Page 132 of Ruthless Sin
Bloodstained.
Everyone can see it.
I look at the room.
Renzo pulled from bed, jaw already set. Here anyway. Izzy’s fingers moving before Dante has spoken a word. Giada, who was just upstairs with Mila, three seats from me. Marco at the door like he’s been standing there for hours.
Three years I kept this from every person in this room.
They came anyway.
Dante speaks.
“Nico. Tell them.”
“Yelena Zakharova. Moscow. Three years ago.”
I tell them.
Moscow. Yelena. The extraction deal. Alexei finding out. The concrete room. Her death. The promise I made. The threat Alexei made. The three years I spent burying it.
Finding Mila in the Benedetti basement. Recognizing her. Not telling her.
I don’t give them details. I give them enough.
Dante listens. Doesn’t interrupt.
When I’m done, the room is silent.
Renzo’s right hand goes to his pocket. To Mama’s rosary.
He’s looking at the cross on the table.
“He kept it three years.”
“Yes.”
“As a trophy.”
“Yes.”
His jaw sets once.
“He’s already dead.”
“Renzo.” Dante’s voice. Low.
“He’s already dead, Dante.” He doesn’t look up from the cross.
Dante doesn’t argue.
Cassia’s pen moves once across the folder. She doesn’t look up. “Your girl. She knows?”
“She knows Moscow. She knows I didn’t tell her who she was.”
“Then she deals with you after. We deal with him first.”
Izzy closes one window on the laptop and opens another. Still hasn’t looked up. “He’s been running surveillance on this property for at least two weeks. That’s the first trace I can confirm. Probably longer.”
