and the alcohol. The pain he’d tried to keep from his brother and father. I figured that, without his mother, Killian was feeling just as lost and broken as his older brother was.
Gemma knocked on my door on the fourth day. It was late, around three in the morning or so, but I couldn’t sleep. I was still dressed in the sweatpants and hoodie I’d been wearing that day, too exhausted to change just to fake an attempt at sleep. Gemma looked nearly as bad as I did, though I suspected it was due to the fact I’d been sending her to parties and clubs with strict instructions not to enjoy it. She was working, not playing.
“Did you hear anything?” I asked. I was still at the point where there was at least a little hope left.
Gemma shook her head, watching my face fall. “I’m sorry, Si. Maybe…”
My head snapped up. “I’m not giving up on him.”
“Sienna, think about it. You haven’t been to the office at all this week. From what I’ve overheard from my father, it’s getting really bad. The bank accounts….”
“I don’t care.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Please tell me you don’t actually love Dante.”
“I don’t.” At least, I wasn’t sure. And I wasn’t about to give her information I didn’t yet know myself.
“Then why are you doing all of this? Why concern yourself with a Scarano on a rampage instead of your own family?” Hurt laced her words. “I miss you.”
My heart softened. “I miss you too, Gem. But you’re the one who wanted me to go find him in the first place.”
“Only because it was making you look weak,” Gemma replied coldly. “He was embarrassing you.”
It made sense to me. Gemma clearly didn’t like Dante, but she also knew he was inexplicably tied to me forever. I sighed. “I can’t just let him go out and kill people. First, because he’s married to me. His actions will fall back on us if they don’t go back to his own father. And second, Dante needs someone. He’s alone, hurting. We can’t just let him suffer for it. Eventually, he’d be caught. Either by the feds or the people he’s pissing off.”
“Then let him be caught!” Gemma pushed her way inside the apartment. Whipping around, she pinned me with a glare. “You have responsibilities—ones that most people were hesitant to give you. And, right now, it looks like you’re failing.”
“What are you talking about?” I closed the door with a slam.