Rocco snorted from the front seat.
“You mean you’ll kill us both,”Icorrected.
“Nah,Giovannihas other plans for your hot wife,”Roccosaid with a leering tone.
I felt chills rush through my entire body.
“After you testified against our boss,Giovanniwas in charge of following you and your partner,Manuel,”Hectorexplained, his lip giving a little tick—the only signIhad that related to his brother. “Hetagged you coming out of the chapel with your new wife.Seemshe took a liking to her, and now that you’ll soon be out of the picture, he plans to keep her for himself.”
Took a liking to her?Morelike stalking.Therewas no wayIwas going to let that man do anything toAce, and if he’d already laid a hand on her by the timeIgot there,I’dkill him myself.
Part of me was shockedAxelhadn’t found anything on this man, butIalso knew thePaganoshad vast resources, which likely allowed this man to bury his tracks well.
“She’ll never go for him,”Itold him.
“Money and power can persuade a lot of people to do things they wouldn’t normally do,”Hectorresponded.
Why didIfeel like there was more to that line than what was on the surface?
“He’s not gonna give her the choice anyway,”Roccoadded from the driver’s seat, further pissing me off.
Focus.
“Let them know you know aboutJoeyand that we arrested him,”Sara’svoice said in my ear.
“Well, maybe theLVPDwill make a trade,”Isaid. “Mywife and me forJoeyPagano.Wefound him gambling in the casino you just picked me up from.Beingthat’s a violation of his parole, he was just arrested.”
“Bullshit,”Roccosaid, but it wasHector’ssilence that got my attention.
I turned to look at him and noticed genuine confusion on his face.
“Joey’s at the safe house.Nicetry,” he said to me, thoughIcould see the wheels turning in his head.
“Nope.Igot it confirmed right beforeIwalked up to you on the sidewalk.Hewas arrested and taken into custody.”
“He’s fucking with us,”Roccosaid. “MatteosaidJoeywas meetin’ us at the safe house.Ain’tno way he was at the casino.”
“Matteo,”Hectorgrumbled quietly, as if he were piecing things together in his head.
“Guess we’ll find out,”Roccosaid, pulling into a parking lot for a vape andCBDshop.
“Need a pack of smokes or something?”Iasked, hoping they could still hear me on the comms. “Whythe vape andCBDpitstop?”
“Don’t do anything funny, or me or one of the other guys will end you before you get to say goodbye to your wife,”Hectorsaid to me, loud enough forRoccoto hear.
I also heard the other message, which was,Don’tdo anything stupid because someone else involved might shoot me.
AsHectorpulled me out of the car, he spoke in hushed tones so onlyIcould hear him. “Removeyour earpiece now.They’llsearch you and see it.”
I leaned back, slipping the piece out of my ear and dropping it on the ground asImoved away from the car.Hectorgrabbed my right arm forcefully and held a gun to my side as he walked me into the shop, not even bothering to hide that he had a gun on me.
Rocco opened the door, andHectorandIwalked into the shop.Theman running the desk looked all three of us over, clearly seeing the gun at my side, but just nodded and looked back down at his computer screen.
I suspected with near certainty that this shop was owned by thePaganosas a front.Thosesuspicions were confirmed as we walked through theemployees-onlydoor at the back and went down a hallway straight into a closed-off room.
Right there along the right wall wasMatteoPaganoand whoIassumed were two of his bodyguards.
“Pedro, good work,”Matteosaid as he took in the sight of me and smiled.
