The idea of human traffickers made Emme sick. She couldn’t imagine how Val and Dario felt. They’d been on the trail of this ring for over two years. They knew Miceli, Tommaso and Angelo were involved, but they needed to know all the players. They needed to know which of the other families were providing children, teens and women. There had to be one or two very powerful figures that stayed behind the scenes and ran everything. Those were the men Val and Dario were ultimately after. Even if they shut down Miceli, it would only cause a brief disruption, not halt the business.
Emmanuelle had spent a great deal of her life in the pull of the shadow tubes, but this was the first time she was responsible for the man she loved. That was a terrifying thought. If she missed something, if one tiny detail escaped her and she overlooked a sign of treacherous intent, Val could be ripped from her in an instant.
Her heart accelerated. Her lungs burned for air. The beginnings of a panic attack. Valentino’s dark gaze shifted toward her for one second. A hot, dangerous lick of heat sweeping past the shadow they’d created for her. He took a deep breath of air into his lungs—her lungs. Let it out. He knew. He always would know. They were that connected.
She was ashamed that she’d let herself panic. That wasn’t her style. She breathed on her own, feeling the flood of warmth surging through her veins. She didn’t want to be distracted, but she knew he was reassuring her that this was his life. He was used to the danger just as she was used to the danger of her life.
Emme kept her gaze from straying to her gorgeous husband and, one by one, inspected each of the men who would go on the raids with him. Normally, a man of his stature would never lead the raids, but Val insisted that if his men were going to put their lives on the line for him, he was going to direct the entire operation with them. Miceli wouldn’t expect them. He would never think that Valentino would dare to raid his lucrative businesses himself. He might hit one, but all of them? In a single day?
“We don’t leave anyone behind. If you’re hit, shout out. We have partners. Your partner is responsible for pulling you out of the fire. If he doesn’t get you out, he’ll answer to me. We let civilians go. His key people die. I want one prisoner taken from his people. Dario will select that person ahead of time and appoint who will take him. We’ll pass him off, and he’ll be brought to the interrogation site. It’s that simple. We take Miceli’s money and we burn his buildings to the ground. We strike fast and we get out even faster. Anyone hurt, we treat at the rendezvous point. We have a clinic set up if surgery is needed. Any questions?”
When there were none, the men moved quickly, drifting through the hotel’s lower structures to the garage to enter cars. Valentino waited until it was only Dario, Severu Catalano, Luca Amato and Quintu Noto, three of the other men they trusted the most.
“Let’s get this done, gentlemen,” Val said, slipping on his gloves. “We’ve got a tight schedule.”
“I’m still not happy with you going, Val,” Severu said. “We can’t afford to lose you.”
“We can’t afford for any of the families to think I’m above spilling blood myself,” Val countered. “I want you to stay back, Severu. I can’t afford to lose you. You’re the man I count on to think things through. We need to figure out our next step.”
Severu shook his head as they made their way to the garage through the underground tunnels. “Not on your life. You go, I go. We agreed to clean the shit up first, and then it would be don and advisor. That was the agreement.”
Emmanuelle suppressed a smile. Valentino had more than his rebellious wife on his hands. It seemed some of his men were just as loyal to him. She saw his face darken. He got that look, the one that said he was the king and the world had better bow to his will. Deliberately, she stepped out of the shadows close to him, scaring his entourage, so that all but Dario pulled weapons on her.
“Damn it, Emme, you could have been shot,” Valentino snapped as she fell into step beside him, walking toward the car.
“Sorry, honey. I needed to give you a message from my brother before you went. It was important.”
“Next time, make some noise,” he groused.
She avoided looking at his men. They would see the woman in the pinstriped suit with her hair in a tight braid woven in a crown around her head. She always braided it as tight as she could possibly get it to keep from feeling as if she were being scalped. She kept her eyes down, the errand girl, the wife delivering a message from one of her powerful brothers. It was an illusion they wanted to keep up as long as possible until they knew who their enemies were.