Page 132 of Fallen Rook

“Why did you lie to me?”

He shrugged. “I wanted to use you to get intel on the Camorra.”

“Bullshit.” I slammed my hands on the armrests, choking them like they were his throat. “You never once mentioned work. I’ll ask again—why?”

Tom remained unbothered, like my rage was nothing but theatrics. “I don’t know what to tell you, Enzo. I wanted to use you, got attached along the way, and decided to spare you. Why don’t we focus on the last part? I’m giving you an out. Take it.”

He was doing this shit again where he bricked over, retreated to that PTSD place inside himself, and buried his feelings. My usual methods of pulling him out of there were not appropriate for his glass-walled office. Besides, I wasn’t going anywhere near his stupid dick ever again.

And this time I was damn serious.

“I’ll call the AG right now so you can sign it before noon.” He picked up his phone. “Take the plea deal, kid. I stuck my neck out to get it for you.”

“I’ll never turn my back on my family.”

“Are you listening to me, Enzo?” He slammed his phone back on the desk, finally losing some of his cool. “I’m saving your life, your liberty, your future. This is the last bus stop where I can actually throw my weight around for you.”

“I never asked you to throw your weight around for me.”

“Well, I did it anyway. I’m about this close to putting my hands on the Camorra. If you take the deal now, you walk out of this untouched. Completely free,” he said. “Lila, too. Tiernan. Tierney. Your mother. They’re all spared.”

Suffocating heat rose inside my chest, the fire curling upward, scorching my airways.

Fuck, fuck, fuck!

“So I should just sacrifice Luca? Achilles? Our soldiers?”

Tom didn’t say anything. He just stared at me, eyes dead.

“Why do I get to walk free and they have to pay the price?” I roared. “Because I sucked some fed’s cock?”

“Yes,” he said bluntly, his eyes burning with all the emotions he didn’t let show. “You want the honest-to-God answer, Enzo? Then yes. It was because you fucked exactly the right person, at exactly the right time, got lucky, and that man happened to be able to move heaven and hell for you. So. Let. Me. Help. You.”

“Tom, I can’t do this.”

“You have to do this. I arranged everything with the attorney general. It’ll free you from the engagement with Katya, from the Bratva, from this entire world. You could start fresh. Go to med school, Enzo. You’re smart and capable. Start over. Come out of the closet. Have a real relationship. Just give me the okay. I’ll make the call, and you walk out of here with every dream you’ve ever had—fulfilled.”

My stomach churned painfully. “I see you’ve given this a lot of thought.”

“I did, actually.” He straightened a little. “And I made the executive decision for you, because you were never gonna put yourself first, and at some point, someone fucking had to.”

My nostrils flared as pieces of the puzzle clicked together in my head.

Oh, God.

Please. No.

No, no, no, no, no.

He wasn’t bluffing when he said he’d put me here.

“How did I get here?”

“What do you mean?” Tom asked in his usual haughty tone, but I could see him flinch.

“This…” I gestured toward the room. “It all seems too…orchestrated. Me getting arrested for some bullshit nothing. You arriving at the scene before I even got officially arrested. Wiring that money to Naples, making the case federal with a plea deal already put together for me…” I frowned. “You making me promise I’ll take your advice when you give it to me… The get-out-of-jail-free card… The influx of arrests among our soldiers… Wave after wave of detentions that kept our ranks short and pushed Luca to put me on protection duty, so I’d do this nonstop, so you could find a CCTV where I was recorded and compromised…”

I stared at him in horror, waiting for a denial that never came.