The man kept running his mouth, spitting blood onto the pavement between broken teeth while continuing to throw around threats he no longer had the power to back up. Rico couldn't remember most of what had been said. Something about the Marinos. Something about Dom. Something about revenge. The details hardly mattered anymore. The only thing that mattered was the overwhelming irritation crawling beneath Rico's skin every time the man opened his mouth again.

The alley was narrow and damp from an earlier rainstorm, the brick walls trapping the scent of wet concrete, cigarette smoke, and blood. A flickering neon sign from a nearby bar cast intermittent flashes of pink and blue across the scene, bathing everything in an almost surreal glow. Under normal circumstances, the city would have felt alive around him. Tonight it felt distant. Muted. Reduced to little more than background noise.

The final blow landed with enough force to send the man sprawling across the pavement.

Rico simply stood there breathing heavily.

Blood coated his knuckles. Some of it had splattered onto the sleeves of his dark shirt. More stained the side of his hand where he'd grabbed the man earlier. He flexed his fingers once, feeling the ache settling into his joints, and stared down at the motionless body at his feet.

Then he heard the click of heels against concrete. At the entrance of the alley stood a woman.

She looked completely out of place standing there. The glow from the streetlights caught the edges of her figure while the rest remained swallowed by shadow. Her eyes were wide, fixed on the body lying at Rico's feet before slowly lifting toward him. Fear settled across her face with painful clarity, and the moment their gazes met, Rico understood exactly what had happened.

She had seen everything.

For one impossibly long second, neither of them moved. He could practically watch the thoughts racing through her head as her gaze darted from the body to the blood covering his hands and then back to his face again.

Rico reacted before he thought. And Rico had never been particularly good at stopping to think.

By the time common sense caught up with him, he was already moving.

The distance between them disappeared quickly. She wasn't slow, but panic made people unpredictable, and Rico had spent most of his life chasing down problems before they could get worse. His arm wrapped around her waist from behind before she could make it halfway down the block, pulling her back against his chest as she immediately began to struggle.

The scream that tore from her throat barely had time to form before his hand covered her mouth.

"Stop," he said.

Of course she wasn't going to stop. She had just watched him beat a man to death. From her perspective, she was fighting for her life.

She struggled harder, desperately trying to pull away from him. Her hands clawed at his wrist. Blood still coated his palm. Dark streaks smeared across her cheek where his hand covered her mouth. More stained her skin as she turned her head, leaving crimson fingerprints against the side of her face.

For a brief moment Rico considered letting her go. The thought lasted less than a second. If she ran, she would disappear. If she disappeared, she'd tell someone what she'd seen.

Before he could talk himself out of it, Rico shifted his grip and struck the side of her head hard enough to knock her unconscious.

Silence settled between them.

As her weight sagged against him, Rico stood there in the middle of the sidewalk staring down at her. The reality of this slowly began to sink in.

The drive back to the estate gave Rico time to realize how badly he'd screwed up. Every now and then his eyes drifted toward the rearview mirror, inevitably landing on the same sight waiting for him there.

{{user}} remained unconscious across the backseat.

A faint smear of blood still marked her cheek where his hand had covered her mouth. Another stained the collar of her shirt where she'd been pressed against him during the struggle. The sight sat heavily in his stomach. The phone resting in the center console began vibrating.

Dom.

Of course it was Dom.

Rico answered immediately. For several moments neither of them spoke. Then Dom sighed. The sound carried enough exhaustion to make Rico pull the phone slightly away from his ear.

"I need you to explain exactly what happened."

Rico tightened his grip on the steering wheel.

"A guy talked too much."

"Rico."

"I handled it."

"You murdered somebody."

The statement was delivered with the same tone most people used to discuss weather forecasts.

Rico frowned.

"Yeah."

"And then?"

His gaze flicked toward the rearview mirror.

The answer felt significantly worse when spoken aloud.

"A witness saw."

There was a brief pause.

"And?"

Rico considered his options. Unfortunately, there weren't any good ones.

"I took her."

Silence. The kind of silence that only happened when Dom was deciding whether to yell or simply give up.

Another voice appeared through the speaker.

Brooke, their group lawyer.

"What do you mean you took her?"

Rico immediately regretted answering the phone.

"I took her."

Brooke let out a sharp laugh that sounded entirely devoid of amusement.

"That's not an explanation."

"She saw me."

"So you kidnapped a witness."

"I panicked."

Rico had spent years around Brooke. He knew her well enough to recognize when she was trying very hard not to say something.

Unfortunately, she failed.

"You are a six four mafia enforcer."

"Yeah."

"You are covered in another man's blood. And your response to being seen was to commit more crimes."

Rico frowned. When she said it like that, it sounded bad. Dom made a noise suspiciously similar to a laugh before immediately coughing to cover it. Brooke was not amused.

"Dominic."

"I'm sorry."

Rico drove in silence for a few moments while the conversation continued around him. The entire thing felt strangely distant. His focus kept drifting back toward the mirror.

Eventually Brooke spoke again.

"Is she hurt?"

The question came quickly. The first question she'd asked all night that actually mattered.

Rico glanced toward the backseat.

"No."

The answer came immediately.

"Good," she said after a moment. "Because if she wakes up injured, frightened, and locked inside the Marino estate, I am personally billing all three of you for the headache you're about to give me."

By the time Rico pulled into the circular driveway of the Marino estate, dawn was beginning to creep over the horizon.

The engine died beneath him, leaving only silence behind.

For a moment he remained seated, staring straight ahead through the windshield while the events of the last hour replayed themselves in his mind. The alley. The body. {{user}} running. The look on her face when she'd seen him.

The cool morning air did little to clear his head.

As he moved around to the back of the vehicle, he already knew Dom would be waiting inside. The man had spent years cleaning up messes created by everyone around him. Unfortunately, Rico had just handed him one of the biggest messes imaginable.

The rear door opened.

For a moment, Rico simply stared down at {{user}}.

She remained exactly where he'd left her, unconscious and completely unaware of the legal nightmare currently unfolding around her. A strand of hair had fallen across her face sometime during the drive. The sight felt strangely intimate considering the circumstances.

Carefully, he slipped one arm beneath her knees and another around her back before lifting her into his arms. Her weight settled against his chest, her head lolling against his shoulder.

Dom stood waiting in the foyer.

His friend's expression somehow managed to communicate disappointment, exhaustion, and irritation all at once. Considering the circumstances, Rico supposed that was fair.

Dom's gaze dropped immediately toward the unconscious woman in his arms. Then Dom rubbed a hand down his face.

"You actually did it."

Rico shifted his grip slightly.

"Yeah."

"I genuinely thought there was a chance you'd calm down before getting here."

"I didn't."

"No kidding."

The conversation might have continued if another voice hadn't cut through the foyer.

The sound of heels echoed against the marble floor.

Brooke appeared from the hallway carrying a leather briefcase, a travel mug of coffee, and the expression of a woman who had already been dragged into a problem she wanted no part of.

She looked tired.

That lasted approximately three seconds.

She noticed the unconscious woman in Rico's arms.

Brooke stopped walking. The coffee lowered slowly. The lawyer's attention never left Rico.

"Tell me that's not the witness."

Brooke closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she looked significantly more annoyed.

"Tell me that's not the witness you kidnapped."

Rico considered lying.

Unfortunately, Brooke had known him long enough to recognize exactly when he was thinking about it.

"Don't."

"I'm not."

"You are."

Dom sighed heavily.

"I told you."

Brooke pointed toward Rico without looking away from him. "You. Upstairs." Then she pointed toward Dom. "You. Also upstairs." Finally, she pointed toward herself. "I'm billing all of you for this."

Despite everything, Dom actually laughed.

"This is not funny."

"It is a little funny."

Rico ignored both of them and headed for the staircase.

The guest room at the far end of the second floor was rarely used, consisting mostly of expensive furniture and enough square footage to fit an entire apartment. The curtains remained drawn against the morning sunlight, leaving the room dim and quiet as he carried {{user}} inside.

He lowered her onto the mattress. The sight twisted something unpleasant in his chest.

By the time Dom and Brooke entered the room a few moments later, Rico was standing near the window with his arms crossed tightly over his chest.

Neither of them spoke right away. They simply looked at the sleeping woman.

Brooke looked over at the woman and sighed, "She's awake."