Chapter 92
Aldo
I sat alone in my study, the weight of my thoughts pressing down on me like an anchor. A map of the city sprawled across my otherwise barren desktop, lit only by the fading rays of the dying sun. I was too focused, too tired, to get up and switch on a light.
I couldn’t pull my attention from the array of pins spread across the map. Each one represented the location of another attack, another disruption, another sign that Michael Rossetti and his shadowed crew were getting bolder. Stronger. More determined.
And yet, despite their bold and blatant daytime, often public, warfare, they were like phantoms—impossible to track. Impossible to find. Impossible to predict.
I had no idea where they were until it was too late—until they’d popped out of the dark to leave a path of chaos in their wake.
A rapt knock at my door preceded Carlo’s entrance. He slid soundlessly inside, closed the door behind him. “Sitting in the dark, Vas?”
“My head hurts too much to turn on a light.”
His gaze strayed down to the map on my desk. “Does kinda seem more appropriate to look at it in the dark, huh?”
“I don’t think it’ll help regardless of how we look at it.” I leaned back in my chair to tub my temples. “We’re getting nowhere.”
“We’re really not.” He flipped the light on anyway, then plopped onto the chair in front of my desk. “I’ve never dug this deep into the bowels of the city before. And still … nothing.”
This was how the last week had gone, night after night. I’d add a fresh new scattering of pins, and Carlo would come sit and tell me how they were still finding nothing.
Carlo slumped lower in his chair. “It’s like these bastards don’t exist until they decide to show themselves.”
I exhaled slowly, my fingers tapping at the desk. “That’s what worries me. They’re small, but they move like they have an endless reach of the city. That means they’ve got something backing them, or they think they do.”
“They own the underground.” Carlo tilted his head up to stare at the ceiling. “That’s what it is. If they were just a bunch of street punks trying to make a name for themselves, we would’ve found them. Someone would’ve talked.”
But what did that mean? How could someone be so powerful—and yet so invisible? How did no one know anything about them?
Discarded atop my desk, my phone buzzed against the map. I swiped it up, already bracing myself for more bad news.
“They hit another one of our fronts,” came Nico’s voice on the other end. “A restaurant this time. No fatalities, but they made a mess of the place. Busted up the furniture, sprayed bullets into the walls. Scared the shit out of some diners.”
“Who was it this time?” I closed my eyes briefly, a pulse of anger rising in my chest. “Any IDs?”
“Same as before,” Nico said grimly. “Two guys, masked up, in and out before anyone could react.”
My grip tightened on the phone. “Pull the security footage. I want every frame analyzed.”
“No casualties. Busted furniture.” Carlo leaned forward as I hung up. “They’re fucking with us, Vasco.”
He was right, I realized. There was no objective to this most recent attack. They hadn’t gained any territories, taken anything of value, hurt anyone important. “They’re laughing at us. Mocking us.”
I tossed my phone back onto the desk.
“Michael Rossetti is giving us a city-wide middle finger,” Carlo said, rather eloquently.
Layla found me later that night out on the balcony, staring out over the city. The cool night air did little to ease the tight grip of anxiety in my chest. But my wife’s presence at my side brought me at least a modicum of warmth.
“Didn’t think you’d be home.”
“Hey, Layla.” I turned to offer her a soft smile. The dark lines of exhaustion beneath her eyes startled me, and I held back a wince. “You’ve been working more lately, haven’t you?”
Since this pseudo-war with the Rossettis had started a week ago, I admittedly hadn’t had the time or attention for much else—including Layla. When was the last time I’d been in a room with her, looked at her properly?
She returned my smile with one that looked as tight as mine felt. “You could say that. You’re barely home much yourself.”
“I know.” My hands laced together atop the railing. “A small problem is proving more challenging than I anticipated.”
“Anything you can’t handle?” Her brows furrowed into deep lines of concern.
“His name is Michael Rossetti,” my jaw pulled tight with determination. “And trust me, We’ll get to the bottom of his bullshit if it’s the last thing I do.”
“If anyone can, it’s you.” She sighed, sounding as tired as I felt—as she looked. And I couldn’t help but wonder …
“Why have you been working more?” Was it because of me, because I’d been absent? Because any time I spent at home was probably in the training ring?
“I’m working with a … new friend … to establish a sort of clinic.” Her words came out tight, like they’d been stretched out across a taut wire. Like she knew more than she was saying.
“What kind of clinic?” I turned towards her, brows furrowing. “Who is this new friend?”
“She’s a former patient of mine.” Layla kept her gaze out over the city, so I didn’t get more than the soft lines of her profile, bathed in silvery city light. “One who doesn’t have insurance.”
“Oh.” The pieces clicked into place. Slowly, but surely. “Let me guess … you helped her off the record?”
“What else could I have done?” Layla’s long, pale fingers clasped together over the rail. “Turned her away? Forced her into debt?”
“No.” I reached for her hand, twined my fingers through hers, and she didn’t pull away. “And let me guess. You helped one, and that got you thinking about all the ones you haven’t helped—and all the ways you could help them?”
“You know me so well.” At long last, she turned towards me, a sad, tired sort of smile playing across her lips. “Felt like the least I could do.”
The least she could do—for taking a life. For marrying me.
My hands felt suddenly cold and clammy against her warm, soft skin. She was working herself to the bone in an attempt to repent for my sins—and the thought made me ill.
“Layla—”
“Nothing will be tied to your name,” she said. “I’ll find ways to fund it through anonymous donations. Nothing that would scare—I mean. I want everyone to feel welcome here.”
With a sharp pulse of clarity, I understood. This wasn’t just another clinic like the probably dozens of others she’d worked at or helped to establish in her long career—inner-city hospitals or battered women’s shelters, things like that.
This was for victims of gang violence. People on the run.
People who might be scared away by my name attached to it. The sense of malaise growing in my gut doubled, and I pulled my hand away from hers.
“Well, I’m proud of you, Layla,” I murmured. “You always had the most beautiful heart.”
“Aldo—” She turned halfway towards me, but I was already leaning back over the rail.
“I still have some work to do tonight.” If I didn’t find Michael Rossetti—and find him soon—my wife would have far, far too much work on her hands. I had a feeling gang violence in this city was about to increase exponentially.
No, I decided. Not if I had anything to say about it.
I had a lot of work to do tonight.
