“No surprise Wynn agreed with her. Whipped,” Ryuji sniggered. At that, voices from Wynn, Leona, and Cas broke out to respond.
“Volpe has been busy himself,” I said, raising my voice to reestablish control over this discussion. It silenced the grumbling. “He has been talking, spreading dissent, through the underground channels. I have already received multiple contacts asking if our partnership is true and whether we are officially off the contract market.”
Ryuji frowned and glanced out the window, no doubt unhappy about his revenue streams being impacted.
We had expected this. We knew the organizations we previously served would not be pleased, and we needed to be prepared to deal with that.
“What did you say to them?” she asked.
“I have confirmed our partnership, though it is to be determined whether we still take contracts. Or whether any will be submitted to us, with the forming of our new syndicate.” I rested my arm against the back cushion, crossing my feet at the ankles. “Volpe is heavily implying that we will present a threat to the underworld, and we must be dealt with.”
He had spread rumors that if we grew in power, we would turn on those we once served. He wasn’t exactly wrong, at least where I was concerned. But nobody else needed to worry about that until we had the power to actuallybea threat. Other moves needed to happen first.
“A threat tohim,”Caspian said. “He’s a coward.”
“Max will never let up,” Leona said. “He will never let his guard down. Until I am dead, he won’t stop. He will have to kill me after we made such a big commotion at the club, with both the Russians and the Irish.”
“That will not happen,” Wynn interjected.
“As I told you before, Leona, you will be safe,” I responded. My heart rate spiked at the thought of her coming to harm. “Every man in this room will make sure of it.”
We’d claimed her, and we’d stand behind that claim. She was ours. We protected what was ours.
My feelings were nothing more than compassion and care. We were a team. We needed to protect one another, or we would fail.
“Then we can’t afford to let him run around. We have to go after him again,” she said. “If he’s at the Tommaso’s, I think we should strike quickly. I think we should use your skills and take him out before he has more time to turn the world, including other worldwide communities, against us. It’s six against one. We can take him.”
It was the six of us against two entire criminal organizations—the vast Vero Family he still controlled, and the unknown Tommaso Family. They had manpower we did not. They had defenses we had to break through.
I looked to Ciel, who still quietly observed the conversation. “Is it possible?”
“Yes,” he said, understanding the meaning behind my question. “Of course it is. We’ve broken through worse.”
We had infiltrated secure government buildings and assassinated world leaders before. But Volpe knew specifically that we were coming, and I could not ignore the feeling that this was a trap. If this was a trap, there had to be a target. That target was most likely the highest-priority person in this room.
We could wait and potentially lose track of Volpe. The longer we waited to finish him, the more time he had to secure allies against us—and the more he could fearmonger the stronger organizations across the world against us.
Or we could turn our efforts to assassination, yet unaware of the cards he may hold up his sleeves. The faster we could eliminate Volpe, the faster our new syndicate could grow.
They all looked at me as I weighed the risks.
“We will plan to take Volpe out as soon as possible,” I began. An audible sigh of what felt like relief passed through the group. The strategy of how we might execute such an assassination began to take shape in my head. “Leona.”
“What?”
“You will be unhappy with this, but if this is our plan, you must not be involved.”
She jumped to her feet, surprise raising her eyebrows. “What?”
“It’s safer for you to stay here,” I amended. Her eyes went hard, and it twisted something inside my chest to see her anger directed at me, but Volpe was planning something, and he would go after her first. “Let us do our jobs and finish this once and for all.”
“No,” she said with the shake of her head. “Absolutely the fuck not. I’m not hiding here. I’m part of this. Part ofus.”
I stared, unmoving as a statue, while I waited for her to process the order. Ryuji’s eyes flicked between us. Caspian reached to grab her hand, but she jerked away. Wynn rubbedhis face. Everyone shifted uneasily at how Leona and I had an unspoken battle of wills. I would not budge.
“At the club,” Ciel interjected, “Volpe said if he dies, so do you. We already know he likes to set traps. He thinks he can lure you into something.”
She fumed, color blooming on her cheeks. “He’s not smarter than me. I won’t make the same mistakes.”
