Page 9 of From Rome, With Hate

I know it’s dangerous asking Tobias a personal question about the whereabouts of his leader, but I figure it’s better than talking about my sordid past. I turn back around to face him.

“No offense toward you, but he had more important matters to attend to.” He wears his poker face well. There’s more to his statement, but he doesn’t give a hint to anything else.

“No offense taken.” I lift my glass to my lips and take another large drink.

Satisfied with my short reply, he smiles. It doesn’t waver, even when the curtain finally parts, allowing Tobias’s client to enter.

A tall, bulky man dressed in a black suit stalks into the room. Beneath his black blazer is a gray collared shirt, no tie, open at the top, revealing a large gold chain resting against his chest.

I glance once at Marcus, hoping to reassure him with a small twitch of a smile. He does the same in response. Fifteen minutes, and this will all be over.

Turning back to the two men in front of me, I stand by and wait for them to get their business started.

“Ni neart go,” Tobias starts with a deep tone and one arched eyebrow.

“Cur le cheile,” the man finishes.

Must be their codewords or something in Gaelic. I have no clue what the fuck any of it means. Irish only conduct deals with their own. Or at least that’s Rhys O’Connell’s doctrine.

“I’m shocked Rhys O’Connell arranges all of his client meetings here,” Tobias’s client says, standing between the empty sofa and the oval table. “This place is a shithole.”

I curl my hands into fists by my sides, resisting the urge not to drive them into this fucker’s face.

The asshole looks down at Tobias, who hasn’t bothered to move with a smug expression. The only movement comes from the arm bringing his large cigar to his mouth.

“Careful, gobshite,” Tobias warns lowly, blowing out a large, gray stream of smoke. “My friend here owns this club and practically every club worth a damn in the city. You should bethanking him really for giving you permission to step foot in this place.” He holds his arm out, gesturing toward me.

I swallow thickly, hating the way the wordfriendfalls easily from his mouth. I don’t consider myself a friend to any of these men. Or Rhys O’Connell. They’re simply a means to an end. A path to a life I’ve tried to leave for far too long.

The man shifts his gaze to his left until it lands on me. He stares at me for a beat longer than expected, causing the hairs on the back of my neck to stand up. It could be the entire situation—the fact I’m allowing the mafia to conduct illegal black-market arms deals in my club—but something about him doesn’t sit well with me.

What I wouldn’t give to go back to an hour ago, when I was far away from this world. When I was simply Rome Montgomery, billionaire business owner, not facilitator for the fucking Irish mafia.

“Is this the order?” he asks Tobias, pointing to the case.

Tobias sits up, stubbing out his cigar on one of my glass ashtrays with my club logo etched into the bottom of it. He takes a sip of his drink before looking up at his client, pulling his pistol with the attached silencer from beside him on the sofa and setting it on the table beside the ashtray.

“Money first.”

The air in the room is heavy and tense. It always is during the actual exchange part of the deal. The man reaches into the front inside pocket of his suit jacket. Despite knowing the security guards out front patted him down for weapons before allowing him to enter, Tobias’s shoulders immediately stiffen, his hand ready to reach for his gun if needed.

Tobias doesn’t take a breath—fuck, neither do I—until the man reveals several stacks of perfectly crisp one-hundred-dollar bills. He slaps them on the table beside the briefcase. Grinning wide, Tobias leans forward, picks up the money, and quickly fansthrough them before casually waving his hand at the briefcase in a shooing motion.

The man bends, spins the case around, unlatches it, then looks inside. Once satisfied with its contents, he closes it and eyes Tobias, his mouth curling into a smirk.

“Pleasure doing business with the Irish.”

“What?” Tobias’s head snaps up.

Everything happens in a flash. The man’s hand darts out to swipe Tobias’s gun from the table before he stands tall and fires the gun, delivering a bullet directly between Tobias’s panic-stricken eyes. I watch the light in them die as quickly as the flick of a switch.

The man turns his attention to Marcus beside me. He fires off a shot, and the bullet hits Marcus in the leg, making his knee buckle beneath him. Before he falls to the floor, he manages to get a shot off his own gun and hits the guy’s arm. Then Marcus cries out, landing on the floor in a heavy heap. He curls inward, gripping his leg. Blood gushes and spills from his thigh. The room is dimly lit, so it takes me a second to spot Marcus’s gun several feet from him. I barely have the chance to lunge for it before the man is charging toward me.

What the fuck?

Marcus may have been able to injure him, but it hasn’t slowed him down. He grits through the pain as blood spills down the length of his arm. Using his entire weight, he lunges at me, crashing into me, and my back hits the edge of the bar, knocking it and every bottle of liquor down around. I cry out as I topple to the floor, immediately lying in a pool of liquor and shattered bottles. Shards of wet glass cut through my collared shirt and bite into my back as I fight off my attacker, flailing to get him off. He lands a heavy blow to my face with his fist. Stars dot my vision, and there’s a sharp ringing drowning my ears.

He reaches forward, clasping one hand tightly around my throat. I wrap both hands around his wrist, hoping to loosen his hold on me. My grip pushes up his sleeve, revealing the snake wrapped around the entire length of his arm.