Page 78 of Where the Wind Whispers

“I’ll be there in thirty.”

Luckily, he wasn’t far from Vera’s office and was actually getting there well before he said he would.

He expected the traffic, that was common in most parts of the city, but what he wasn’t expecting was the normality. Nothing looked out of place, nor was there any problem that Kaz could see.

Why the fuck had he been called?

And he was readying to ask just that when he got out his car and could finally hear whatever had been playing when he was on the phone.

It was an audio recording, though Kaz couldn’t for the life of him figure out where the music was coming from. He was trying to grasp where he’d heard the melody when Vera shouted his name.

“Kaz! What’s going on?”

He looked at her in confusion. “I should be asking you that, no?”

“Ijor called me and said you wanted me here for a surprise.”

Kaz’s frown grew more pronounced. “No, I didn’t. What the fuck?”

“Well,” Alfie said as he came upon them, “seems like a giant waste of my time.”

“London Bridge,” Kaz said, earning two confused expressions.

That was the song someone was playing, and Kaz had only just realized it when a big blast shook the street, sending him dropping to the ground. Alfie already had a hold of Vera, shoving her down before using his body as a shield for hers.

A second followed, the screams of others standing along the street turning even louder. It took several minutes before Kaz finally raised his head to survey the damage.

Now, Kaz understood why they had been called.

It was Vera’s building that had been hit, fire licking out of the windows, curling black smoke following. And all the while, that nursery rhyme played.

London Bridge is falling down … falling down … falling down …

There wasn’t a single part of Kaz that didn’t think this was done by the Italians—Alberto, sending another message—as they loved their fucking explosives. He could feel the phantom burn of a car bomb very much like this one as he got to his feet.

But this wasn’t just about him, he thought, as Alfie shot to his feet with a curse, drawing his gun out for anyone to see as he marched across the street to where the music was playing from. There was a car there, though no one was inside it, with the windows down as the song played.

Alfie merely stuck his gun through the window and fired off three shots into the car, silencing the music.

“Don’t ever play that fucking song again,” Alfie said absently as he walked back over. “You had one job, mate, yeah? One fucking job. You can’t even manage that, can you? Fucking hopping about declaring to all how much you give a fuck about that bird you married, but you can’t even handle your business, mate. Gallucci did this,” Alfie snapped with a wide gesture of his hand, first to the building, and then to Vera a little ways away with her hand over her mouth as she stared at the one place that meant everything to her.

“I know. I’m—”

“Oh, fuck off, you. He’s laughing at you, mate. And fuck if he isn’t laughing at me now.” Alfie shook his head, and then pointed at one of his men. “Oy! Take her home and lock her down. Then find a building, whatever she wants, and get it. Yeah, got that? Now, fuck off.”

Kaz could just hear the sirens sounding in the distance, and the vibrations of his phone in his pocket.

“Listen well, Russian. You should hope you find that fucking wop before I do—the second I get my fucking hands on him, yeah, I’m breaking his fucking neck.”

Fuck.

Little Anastasya wailed in all of her twenty-four inches and nine and a half pounds of angry glory. Violet was silently thankful that Kaz had opted to stay outside of the small, private doctor’s clinic for the baby’s one month appointment. He’d gotten a call just as they arrived, and Violet, knowing what the appointment would bring, convinced him that it would be fine to miss it.

Vaccines were a bitch but important.

Still, the baby girl cried her little lungs out in her mother’s arms until all she could do was sniffle miserably and suck on her tiny thumb.

Violet could just imagine how well this whole appointment would have gone over with Kaz had he decided to come in, too.