Page 84 of Where the Wind Whispers

His words were enough to make Kaz’s hand shoot out to catch Alfie’s wrist as he’d prepared to raise his own weapon to kill the man himself.

Unease came rushing up his spine though he made sure not to display it. “What are you on about, Gallucci? I know you’ve had your people following us, so believe me when I say if they even breathe the wrong way, Rus will put a fucking bullet in them.”

“Maybe he could,” Alberto returned with a sly grin, brushing invisible lint off his coat sleeve. “But how many do you think he can take? It only takes one bullet to kill, you know—or three, in this case.”

Kaz was lunging for the man before he’d even finished that statement, hands fisting the expensive material of his shirt. “You’re a fucking dead man,” he growled at him, slipping into Russian. He knew the other man wouldn’t understand, but he didn’t care.

Alberto still smiled, though he shook his head. “You’re predictable—just like your father. You act before you think, and that makes it easy to read you, Kazimir. It was only a matter of time before you showed up here as you did now.”

He didn’t know that the only reason he even knew Alberto was in the city was because of Vera, but that wasn’t important because he was right. Whether he had found out first or not, he would have done exactly the same thing.

“Then you know how this ends.”

“The one man you saw? He isn’t the only one trailing them. There are others—plenty of others all waiting for a phone call from me. You kill me, they kill them.”

“Right then, nothing stopping me from doing the deed, eh?” Alfie asked, not bothered in the slightest by the idea that Violet, Anastasya, or Rus would be killed if Alberto couldn’t make his call.

That didn’t seem to factor to him.

“Unless you’re tired of that Russian girl warming your bed at night, put your gun away. You couldn’t possibly think that I wouldn’t prepare for you as well, Alfie?”

“What do you want?” Kaz demanded, not in the mood to go back and forth. “You showed up here for a reason, and if you wanted to kill me, I’d already be dead.”

“Quite right about that. I came here today to offer you a choice.”

Was he fucking serious? “Explain.”

“Violet, Anastasya, or Rus. Your choice.”

Though Kaz’s mind raced with possibilities, he didn’t think that anything Alberto said next would be what he wanted to hear. “What are you saying?”

“Only one—no, perhaps I should be generous—two of them will walk away today. How’s that for a choice?”

Kaz’s gun was back in his hand before he even had a mind to grab it. “You wouldn’t fucking dare hurt a fucking hair on my family.”

“Was that a choice there, boy? It didn’t quite sound like one.” Alberto tapped the face of his watch. “One minute, Kazimir. I’m meant to make the call in fifty-seven seconds now.”

He had fucked up.

Kaz had always been under the assumption that when Alberto struck, he would be gunning for him—not going after everyone but him.

“Of course,” Alberto said conversationally, “you could always go with the choice your colleague suggests—shooting me—but if that happens, they’re all as good as dead. And that includes the rest of your wretched family. Now, I do believe you have twenty seconds to make a decision. Would you like me to countdown?”

“I swear to fucking—”

“Thirteen seconds.”

“Fuck.”

He couldn’t think.

He couldn’t think.

He couldn’t fucking think.

“Five seconds …”

“Rus!”