I am not the lads I’ve killed.

I am not vengeance.

I am hers.

If I’ve to bend my knee to her father to get her again, I will do it.

I will drag him kicking and screaming the entire goddamn approach if that is what I’ve to do.

No matter it takes.

“Open up, Alessepo!” I bark, pounding on his door. “We’ve unfinished enterprise.”

The door swings open. Alessepo’s hair is a raveled mess, his grey eyes haunted. The arduous strains of his face softened by one thing I did not anticipate to see on this man: concern.

“Karina,” I growl as I step into the lobby, not ready for an invite.

“Jesus, Coda…” he trails off, his fingers tremoring as he shoves the door closed behind me. This is not the untouchable officer who killed my dad and mom and systemically bullied his approach by way of the ranks to the highest. This can be a man unraveling on the seams.

“The place is she?” I demand. She’s the one factor that issues.

He runs a hand by way of his hair, his expression hunted. “I backed out of a deal. A gun cargo.” The phrases cling heavy between us. “It is larger than something I have been blended up in earlier than. I knew they’d come after me, however this metropolis does not want that form of downside.”

“I do know concerning the deal,” I growl, spearing him with a scathing look. “She heard you on the telephone the day she moved in with me. You are blended up with the Alamilla Cartel. Your predecessor was bringing weapons into the town for them earlier than we bought our fingers on him. You have been silly sufficient to observe in his footsteps.”

Santorum was smarter. He managed to maintain management. Alessepo by no means had it. He noticed greenback indicators and by no means observed the fucking yoke ready for his neck. That is all the time been his downside. Greed. I am shocked he stopped to consider what he’d be turning Chicago into if he adopted by way of. That must be a primary for him.

“How does this contain Karina?” I ask.

“They threatened to kill her if I did not observe by way of.” His voice rises, a mixture of desperation and anger. “You suppose it did not kill me to know I used to be the explanation she was in that fucking accident? She’s my daughter, Passero. I broke her fucking coronary heart making an attempt to guard her. I needed to get her out of this home, so I did what I needed to do. And I’ve saved my distance, hoping to defend her. However she was being watched on the college. I wanted to get her out of there. I knew she’d go working again to you.”

“Working again to me…” Is he saying he needed her with me?

“You have been supposed to maintain her protected,” he growls, answering that query earlier than I can voice it. The accusation in his tone is evident, however the underlying fear is louder.

“Perhaps you should not have advised her that I used to be utilizing her then,” I mutter, eyeing him coldly.

“She would not have believed an apology. She wanted to suppose I used to be there to trigger issues. I do know my daughter, Passero.”

“Not nicely sufficient. All you managed to do was ship her working proper into no matter fucking lure they set.”

Within the silence that follows, we’re not enemies. We’re simply two males, certain collectively by concern for a similar girl.

“I could also be a number of issues, however I by no means needed any of this touching Karina,” he rasps. There’s an fringe of sincerity to his confession that I did not anticipate, a flicker of one thing paternal that surprises me. He is a bastard, yeah, however he is a bastard who loves his daughter. And proper now, that love is the one factor I can depend on.

“We work collectively,” I grunt, the phrases tasting like acid on my tongue. “We’ll deliver her residence and take care of Alamilla. However as soon as she’s protected, you are accomplished. You allow the pressure and Chicago. I do not give a fuck the place you go, however it will not be right here, fucking up her life ever once more.” I meet his gaze, mine chilly and unrelenting. “You will not use your place to fuck up her life ever once more.”

Miles bows his head, expelling a breath. “Agreed. What is the plan?”

I smile, a vicious, lethal smile. “First, we discover her. After which I kill everybody standing between me and her.” In the event that they needed to reside, they by no means ought to have taken her.

Chapter Eleven

Coda

The small pockets of the town that road gangs and cartels have carved out as their very own are a number of the few locations the place our attain does not prolong. We keep out of their enterprise. They keep out of ours. That is the way it’s all the time been. Till now.

If Alamilla did not need us in his enterprise, he ought to have left Karina alone. Now, his enterprise is Valentino enterprise. And his life is forfeit.

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