Bloody Heart: A Second Chance Mafia Romance (Brutal Birthright Book 4)

Thanks to Riona’s powers of persuasion, and a little pressure from Callum, the cops agree to let me in the hotel room they think the sniper used.

He was long gone by the time they arrived—with plenty of time to pack up his equipment. But “vacated” doesn’t mean “empty.” Nobody can sit in a room without leaving a trace.

For instance, he didn’t bother to move the hotel-room table that he slid over closer to the window. I can see the marks on the carpet where the table was originally situated. Now it’s exactly in front of the east-facing window he must have used for his shot.

I assume he picked this hotel because it’s old and the windows actually open. He left the sash up. I can see the square hole he cut in the screen, and the piece of discarded mesh laying on the ground next to the radiator.

I can barely see Hutchinson Field from here, not with the naked eye. I’ve got better than twenty-twenty vision, but I can’t make out anything besides the stage itself. Not the flags, the flowers, or the chairs still sitting on the stage, some of them tipped over when everyone scattered.

The sniper would have seen it all clearly through his scope, however.

According to the cops, he checked into the room using the hotel’s app. The miracles of modern technology—he didn’t even need to visit the front desk for a key. He could open the door automatically using his phone.

Of course the name he registered under is fake. So is the credit card he used to pay. The Royal Arms will be out the $229 for the room.

“Did anybody see him going in or out?” I ask one of the cops. “Maybe one of the maids?”

“Nobody that we talked to,” the cop says. “The maids only work in the morning. He checked into the room at 1:20 p.m. Or at least, that’s what their computer says.”

The cop is giving me the information, but not cheerfully. He’s annoyed that I’m looking over his shoulder. That has to be particularly galling, since this cop, like most cops in Chicago, knows exactly who I am. There’s no love lost between the Gallos and the Chicago PD.

Riona has a slightly better relationship with them, though not by much. She’s friends with a couple of the DAs. But she also keeps bad guys like me out of jail.

Right now, she’s looking around the room with almost as much curiosity as I’m feeling.

“Nothing in the trash,” she says, peering into the bin.

I can see marks on top of the table. That’s where the sniper had his rifle set up. I can’t tell what type of rifle it was—not from a couple scratches. But I assume he had the latest and greatest—something like the McMillan Tac-50, or the Barrett M82A1.

I’m leaning toward the Tac-50. The bullet I found looked like a .50 caliber. Tac-50s are made right in the good old US of A, in Phoenix. I saw plenty of them in Iraq. Used one myself, after my L115A3 got fucked up by a makeshift grenade.

It’s also the gun that set the most recent long-distance records. It has the most confirmed kills over 1367 yards.

“Are you sure it was just one guy?” Riona says to the cops. “Don’t snipers usually work in teams?”

She directs the second part of that question at me.

She knows I had a partner in Iraq—Raylan Boone, a kid from Kentucky.

“Sometimes they do. Sometimes not,” I say. “Used to be you needed somebody to take measurements and do calculations. Now you’ve got rangefinders, ballistic calculators, hand-held meteorological equipment, ballistic-prediction software . . .”

Still, there’s nothing quite like another person keeping an eye out. All those endless hours crouching in bombed-out buildings and tumbled-down towers . . . talking, waiting, keeping each other from catching a bullet to the back of the head. Raylan’s a brother to me now, just about as much as my actual brothers.

I get the feeling this guy was alone, though.

There’s no reason for it, no evidence. It’s just the emptiness of the room, the precision with which he removed every trace of himself. This guy is a perfectionist. And perfectionists don’t tolerate other people very well.

I look down his line of sight again. I can see the way the flags are lined up, and other markers he set along the way—a white cloth tied to a power line. A string on the edge of a tree branch.

Wind direction and speed can vary dramatically along the path of the bullet. He was careful to set up markers along the way. Gauges too, maybe. And the way the flags lined up on the stage . . . that was no coincidence. He must have been down there. Or had somebody on the inside.

We might have passed right by each other. I try to remember the faces of the set-up crew and the security teams—thinking back if there was anybody who behaved strangely or seemed out of place.

If there was, I didn’t notice it at the time.

I look down at the table. I can see the tiniest residue of gunpowder, much finer than sand. I see the sparkle of graphite, and white grains of aconite. I put my nose right down on top of it and inhale. It definitely smells like nitrocellulose.

“It’s not cocaine, you know,” one of the cops sneers. “It won’t give you a buzz.”

“No, no, let the bloodhound work,” his partner laughs.

I can tell Riona wants to lip them off, but I give her a shake of my head to show her that I don’t care what those fuckheads think.

“Anything else, Inspector Clouseau?” one of the cops says sarcastically.

“No,” I say. “Nothing else.”

The cops keep dusting the room for prints—useless in a hotel—and combing the carpets and drapes for evidence. Riona and I head back down to ground level.

“So?” she says in an expectant tone.

“Wasn’t much to see in the room.” I shrug.

“No—I’m wondering if you’re planning to go to the cocktail reception.”

“Why would I?” I frown.

She lets out a snort.

“You’re going to pretend you don’t care in the slightest? I saw your face when you saw her crossing that stage.”

“Did you know she was going to be here?” I demand, rounding on Riona.

“No,” she says calmly. “But I’m not sorry that she is. You two have unfinished business.”

“No, we don’t,” I say, in the tone of voice that would usually scare the other person off of saying anything else. But Riona argues for a living. Nothing short of complete removal of her vocal cords is going to stop her talking.

“Right,” she says. “That’s why you’re so cheerful and optimistic. Because you’re emotionally healthy in every way.”

“You’re not my psychiatrist,” I snap at her.

We had to see a shrink sometimes in the army. I fucking hated it.

“I am your friend, though,” Riona says, looking at me with her steady gaze. “I think you should go.”

“She left me nine years ago because her family thought I wasn’t good enough for her. I doubt they changed their minds.”

“Why not?” Riona says. “You’re a decorated veteran. A successful real estate developer. Plus, you just saved her dad’s life for fuck’s sake.”

“I’m still a Gallo,” I say.

I didn’t stop blowing people’s heads off just because I came home from Iraq. I’m still the same gangster I was nine years ago. Worse, actually. The fact that our legitimate business has grown along with our criminal organization . . . I doubt that’s going to impress Yafeu Solomon. Not that I give a fuck what he thinks.

“I think you should go,” Riona repeats. “Not to start anything up again. Just to get closure.”

“Nobody gets closure by opening the door again.”

“They don’t get it by sulking either,” Riona snaps.

Her patience has run out—she’s done being nice to me.

“I’m heading over there in an hour,” she says. “And I’m picking you up on the way.”

“Don’t bother.”

“Put a suit on. A nice one.”

“I don’t own a suit,” I lie.

“Come naked, then.” Riona grins. “If that doesn’t impress her, nothing will.”