Page 135 of Righteous Enforcer
Now he hates me anyway.
As painful as it is, I’m grateful too. It means he won’t do something stupid like try to save me and walk into Ivan's trap.
"The Dantes have made their position clear. I'm not leverage anymore."
Ivan's eyes glitter with amusement. "Perhaps your value has shifted."
"What does that mean?" I demand.
"It means, Eva, that there are many ways to break a man." He circles me slowly. "The Dantes think they've neutralized the threat by rejecting our terms. They believe they've won this round."
"You're wasting your time. I've told you I have no intel, and they clearly don't care whether I live or die."
"Ah, but there's someone they do care about." His voice drops to a menacing whisper. "Someone who looks just like you, only smaller."
The air vanishes from my lungs. "Don't you dare?—"
"Your daughter would make an excellent guest." Ivan's casual tone makes the threat all the more horrifying. "Children adapt so quickly, don't they? I wish I hadn’t agreed to let her go. That was a mistake on my part."
Something inside me snaps like a wire pulled too tight. "If you touch her, I will kill you." I don’t know how, but I will. It’s a promise I’ll keep even if I have to come back from the dead to do it.
Ivan laughs. "You're welcome to try."
As he leaves, my mind races. I've been running too long. From the Bratva, from the truth, even from Adriano. And where has it gotten me? My daughter is vulnerable, and the man I love believes I've betrayed him.
This war between the families needs to end. Mirabella deserves a life free from constant threat, whether I'm in it or not.
There must be a way out, not to run this time, but to finish this.
I think of Adriano, of what he would do in my position. He'd fight with everything he had.
So will I.
For my daughter. For the future I want her to have. Even if I won't be there to see it.
I have no plans when I exit my room. I’m a little surprised that Ivan hasn’t locked me in. It’s a testament to how confident he is that I can’t escape.
I move quietly down the back stairs. In the kitchen, his staff is preparing coffee and Russian tea cakes. They barely look at me as I pass by. I realize that Ivan has company, business company. I enter the library knowing it’s next to his office.
I press my ear against the wall, straining to hear who he’s talking to and what they’re discussing.
"The Dantes have grown complacent," Ivan's voice carries through the wall. "They believe their position is secure."
"We've tried to challenge them before," a gruff voice that I can’t place responds. "It didn't end well for us."
"Because you didn't have the right leverage or timing." Ivan's voice drops lower, forcing me to press closer. "That was Maksim’s mistake as well. Together, Don Vitale, we have both."
Don Vitale? That doesn’t make sense. Why would a Mafia family join the Bratva against another Mafia family? Power, I guess.
"The Dantes are expecting a big shipment… their biggest to date since Lorenzo’s death. It will include twenty million in cash,” Ivan says. "Alessandro will send Adriano to oversee the exchange. He doesn’t trust anyone else with a sum that large."
"So we hit the shipment?" Vitale asks.
"Better." I can hear the smile in Ivan's voice. "We let them complete the exchange. Then we don’t only take it, but we wipe the Dantes out. We take Adriano, and Alessandro is all but doomed.”
“He’ll send for his brother.”
“Not if he’s dead too. Once the ambush begins, a call will go out. We’ll be able to eliminate the head and the body of the snake.”
