“Fist.” Mike grinned, his teeth covered in blood. A mobster, after all.
“Foot it is, then. I don’t take any orders from you.” I smashed my Oxford-clad foot right into his face and heard a crack as his nose smashed to pieces. Stepping back, I strolled around the room. I, too, had better things to do with my day than spend it with men who ruined my hard work for a living.
“I’m feeling charitable today. Maybe it’s the bliss of being a newlywed. I’ve always been a hopeless romantic.” I scanned Arthur’s twisted face and the soldiers around him, who sat with the kind of electric defiance that rolled off their red-blooded bodies. Fists balled, chins high, feet tapping over the floor. They were dying to beat the hell out of me but knew I was depressingly untouchable.
I wasn’t always like this, though. And Arthur Rossi was the sole reason for my weaknesses.
“So I’m going to spare the bastards’ lives who did this to Francesca. But I thought a gentle reminder—and trust me, this is my idea of gentle—was more than necessary. I have the power and the means to shut you down completely and kill every part of your business. I could make sure all your recycling and sanitation projects are terminated. I have the power to purchase all the competing restaurants and bars to yours, throw money at them, and watch as they put yours out of business. I could make sure your families don’t have a breadcrumb to eat for dinner, and that your medical bills are unpaid. I could send the FBI to your underground gambling joints and whorehouses. I could reopen cases that have been dormant for years and hire enough investigators to populate your streets”—I took a deep breath—“and I could bleed you dry of every dime you own. But I’m not doing that. Not yet, at least, so don’t give me a reason.”
Arthur frowned. Up until now, he stayed silent. “Are you implying that I harmed my daughter, you slimy little shit?”
“Bandini’s muscle did.” I pointed at his friend, who was standing up from the floor and wiping his face of blood. Arthur turned to Bandini sharply. Oh, brother. He didn’t even know. His empire was falling apart. His power diminishing by the minute. It wasn’t necessarily a good thing for me. A weak king is a mad one.
“Is that true?” Arthur spat out.
“He put my son in jail the day of their wedding.” Mike spat blood into a trash can. I walked over to Mike, balling his collar in my fist and tugging it so he looked up at me.
“Get anywhere near my wife again, and I shall consider it an act of war. A war I am more than equipped to finish, and in record time,” I warned. “Understood?”
He averted his gaze from me, unwilling to see the determination in my eyes. “Fine, stronzo, fine!”
“Same goes for your son. I catch him near her, and he’ll be sorry your wife was drunk enough to permit his conception.”
“Angelo can do whatever he wants,” he gobbed, waving his fist in the air. “Leave him out of this.”
“We’ll see about that. Rossi,” I said, turning from Mike. Arthur was already standing up, refusing to go down without a fight. I’d dreamed of this moment for many years. Holding such power over his head. And now, when I finally had it, I felt nothing but disdain and wariness. Coming here was an uncalculated risk. These men had no moral compass, and if Francesca ended up six feet under, I’d never be able to forgive myself. I was the one who got her into this mess in the first place.
“Put your soldiers and associates on a shorter leash,” I ordered, pointing at his face.
“You mean, like your wife does to you?” He patted his pocket and produced a cigar, sticking it between his lips. “She seems to have taken over your better judgment. You’d have never showed up here months ago, and you wanted my head even back then,” Arthur said.
“I have your head.”
“You’re playing with your food, Senator Keaton, instead of going in for the kill. You’re enamored by a teenager, and that wasn’t in your plan.”
“Give me your word,” I repeated, feeling a tick of annoyance flickering behind my eyelid.
Arthur waved his hand. “I will not hurt my own daughter and will make sure no one in this room does either. She is, after all, my flesh and blood.”
“Don’t fucking remind me.”
On the way home, I put Bishop and White on a conference call. I knew two things: they weren’t going to turn the conference call down, aware that I had too much ammo on them, and that they didn’t want me to leak anything over the phone—for exactly the same reason. The problem was that I was sick and tired of corrupt assholes getting their way. Especially when innocent people were being hurt in the process.