Page 13 of Rise of the Queen

“At the time, I was more worried about her. And I still had an ounce of respect for Salvadori, although that was short-lived,” I said.

“And what about your guy?” Vitaliy asked Trino.

Trino cursed in Spanish, disgusted at the thought of Martin. “That’s also Sal’s fault,” Sephie said. “Sal convinced Martin to help them overthrow Trino. He involved the Mexican cartels, too. Either Ricardo or Lorenzo or both decided to use the cartels as their army. They needed manpower and they knew it. Overthrowing Trino was the payment for the cartels helping them, but Ricardo knew there likely wouldn’t be enough of them left at the end of it all to worry about that. When Trino stayed loyal and wouldn’t negotiate, they changed their plan slightly. Somewhere along the way, they convinced Martin to help them overthrow Trino, with Sal’s goddaughter as payment.”

“The same goddaughter that was sleeping with Armando when she first met Martin, let the record reflect,” Misha said. I wondered to myself if he would ever get over his hatred for her.

“This is all connected nicely, I must say,” Vitaliy said.

Sephie snapped her fingers, pointing at him. “Same, Vitaliy. Same.” He laughed at her, shaking his head.

“It all points back to Salvadori. And apparently Ricardo,” he said. “I still have a few contacts in Italy. I’ll see what I can find out about Ricardo.”

“We have a way to get rid of him and make the people of the city think the mayor and police are actually doing something, but we also think the mayor is in Sal’s pocket. The policecommissioner is not, but he can only do so much. The people are ready to revolt against the other bosses. They still love Boss though. They will stand with him if he gets rid of all the other bosses,” Ivan said.

“That’s your plan? Get rid of all the other bosses?” he asked me. I nodded my head. “What do you need from me?” he asked.

Chapter Four

Sephie

I could feel Adrik’s surprisewhen his father asked him what he needed. We had come to Panama for Trino, nothing more. I knew Adrik wasn’t planning on asking his father for help. In his mind, this was his problem and he was going to deal with it. His father, however, was more than willing to help his son finally realize the plans he could never materialize when he was in charge of the city.

“We might’ve just fucked up part of their plans. We got Sal’s goddaughter out of the picture, so now Martin has no payment for whatever his part in this plan is. That just happened yesterday, so we’re waiting to see how he handles that when he finds out,” Ivan said.

“She was being held at my building. Martin’s plan was to get her away from the building and grab her. I’m taking it as a move against me since it’s my guys who are on her,” Adrik said.

“How do you know this?” Vitaliy asked.

“We have the messages between Martin and Giana to prove it. We’ve also overheard conversations between them,” I said. I caught Misha and Andrei looking at me. Both were clearly surprised I would tell him that. The exchange did not go unnoticed by Vitaliy.

Vitaliy looked at Trino. “What’s his relationship like with the Mexican cartels?”

“Not good. If it weren’t for Sephie, he’d be dead. He went to try and negotiate with them while I was still in the city. I enjoy making personal deliveries,” Trino said, a sly smile creeping across his face.

Vitaliy was quiet for a minute, then he ordered all of his guys but Aleksei to leave. Once they had left, he looked at me, asking, “How?”

I glanced at Misha and Andrei, then looked at Ivan, silently asking them if they were okay with what I was about to say. They all nodded. Adrik whispered, “You can tell him.”

“It wasn’t actually me. It was Misha. Me and Andrei are just batteries for him,” I said. They weren’t aware yet that we’d already told Vitaliy about what they could do.

“Don’t let her lie to you. She plays a bigger role than she’ll admit to,” Ivan said.

Trino looked surprised. “It’s not just you, Miha?” I shook my head no. “You were right to make it appear that it was only you when I was there. My guys couldn’t have handled knowing it was more than just you. They would’ve killed me on the flight home.”

I felt Adrik and Ivan both starting to get angry. “I knew they had a bigger problem with me than you were letting on,” I said. “What about Gus and Oscar though?”

He laughed. “Oh, those two love you as much as I do. Your friend Chen has told them what you did for him and how awesome you are. They have to listen to me tell them how awesome you are. Then they both witness it firsthand. Literally every time they see you. Shit, you’re the reason Oscar got to blow up an extra building. For that reason alone, he’s always going to love you.”

“Good news for Gus and Oscar. They won’t mysteriously drop dead from a random bullet through their head,” Stephen said.He’s definitely still angry about this.

“Wait until they find out what happened withmi madre. You won’t ever have to worry about them,” Trino said.

“Her threat still stands. We’re also happy to add to it at any point,” Stephen said.

Misha had his faraway look. I knew he was checking the accuracy of Trino’s statement. “They won’t be a problem,” he said.

Vitaliy looked to Misha. “How long have you had this?”