She Took Her Sister’s Blind Date To Help Her Escape — Then The Mafia Boss Across The Table Revealed He Had Been Waiting For Her Name For Years.

PART 2

“The first interesting surprise I’ve had in years.”

Before she could respond, one of the men at the bar touched his earpiece. His face hardened. Two words in a language she didn’t recognize.

Nikolai rose instantly.

The lights went out. A second later, a violent crash shook dust from the stone ceiling. Emergency lamps came on in red strips along the floor. Glass shattered somewhere above. A series of sharp, contained sounds followed.

Not fireworks. She understood that much.

Nikolai came around the table. “Get up.”

“What’s happening?”

“People who shouldn’t know this location have arrived.”

One of his men hurried toward a concealed door behind the bar. Nikolai’s hand landed on her arm, firm but not possessive.

“Come with me.”

“Am I a prisoner?”

“No.”

Another crash overhead.

“Then give me a choice.”

“You can follow me into a secure room, or stay here and negotiate with whoever’s breaking through the front.”

She stood. “That’s not a choice.”

“No,” he said. “It’s information.”

They moved through a narrow stone corridor while the sounds behind them grew louder, his men forming a practiced shield around them. At the end waited a reinforced door. A code, and it sealed behind them into a room of communication equipment, bottled water, medical supplies, and three security screens.

On the center one, Vivienne saw their abandoned table. Her water glass had tipped, the dark tablecloth swallowing its reflection of the overhead light.

She thought of Delphine’s message. *Forty minutes. An hour at most.*

Not *help me*. Not *save me*.

*Keep him there.*

“She knew,” Vivienne said.

Nikolai glanced up from the phone in his hand.

“My sister knew something would happen here tonight.”

He finished the call, set the phone down. “That possibility has occurred to me.”

“She didn’t send me because she was afraid of you. She sent me because she needed someone sitting in her chair when this happened.”

“Why you?”

“Because she knew I would come.”

The truth hurt worse spoken aloud.

Movement on the left screen caught her eye. Men fought in the main corridor, but one figure in a gray coat stood apart — not attacking, not running. Watching. Then, at the exact second Nikolai’s people pushed the intruders back, he turned toward an emergency exit.

“That man,” she said.

Nikolai followed her gaze. “He isn’t moving like the others. Knew where the exit was before the lights failed. Came to observe, not participate.” He lifted the phone. “East corridor. Gray coat. Take him alive.”

Two men cut off the stranger’s escape. For one second, his face turned toward the camera.

Vivienne leaned in. She knew that face — from a misdirected municipal file three years back, a South Loop property acquisition, Preston Cole at a contract signing with several investors.

“That man knows Preston.”

“How certain?”

“I remember documents the way some people remember songs.”

His eyes lingered on her a beat too long.

—

Within fifteen minutes, the attack was contained. The man in the gray coat, Desmond Frey, a private investigator who’d worked for Preston, was brought to a lower room.

“Who sent you?” Nikolai asked.

Desmond glanced at Vivienne. “Hired to confirm attendance.”

“Whose?”

“Delphine Marchetti’s.”

“And when she didn’t arrive?”

“Told to report whoever came in her place.”

Vivienne’s stomach tightened. “You already sent my description.”

His silence answered.

“Who received it?”

“Preston Cole.”

She turned away and looked down the brick corridor. Preston had expected Delphine might run. He’d expected another Marchetti might arrive. The agreement had been written to allow substitution. None of this had been improvised.

“Preston built the loophole,” she said when Nikolai joined her. “Delphine always had an exit. If she ran, you’d still have a Marchetti at the table.”

“For what purpose?”