Chapter Forty-Six

She was small and dark, this niece of George Rapava, and what was more, George was very fond of her.

Jabba watched as the old man tried and failed to hide his anxiety over the woman. Of course George was most likely in quite some pain, which may’ve made it harder for him to conceal his emotions. Jabba had amused himself the night before tracing the tattoos on George’s chest with his knife. Shallow cuts, not deep enough to do any lethal harm. And then he’d cut off George’s little fingertip, and George had screamed and Jabba had thought that perhaps he should stop there.

It would not do to kill him too soon.

But now he had this niece who had so kindly walked into the middle of the town street and shouted that she had the diamonds. He had had her brought to him and she stood defiantly before him, her gaze calm and unafraid.

“So,” Jabba said, lighting a cigarillo. “You have the diamonds.”

“Yes,” the niece said. “Send my uncle out and I’ll give them to you.”

“Or—” Jabba sucked on the cigarillo “—I have my men kill you and I take the diamonds from your dead body.” He exhaled smoke through his smile.

She shook her head. “I’m not stupid. I don’t have them on me. Let my uncle go and I’ll lead you to where I hid them.”

Jabba thought about torturing the niece to find out where the diamonds lay. It would be simple enough with his men here. But he grew bored easily. More torture—even of a woman—seemed tedious.

He caught a movement from the corner of his eye, and then he had a new idea. George Rapava seemed truly afraid for the first time since he’d stepped into the police station.

Afraid not for himself, but for his niece.

“Very well,” Jabba said. “You’ve convinced me with your words. I shall let your uncle free.”

“No!” George lunged forward.

Rocky casually kicked him in the hip and the old man went down, groaning.

The niece looked down at the uncle writing in pain on the floor and then up at Jabba. “Are you finished?”

Ah, now this was interesting. She’d risked her life to save the uncle, yet she was uninterested in his pain.

Jabba cocked his head. “Should I be?”

She sighed as if weary of him. “I think so. You do want those diamonds, don’t you?”

“Oh, indeed I do.” He stepped close to her, and raised a hand to trail his forefinger over her cheek. “Perhaps I want other things as well.”

She slapped his hand away. “I bet you already have plenty of women for that. I have something else you need.”

He narrowed his eyes, intrigued. “And what is that?”

She smiled, her lips curving prettily. “You want to get out of here alive, don’t you?”

“Most assuredly.”

“Then you’re going to need a hostage.”

Jabba smiled. “And you offer yourself in exchange for George here? The niece of a notorious mafiya?”

“No,” she said, her eyes hard. “I offer myself. The daughter of a notorious Minneapolis prosecutor.”