41 | Risky Business

◇ KEL ◇

Body.

Niccolo's body.

Too late.

The damned Russians. They slashed his head off. Those merciless animals had chained him, cut his tongue in half, then dumped his remains somewhere in the outskirts. Like maimed roadkill.

Niccolo's dead. The cops couldn't find him in time. They failed.

I failed. "I'm sorry, Nicco." My chest felt hollow. Heavy. The sting of a sudden loss... "He's gone," I whispered to myself while I gripped my phone.

"Mykaela?" Enzo's deep voice poured over the line, jolting me out of the daze his news just put me in. "Still there?"

The initial shock stunned me like a bolt of lightning. When I asked for more information, only then did Enzo share the gory details. His contacts had found Niccolo's body in the morgue.

It had to have a lick of truth to it...Enzo delivered the news with an empathetic certainty that just shook me. I leaned against the edge of the sink and glanced at Miles.

He stood right next to me, no longer sweaty. His arm touched the side of