“If not for Katherine, I’d agree. But he knows how much she’s worth to me. He lost eight men in Singapore. I’m sure his price has gone up exponentially. And to be perfectly honest, I can’t walk away like I might have in the past and tell him to do his best or go fuck himself. Not with Katherine in the picture. It changes everything.”

“We can protect her.”

“No, we can’t,” Dominic said. “Not completely. Not unless we scare the shit out of her—which isn’t an option. And not when she’s working in some goddamn office building with thousands of people coming and going.”

“So what’s the plan?”

“Don’t have one other than the usual pile of money that buys off most anything in the world. I’ll wait for Gora to make his move. I’ll make mine. We’ll see where it goes.”

“At least you’ve done business with Gora before.”

Dominic smiled. “And by that you mean I’ve paid him beaucoup extortion money to keep my factory open.”

Max shrugged. Both men knew the price of doing business in the lawless regions of the world.

Dominic sighed. “You’re right though. Gora’s been dependable. He kept all the small fry scumbags off our backs. And I expect he didn’t have much choice when his in-laws put the squeeze on him to steal another twenty million. He likes to live too. Probably even more now with his new little teenage lay.” Dominic flicked a finger at the plane door being opened by a flight attendant and smiled. “Ready to rock? Let’s go see if we can nail down this deal.”

The restaurant was across the street from the Pantheon, the view splendid, the two-thousand-year-old building a thing of beauty, still flawless and sublime. It almost made Dominic turn to Gora and say, “This is really petty shit we’re dealing with. Why don’t we just put our dicks on the table, see whose is bigger, and be done with it?” But Gora was sitting across from him, dressed by Rome’s best tailor, giving him his badass I’m top dog look, which didn’t portend well.

“So what can I do for you, Gora?” Dominic said, speaking Italian, their common language, settling back in his chair, and thinking he’d dressed down for this party in jeans and a T-shirt. Although the knife blade in the sole of his red sneaker would get him out the door faster than any Savile Row suit. Not to mention, Gora was a lightweight by Balkan standards where no-neck enforcers were standard. His neck wouldn’t be hard to crush.

“I need compensation for eight men.”

“You shouldn’t have sent them. You stole my money. I took it back.”

Gora gave him an oily smile and spread his hands palms down on the table. “If it were only me, Dominic, we might be able to come to an agreement. But the organization doesn’t like to lose money.”

“Then your wife’s family should prey on people who don’t fight back. They fucked up. What can I say.”

“Your girlfriend is in London I see.”

He wasn’t wasting any time. Just as well. “Yes. For six months.”

“That’s what I heard.”

“I’m not surprised. So let me make myself perfectly clear. I don’t want Katherine involved in any of your money problems. So count your fucking blessings. I’ll buy my way out instead. How much do you want to make this go away?”

“I don’t want money. I need you to marry my girlfriend.” Gora quickly put up his hand as Dominic began rising. “Temporarily. She’s six months’ pregnant and she comes from an old, conservative family who insists she marry well before the child is born.”

Dominic sat back down. “And you’re afraid of your wife.”

“Like you, Dominic, this young woman is important to me,” Gora said, ignoring Dominic’s comment. “So you see we both face a dilemma.”

“You don’t come back with the money? How do you explain that to your wife’s organization?”

Gora shrugged. “I have enough to cover the shortfall.” He smiled. “My business is lucrative too.”

“I wish I could help you, Gora,” Dominic said, “but I’m not interested in marrying the sixteen-year-old you’ve been fucking the last three years. Don’t look so surprised. Why wouldn’t I keep track of you? I’m almost tempted to show the video I have to your wife, but then you’d be dead and who would I deal with then?” A certain level of corruption was inevitable in doing business in the Balkans. That Gora had been useful when Dominic set up his factory in Bucharest was the trade-off.

“I could have you killed instead,” Gora said coolly. “How would Miss Katherine Hart feel about that?”

“She did fine before me,” Dominic said calmly. “She’ll do fine after me. I don’t kid myself that I’m indispensable to anyone. That’s always a mistake, Gora. To think it matters whether we live or die. The world will survive without either one of us. So don’t threaten me. I don’t much give a shit. Just like I don’t give a shit whether you live or die.”

“Let me show you something.” Gora pulled out his cell phone, tapped an icon, and handed the phone to Dominic.

The screen held a single photo taken with a night-vision camera. The picture had been taken from a higher sight line—across the street, Dominic noted. Katherine was in her bedroom, seated at the vanity, brushing her hair. Dominic handed it back. “Do I threaten your girlfriend now?”