I did as he asked, and he picked up a dagger, admiring it in the low light. “Do you know where I got this from?”
“No, Don,” I said, my stance relaxed but also primed and ready. Cosimo enjoyed having me dodge sharp things from time to time, and I had learned to come ready to have something thrown at me. Also, it was never good when he called me to his study like this.
Unplanned.
He stood and walked around the desk, gripping the dagger. “This was on the woman that you let upstairs earlier. She was sent here to kill me.”
Fuck. “I missed it,” I admitted. The woman had been a dark-haired beauty who giggled far too much when I had patted her down. I should have known she was up to something.
“Yes,” he sighed. “You did. The boys are taking care of her body as we speak. But do you know what hurts worse than knowing she was here to kill me? It’s the fact that my best guard missed a tiny detail like this.”
I didn’t move as he grabbed the back of my neck hard, bringing my face down until the tip of the dagger was just barely pressed into my chin. “A mistake like this could be death,” he seethed, his eyes hard. “Count yourself blessed that you’re among my favorites. You’ll leave here today with your life.” He released me, and I felt the well of blood on my chin from where he had pricked it. “Do it again, and I will fucking gut you, you understand?”
“Yes, Don,” I growled, hating that I had missed something so easy.
“Good,” he replied. Before I could breathe another breath, he had slashed the dagger down my shoulder, the white-hot pain causing me to grimace inside. “There’s a reminder of what I did to you. Now get yourself cleaned up, Lucas, before you fucking get blood all over my carpet.”
Chapter 10
Lucas
“Don.”
I shook out of the memory, my jaw so tight that I could feel the pressure in my head. It was a life lesson I hadn’t repeated since that night, expecting the worst out of people, and sometimes I was fucking right.
Now, though, I was the Don and not an enforcer. Straightening my shoulders, I gave him my best glare. The messenger wanted to talk. Well, so did I.
“Who sent you?”
“You know who sent me,” he replied evenly as the guard reached under the visitor’s coat. “And he says you have something of his.”
Fucking Leda. He wanted Leda. I schooled my emotions from the messenger. “Well, he should have come himself. Don-to-Don.”
The messenger chuckled, shaking his head. “That’s what you think, Don? I hear he calls you something else, whore.”
Emil bristled beside me, but I was in no mood to deal with name-calling today. “State your piece,” I said as the guard stepped back. “And maybe you will get out of here with only your tongue missing.”
His grin broadened. “I have no intention of getting out of here.”
It was only a split second before I realized the weight of his words, but he was already reaching under his coat.
“Gun!” Emil shouted. “Get the fuck back!”
But it wasn’t a gun at all.
The explosion rocked everything around it, knocking both Emil and me off our feet from the blast. Windows shattered around us, spraying glass shards all over the front sidewalk. Bnd before I had a chance to breathe, the sounds of shrapnel whipped around me. Emil pulled me through the doorway and into the house, his gun drawn. I fully expected to feel the heat of the blast, but there was nothing else, no smell of fire, and no smoke.
I sat up on the floor, and saw the tiny ball bearings littered all around us. Some were stuck in the doorway that I had been standing in just moments before.
Fuck.
Emil groaned beside me, his head in his hands. “He was clean when we searched him,” he grimaced as I pushed myself off the floor. “Bastard must’ve swallowed the bomb.”
I wasn’t thinking about what had just happened—more about what was going to happen. It couldn’t be the end of it. Something, or rather,someonewould be coming.
“Get the fuck up.” I said. “This is a distraction.”
Emil groaned, and I reached down to help him off the floor, my ears ringing a little. “Are you all right?”