My jaw is too tight for me to reply. I haven’t decided yet, but it’s going to fucking hurt.
I shove the shaking obstetrician back into the exam room. Cassius and Salvatore follow me in and close the door behind them.
“You stay there, princess,” I tell Chiara, and pull the curtain around the bed so that she can’t see what I’m about to do.
When I turn around, the doctor has his hands up and he’s backing away, half begging, half fending me off. “Please don’t kill me. The mayor said he just wanted to talk to his daughter. I had no choice, he’s the mayor. What about my business?”
“No choice? No fucking choice? There’s always a choice, and you made the wrong one.” I grab the obstetrician’s right hand and yank it down on a counter, the world turning red.
“Wait, not my—”
I take hold of the ultrasound monitor and slam it onto his hand, over and over again. He breaks off and screams in pain. I keep slamming, listening to the crunch of bones and the smashing of glass.
I let him go and he crumples to the ground, gripping his wrist with his left hand, staring in horror at the mangled mess.
“Be grateful you’re not dead,” I seethe. “Lock your doors and don’t walk alone at night. I might return and finish the job.”
I pull back the curtain and check on Chiara. She’s sitting on the edge of the bed wearing her jeans, and her complexion is better, as if hearing me beating on the asshole who put her in danger has put some color back in her cheeks.
That’s my girl.
I hold out my hand to her. “Come on, princess. Let’s get out of here.”
Chiara puts her hand in mine and glances at the blood spattered across my T-shirt. “I’m going to need another obstetrician.”
I give the man a kick as we pass by and he yelps and scurries away from me. “All of his patients are going to need another obstetrician for a while.”
Back at the compound, Salvatore paces up and down the living room floor. “This is all my fault. I shouldn’t have booked Ginevra’s obstetrician. The mayor must have realized you’d be pregnant soon and found out that the Fiores use that doctor.”
“None of us realized,” Cassius tells him. “We’re all to blame, not you.”
I lean against the wall, arms folded tight, my mind too full of blood and violence to think about anything but finding out where that doctor lives, smashing the front door in with a sledgehammer, and breaking his fucking legs.
Vinicius kneels down before Chiara, putting gentle hands on her thighs. “Did the mayor say anything to you, kitten?”
She swallows and looks sick again. “He said, Remember, this is my city. I can get to you and this child anytime I want.”
The muscles in my jaw get even tighter and my head starts to pound. Once I’m done with the doctor, I imagine taking that sledgehammer to Mayor Romano’s front door and crushing his fucking skull.
Cassius spits curse words. “His city? It’s not his city. It’s ours.”
“Is that all he wanted? To threaten you?” Vinicius asks.
She nods. “I managed to ask him a question, though. Why he made the chief of police remove the evidence from the Black Orchid Murders case from the archives.”
Vinicius’ mouth falls open. “He admitted it?”
Chiara shakes her head but her eyes are suddenly burning. “He didn’t need to. He looked shocked, and he started to say, How did you know about that? Then he must have realized I could be bluffing and shut his mouth. But it was too late. I could see the truth written all over his face.”
Salvatore passes a hand over his jaw. “Holy shit. Is he mixed up in the Black Orchid Murders somehow, or is he just hell-bent on the four of us never getting justice?”
“Dad never wanted the police to investigate the murders and the evidence was languishing in the archives. The fact that he went out of his way to have the evidence moved or destroyed makes me wonder if he knows who the killer is.”
We exchange ominous glances.
“Did he say anything else?” Cassius asks.
“I asked him what his voters would think if they knew the Mayor of Coldlake was covering up for a serial killer. He looked even more shocked. Then he called me some horrible words and stormed out.”
Fury burns in my chest. All this time, the Mayor of Coldlake has been covering up for a serial killer. “But who would he cover up for?”
Chiara stares blankly across the room as she considers this, and shakes her head. “I don’t know.”
Could it be someone in the mayor’s family? Does he have a brother, an uncle, a cousin? Someone he feels he has to protect? Maybe the killer is blackmailing the mayor somehow to hide the evidence.
“What did he call you as he walked out?”
“Traitorous bitch. But it doesn’t matter. He thought he could appear suddenly and scare me, but after I started talking about that evidence I think he was more frightened of me.”
Salvatore smiles and brushes the backs of his fingers against her cheek. “That’s our girl.”
Yeah, that’s our fucking girl, and we’re going to protect her properly from now on. I point a finger at her. “You’re not leaving the compound from now on.”
“Lorenzo, please don’t lock me up. We agreed I’d be safe as long as I’m with one of you. Dad won’t kill me, not before the election, anyway. I’m too useful as his poor, kidnapped daughter.” She gives me a small, unhappy smile.
More useful alive than dead, for the moment. She’s probably right. Through my gritted teeth, I growl, “Remind me again why we haven’t taken him out yet?”
“Because it’s not enough for me that he dies. I want Mom to get justice for what he did to her.”
I jab a thumb at my chest and shout, “I can give you justice. I’ve been saying that from the start.”
“Lorenzo,” Salvatore says sharply.
I growl and push my fingers through my hair. My heart hasn’t stopped pounding since we left the obstetrician’s office.
I feel someone touch my forearms and I look into Chiara’s beautiful face.
“If Dad knows something about your sisters’ murderer that’s all the more reason not to kill him. I’m not saying never, but I’m not ready for that.”
“I can still help you.” Listen to me, I’m practically begging for permission to beat that man to a pulp. “If he knows something about the Black Orchid Killer, I’ll torture it out of him. I could break him within an hour.”
It wouldn’t be hard, either, but I’d take my time over someone like the mayor. Really make a meal out of it.
“I know you could.” She glances at the others and then back at me. “Maybe it’s unfair to stop you if you really want to do this. Your sisters are as important as my mother.”
I rub my thumb over her lower lip and slowly shake my head. “No, you’re right.”
“He’s your father,” Cassius murmurs. “It’s your decision what happens to him.”
“If it’s what you want, we won’t touch him,” Vinicius assures me.