Mafia Queen

Chapter Ten

Luca

I was starting to lose my patience. We'd been sitting in this rundown, shitty bar for the last three hours and hadn't even seen so much as a female. The beer was watered down, and I wasn't about to have anything stronger tonight. If we were going to run into Niko, I needed to bring my A game.

Maybe Serena was lying. This certainly didn't seem like the type of place you would go to trade women. In my experience, men involved in trafficking had high end rings that they paraded the women around before handing them off to the highest bidder. You didn't come to a dark and decrepit bar where you could hardly see each other's faces.

If I was devoting all of this time and money to getting secrets from Serena, she better damn well be feeding us the right information. So far, it wasn't looking that way.

"I'm out." I grunted, slamming the rest of my beer down and setting the bottle on the table. "This is just a waste of fucking time."

"Are you sure this is the place Serena said?" Axel clarified, scanning the room once again. The only people in this place were old drunks and the guy they paid to play shitty guitar.

"This is what she said. She said every single night he gets a new girl here." I stood up, grabbing my jacket and was ready to head home. I missed Charlotte and the kids and there was no way I was going to sit around here any longer than I had to, especially when it wasn't generating any information.

"Maybe we're too early." Marco shrugged, checking his watch. Fat chance of that. It was nearly midnight.

"Look, Luca, this is the only viable lead we have. Are you sure you want to throw the towel in before we're absolutely sure?" Axel pressed. I couldn't help but roll my eyes. He was so desperate for this to work out that I almost pitied him. I would if he hadn't dragged my family into it.

"Yeah, Axel, I want to throw the fuckin towel in. I have a wife at home who is way more interesting than this bullshit and I don't want to..."

"Hey!" Angelo slapped my shoulder, nodding towards the corner of the bar. At first, I couldn't see what he was looking at. It looked like a normal bar to me. A man appeared from behind the wall of liquor and the sight of him stopped me in my tracks. The smoke was obscuring my vision a bit, but I was willing to bet it was Niko Almieda. Until this moment, I'd only seen him in pictures, but he had a face you never forgot.

"Bingo." Axel grinned like a school boy he was so excited. "I knew Serena would come through."

I kept my eyes locked on Niko, wanting to be sure. He looked so different in person than I imagined. Narrow eyes, dark facial hair. An unmistakingly evil air surrounded him, masking any redeeming quality he had. Part of me wanted to end this right now and put us all out of our misery. I knew I couldn't do that, though. I had to wait for the opportunity to present itself and when it did, I would enjoy every fucking second of ripping him apart. For now, I had to bite my tongue and put us in the position to end this once and for all.

"What do you want to do, Luca?" Angelo asked, waiting on pins and needles for my direction.

"Stand down." I clenched my jaw. "Don't engage him unless he approaches us. I don't want any kind of scene here."

Angelo nodded, staying just to the side of me. I took my seat at the table again, careful to keep an eye on Niko.

He spoke briefly with the bartender, smiling and slapping on the back. I glanced around the room, wondering how many of these people knew what was going on behind that wall. Niko was alone, except for another man close at his side. It wasn't like he was going to parade his latest purchase through the bar as if she were on display.