“Mr. Donati, we need you to sit down and have an interview with us about today’s attack. We have every reason to believe that it is related to the one on your—”
Cross put his hand up in the face of the detective, and walked on past, saying only, “You have my lawyer’s number; call him.”
“We have sent for a child forensic psychologist to sit down with your daughter, Cross. You may want to reconsider chatting with us.”
Instantly, Cross stopped walking. He turned so fast, his fucking vision blurred from the speed. Rage and hate filled his heart as he faced the smirking detective and the man’s partner. He didn’t know their names, and frankly, he didn’t give a fuck to learn.
“You will not be questioning my daughter,” Cross said through clenched teeth. “Let me make that one thing perfectly fucking clear. Under no circumstances will my wife or I sign off on anything that allows you to speak with Cece. Not now, and not ever.”
His daughter was too smart, and too observant for her own good. He knew without a doubt Cece likely understood what had happened today. She simply might not have the right vocabulary yet to explain it.
He was not going to allow her to talk to cops. He didn’t fucking talk to cops, for that matter. None of them did.
“She was a witness to—”
“She is barely beyond her third birthday!”
“Which is why the child forensic psychologist was called in. This particular one specializes in Cece’s age group. You cannot impede our investigations.”
“You will not be questioning my daughter,” Cross repeated.
Hatred coated his every word.
The detective barely batted an eye.
“We think differently, Mr. Donati.”
“I said what I said, asshole. This conversation is done.”
With that said, Cross turned on his heel and headed further into the hospital. He heard the detective call at his back. The fools still expected some kind of agreeable response from him, but he had news for them. Holding his hand high over his shoulder, he flipped his middle finger up and left it like that until he rounded a corner.
There.
Let them make of that what they wanted.
He would handle this little issue of the Russians. Today was his absolute last straw, no questions asked. He didn’t even know the whole story about what had happened, as he immediately came to the hospital when he got the call. He didn’t even wait on the phone long enough to ask for details.
The only thing that had mattered was Andino made it perfectly clear Cece and Catherine were all right. The rest, Cross would deal with once he was there.
Well, now he was.
And it was time to deal with it all.
Cross was not going to give the Russians one more chance to mess with his family or organization. As it was, they had already made the streets practically impossible to safely work on for his men. They had put his family into hiding, which had done no good, it seemed. The very first moment Catherine and Cece left the brownstone, they were easily found.
Someone had been watching, probably.
Besides his family, and the Donati men, there was also the constant problems and issues that had been thrown at Zeke and Katya from Vlad, his men, and the one Russian who thought he owned the woman. Timur. Apparently, that one was a lot bolder in his threats and actions, but Zeke had asked that he be allowed to handle keeping Katya safe while they figured out the rest.
So much for all of that, Cross thought as he headed toward the ICU wing. The time for keeping people safe was over, he suspected.
It was time to act.
Cross stepped into the ICU room, and his gaze immediately found the woman in the bed. IVs hooked to her arm. A line of oxygen went to her nose. Katya was already a light-skinned, pale woman, but now she was almost gray in pallor. Still, her gray eyes were wide and clear, focused on the person speaking to her.
Catherine.
“You’re sure she’s—”
“I promise,” Catherine said with a smile, “Cece is just fine, Katya. She is.”
“I’m sorry.”
Catherine grabbed hold of the young woman’s hand, and held tight. “Don’t be sorry. She’s fine because of you. That’s what matters.”
Cross slid in beside Zeke along the wall. He didn’t think he had ever seen his friend so silently seething, yet he was. Zoned out, glaring out the window of the hospital room, and seemingly totally unaware that Cross was even standing there with him.
He didn’t blame his friend.
He would be the same way, likely.
“Care to fill me in on the details?” Cross asked.
Zeke sighed, and his gaze slid to Cross. “Catherine was walking with Andino around the park. We were on the other side tossing snowballs back and forth.”
“All right.”
“Cece’s mittens were soaked, and her hands were cold. I knew Catherine had brought along extra mittens for Cece—she told me they were in the car if we needed them. Catherine had parked at one side. We parked at the other. I ran to grab the mittens. I figured it would be fine because the enforcers were close by.”
“It wasn’t okay,” Cross assumed.
“The Russians don’t care; that’s what fucking happened. They’re too bold, too brazen. Two of them walked right up to Katya while I was gone. A gun to her. A gun to Cece. Walked her straight out to the other parking lot by using Cece as a threat.”
Cross had stiffened all over at the image of a gun being pointed at his child. Still, he kept quiet and let Zeke explain what he knew about what went down earlier.
“The enforcers were at a safe distance, trying to step in without getting one of the two hurt in the process. By that time, I realized Katya and Cece were gone, and bolted for the parking lot. I only got there after the shots. I guess once they had her near the car, they stopped pretending like they gave a fuck about what happened to Cece.”
A slow, heavy stream of air blew from Cross’s mouth. It was the only way he could keep the rage building inside his heart at a manageable level.
Time and a place, he kept telling himself. There was always a time and a place for his violence, and this was not it. Soon …
“They were going to kill Cece anyway?” Cross asked quietly.
Zeke nodded. “Katya got out of the one guy’s hold, and ended up taking two bullets for it. One to her back. One to her arm. The one in her arm is out—she’s going into surgery in two hours for the one in her back. They needed her blood pressure and anxiety stabilized first. She just wanted …”
“What?”
His friend shrugged. “To hear Cece was okay, I guess.”
“So that’s it?”
“Once the shots fired, the enforcers went in. People in the parking lot and park were running and screaming everywhere. They traded more bullets.”
Cross cursed lowly.
Police attention was going to be at an all-time high, now. He fucking hated that, but there wasn’t a whole lot he could do about it for the moment. Deal with the fuckers, he supposed. Divert their attention. Get business done on the low, somehow.
It sucked.
“Two Donati enforcers are dead,” Zeke murmured, “and the Russians bolted when they realized they were outnumbered. Katya was passed out on the ground, and shit was going bad. I think they assumed she was dead.”
Cross’s gaze drifted across the room. “Where was Cece then?”
Zeke cleared his throat. “Under Katya.”
Oh.
The bullet in the back.
She had saved his daughter, and was willing to sacrifice her own life to do it. Cross no longer thought he needed to find something about Katya to make this whole shit-show worth the effort and trouble. She had done that all on her own, really.
“Cece is—”
“With my mother and father, currently,” Cross interjected. “I asked she be taken there from the hospital when I got the call.”
“Oh.”
“It’s time to end this fucking nonsense.”
Zeke agreed. “Not sure how, though.”
“I’m starting to like that whole idea we were given about just going in, getting business done, and cleaning damn house all at once.”
“Even with the police attention like it is right now?”
“Even with that, man.”
“Dangerous.”
“So are they, clearly,” Cross said with a gesture in Katya’s direction.
The woman was still talking to Catherine, and neither of the two women seemed to notice the men were knee-deep in conversation at the moment. Cross was fine with that. He could fill Catherine in on all the details later.
“We know the Russians never gather in large groups,” Cross said.
“Not at the same time, no.”
“So an attack like that, where we just hit them all at the same time, is basically impossible. But we do know who the main heads of the organization are.”
“What do you want—specific details on those men, and their meets?”
“All of that, and whatever else you can find for me,” Cross replied. “Shit, sit Katya down, too, and get whatever you can get from her, too. Women know more than they let on when it comes right down to it.”
Zeke rubbed a hand down his jaw before saying, “We’ll need a few days to get everything ready, and worked out.”
“Not an issue. After tonight, everyone who needs to be locked in for safety is doing exactly that. Men are coming off the streets. Donati business is on hold until I say otherwise. I am not losing one more person to these cocksuckers.”
“Could I see her?” Katya asked.
Her question drew Cross away from his conversation. Zeke, too, looked at his wife.
“Cece, I mean. Could I?”
Catherine passed Cross a look. “She’s not here, is she?”
“She can be,” Cross said, “but only for a few minutes.”
“You’re going into surgery in a couple of hours,” Zeke reminded Katya. “Maybe it would be better to wait until after when you’re home again and—”
“Please?” Katya asked.
Cross touched his friend’s arm to keep him from refusing again. “Cece will be here before you go into surgery. I’ll make sure of it.”
And she was.
“Plane takes off in three hours,” Dante said.
Cross passed a sleeping Cece into her grandfather’s arms. “Just enough time for you to get to the airstrip, then.”
“About that.”
Further down the hallway, Catrina and Catherine quietly talked. Cross couldn’t hear their conversation, but he didn’t really need to. Besides, he had his own pressing matters to handle at the moment.
“She’ll have fun at the Florida vacation house,” Dante said. “She always likes the beach.”
Cross smoothed a hand over the crown of his daughter’s head. “Hopefully this won’t take too long, anyway.”
“Take as long as you need to make sure it is done, Cross.”
He heard his father-in-law’s words loud and clear.
End them.
“It’ll be done,” he said.
“Have you considered closing ranks in the Three Families to have strength in numbers or some back up?”
Cross shook his head. “It’s still only a Donati problem. The Donati people will handle it.”
“Ah, I see.”
“At least with Cece gone for a while, the cops won’t be bothering us about her.”
Dante frowned. “Come again?”
“Detectives at the hospital. They wanted me to hand Cece over to do interviews with a child forensic psychologist about the shooting.”
“Of course they did,” his father-in-law grumbled.
“I refused.”
“It’s your right as the parent. Be concerned, however, if they attempt to legally force her testimony.”
“That’ll only happen in the event of a Grand Jury or trial.”
“I suppose.”
“And we won’t be having either of those at all, Dante, not when I remove the people causing us all these issues.”
Dante chuckled. “Mmm, true.”
“Still pissed me off like nothing else, though,” Cross said.
“It’ll pass. Once everything is said and done, it will all pass.”
Hopefully.
“But should you find yourself over your head,” Dante added when Cross stayed silent, “remember that John and Andino have phone numbers, and you have a phone.”
“Yeah, I’ll remember.”
How not to use them.
Cross understood the point Dante was trying to drive home with him. The other points in the triangle of the Three Families were supposed to have his back, like he had theirs. Still, Cross had his own way of handling things, and this was one of those.
He didn’t need help.
He needed time and information.
Cece’s sleepy eyes blinked awake, and the first person she looked for was her father. A little smile lit up her face. She’d had a horrible day. From the shooting, to the nurse at the hospital demanding to take her pretty jacket and ski-pants because they had blood on them.
Evidence, the woman said.
Apparently, anyway. That was before Cross had even gotten to the hospital, and he had already given the order for Cece to be taken to her grandparents the very second someone could do that.
Catherine had been dangerously close to killing someone herself at that point. Not that Cross particularly blamed her.
“Hi, Daddy,” Cece said in her sleepy, childish voice. Then, she noticed her grandfather was the one holding her and added, “Hi, Grandpapa Dante.”
The two men smiled at her.
Cross stroked her hair again. “Hey, bambina. You’re going to go on a big plane ride with your grandpapa and grandmamma. Doesn’t that sound fun?”
“Okays.”
“Okay,” he echoed.
“I see Aunt Kats again?”
Dante shot Cross a curious look, but he figured his next words would explain it well enough.
“Aunt Katya will be with Uncle Zeke when you get home, and you can see her all you want then. How about that?”
“Okays,” she said, slightly cheerier than before. “I gottsa pee.”
“Cat!”
Cross chuckled at Dante’s instant holler.
Dante put Cece down on her feet as Catrina and Catherine came back down the hallway. Cece danced on the spot while her mother said goodbye to her, and then darted for her grandmother’s outstretched hand as soon as the bathroom was suggested.
“She’ll be fine,” Dante assured Catherine.
She pressed her lips together, looking entirely unhappy about the turn of events. “Mmm.”
“She will, Catherine.”
“She knows,” Cross said for his wife, “but it’s been a difficult day for everyone, I think.”
“Exactly that,” Catherine agreed with a sigh. “All right, Daddy. Call us when you get to Florida?”
“I will. By the way, Cross, what about your mother and father?”
“Headed out of state tonight, actually. As soon as I picked up Cece, they were already on their way. They were going to Chicago for a week a bit later in the month, but they decided to speed that up.”
Dante nodded. “Still a little close, isn’t it?”
“A little for comfort, yeah.”
“Calisto does what he wants, hmm?”
Cross laughed. “I get it from somewhere, don’t I?”
“It’s definitely a Donati thing, Cross. I will give you that.”
Dante reached for Catherine, and gave her a hug. A quick kiss to her cheek, and then Dante held out a hand for Cross to shake as well. One thanks between them all, and another word of advice for Cross to be safe, and they were gone.
It was only once Cross and Catherine were inside their Rolls-Royce that his wife finally turned to him. In her eyes, he could see the same thing he had been feeling all damn day. Catherine, like him, was just really good at hiding it.
“What?” he asked her.
“How long before the bastards are all gone?”
Cross turned the car around in the circular drive as he considered how to answer her question. “Well, a few days likely. That’s only because I want it done right.”
Catherine nodded. “All right.”
“Was that all?”
“No.”
“What else?”
Her green gaze turned on him again—all fire and ice in a blink.
“Bury them.”
Cross kept his head low as he slipped out of the skylight window. With darkness all around, and his black clothing, he doubted anyone could see him on top of the empty house, anyway. Apparently, the place had been for sale coming on two years, now. The market was shit, and the seller was asking six million for the place.
After seeing the inside the other day, he knew it wasn’t worth the price they wanted. It needed major upgrades to get it into this century, a new roof, and the chimney needed either torn out or replaced.
However, he’d made it seem like he was interested in every nook and fucking cranny inside the three-level, old Victorian when he called up the realtor. So much so, that the realtor had been so excited for a possible sale, he didn’t even realize Cross had left the window unlatched and the bottom floor window unlocked after he checked them out.
Two days after that initial meet with the realtor, and here he was. Slipped in the back window, and straight onto the roof.
Cross carefully climbed to the peak of the roof, mindful of the slipperiness. At the peak, he rested down on his stomach, and grabbed the medium sized case at his back. Setting it beside him, he opened the case up and began slowly assembling the pieces of a Mosin-Nagant. A Russian sniper rifle.
He felt it was appropriate to use, all things considered. The weapon certainly wasn’t the best of sniper rifles—fuck, it wasn’t even the best in his collection. However … appropriate.
Cross grabbed the magazine inside the case, and checked the number of bullets inside. He dumped out all but two back into the case. Even the best shooters in the world had to take a second shot sometimes, and he wouldn’t have time to take more than that after the first one.
Clicking the magazine into place, Cross set the tri-pod of the gun just before the crest of the roof’s peak. Beneath the black wool mask covering all of his face except for his mouth and eyes, he felt invisible. A quick check of the houses around the one he was currently on top of told him that most of the residents were asleep at almost midnight.
Across from him, two roads over, and a large hill upward, a single house sat on a property guarded by four men, and a six-foot high stone fence. About six hundred meters, he figured. Of course, he couldn’t get much closer than he had already been without possibly drawing attention from the Russian organization, or the man inside the house.
Vlad Sokolov, that was.
Cross’s hit.
Rick had the man’s Sovietnik hit—a consigliere type situation, as far as Cross understood the guy’s title.
A Donati Capo that Cross knew had one fucking hell of a shot due to his hunting skills had Vlad’s Obshchak to kill—an underboss, or something of the sort.
He didn’t really fucking understand Russians. At this point, he figured he didn’t need to, and wasn’t about to start learning.
However, what Cross did know was that the three men they were about to take out were the highest three in the Sokolov organization. It meant that every Russian who wielded some kind of power over the other Russians in the business were about to meet their maker.
No boss would be there to answer to in the morning. Revenge would be the last thing on the Russians’ minds when something more important needed done—actually organizing an organization.
As for Zeke?
Cross smiled to himself as he shifted the gun in front of him, and looked through the night vision scope.
Well, after Zeke’s work for five days straight to get every single piece of information he could that would be usable for them tonight, Cross let his friend take his pick.
Zeke’s pick was Timur.
Surprise, surprise.
In both ears, buzzing began almost one after the other. Cross let go of the gun to press the Bluetooths’ on buttons. Instantly, he heard Rick’s voice in one ear, and the Capo—Jason—in his other.
“You there, boss?”
“In position,” Cross replied to Rick. “You two?”
“I’m good,” Rick said.
“Almost,” came Jason’s voice. Then, an oof noise before he muttered, “Fucking slippery ass roof, piece of shit.”
Rick chuckled.
Cross just rolled his eyes. “Who has Zeke on their end?”
“Me,” Rick said. “He says he’s good.”
“All right,” Jason grumbled. “Freezing my balls off on this roof, boss.”
“You’ll be fine. Let’s not pretend like you don’t have a piece of pussy at home waiting to warm ‘em up,” Cross replied.
“Yeah, well—”
“We gonna shoot, or what?” Rick asked.
“Relax, Rick. You fuck up your shot when you get too excited. Remember, always—”
“Slow down your breathing, get your heart rate settled, and take the shot between beats.”
So, maybe Cross had been training some of his guys on how to properly shoot a sniper rifle for a while. It was a good skill to have.
Clearly.
“In sights,” Rick said.
That was Cross’s cue to look in his own scope, and find his target. Through the haze of greens and blacks, he zoomed in on a window on the third floor of Vlad Sokolov’s home. An office, he thought, when he had checked out the place in the daytime from afar.
“Confirm with Zeke that the wife is out of town,” Cross said.
He heard Rick pass the question along before a simple, “Yep.”
A human-like green-shaped form passed the window. Cross adjusted his shot accordingly.
“Likely in sight,” he said. “Jason?”
“Working on it.”
“Work faster.”
A sigh echoed.
“Jason, hang up from me and get Rick on your call.”
One step at a time …
“Got it, boss.”
Jason’s call clicked off a second later, leaving him with only Rick.
“Still think it’s a good idea to call him before you kill him?” Rick asked.
“For one, I need to make sure my target is the right one. For two, if he’s distracted for a minute, he might stay the fuck put in front of that window if it is him.”
“Yeah, all right. Point made.”
Their targets were easier. Lazy fucks who sat in front of television screens most of their nights, and took phone calls. Vlad, not so much. Cross suspected that was why the man was a boss.
Cross pulled his cell phone from his pants pocket without ever taking his eye away from the scope. The phones were all burners he and his guys had picked up the day before, and preprogrammed with numbers they needed. Like the guns they were using, the phones would also be crushed and gone before the night was out.
Again, the form passed through his line of sights as he hit the number two button on his phone, and held it to automatically dial.
He pushed the Bluetooth in his right ear on, shut the phone screen, and put it in his pocket as the phone call switched over to his ear. The desk was right in front of the window by the looks of the shapes in his scope.
And apparently, so was the phone Vlad needed to pick up for Cross’s call.
“In sight,” Cross murmured before Vlad picked up.
Vlad greeted in one ear.
Rick spoke in the other.
“Zdravstvuj. Vlad here.”
“Jason confirms in sight, boss.”
Cross didn’t speak to Rick, only to Vlad. He did not want the boss to know what was happening only a few miles away at one of his man’s homes, and then further east another five miles, at his other man’s house.
“Vlad,” Cross said.
In his scope, he saw the green human form become a little straighter.
“Donati, is that you, no?”
“It is. I did not appreciate that mess in the park a week ago,” Cross said. “I’m sure you can understand why. See, now I have cops trying to question my three-year-old daughter.”
“Lucky she’s alive to be questioned, boy. I ordered she be killed.”
Rage slipped down Cross’s spine.
Cold and unforgiving.
He welcomed it.
He knew it well.
Take me back, old friend.
“I did tell you a lesson was in order,” Vlad said a little too happily. “Your man is not the only one in the wrong, yes? You are, too.”
Cross rolled his eyes upward, but went right back to his scope. “Well, that lesson failed.”
“It’s fine, boy. I have others in the works.”
He did not like the sound of that. Then again, Cross figured after tonight, the Sokolov organization would be in too much turmoil to worry about old plans and never-given orders from a dead boss.
What would honestly be coming back to him?
“What’s that old saying?” Cross asked.
At the same time, Rick’s voice in his ear confirmed, “Jason took his shot. Hit, target down.”
“What saying?” Vlad asked. “You Americans drive me insane with your isms.”
“Mmm. Only because you don’t understand them, you piece of Russian shit.”
“Now—”
“Too little, too late,” Cross interjected, his gun adjusting and his finger wrapping the trigger. “That’s the saying. You waited too long to make a second move. Now, Vlad, it is too little, too late for you.”
In his scope, he saw the form move.
Likely to turn and face the window.
At the same time, Rick said, “Shot taken. Hit, target down.”
“I will ruin you, boy,” Vlad said into the phone, “never forget that it will be done.”
Right.
“Famous last words, asshole. Wave for me?”
Deep breath in.
Finger tight.
Between the heartbeat.
Cross took his shot.
“Shot taken. Hit, target down.”