Chapter 3

My father laughs. It's the ugly kind. The kind that means somebody's about to bleed.

"Alright. You wanna do it the hard way."

He throws up a hand.

"Everybody. On her. I don't care if she walks out of here."

This time it's not just his personal detail. Every soldier the Bianchi family keeps on the property comes pouring in. Bodyguards. Enforcers. The guys my father keeps around for the jobs he doesn't want on paper. Dozens of them.

They box me in. Guns. Knives. Bats. Whatever they got.

The guests are already spilling out the front doors, watching from the driveway. I can hear them.

"All that money, all those schools, and she turns out like this."

"Trash. You can't fix trash."

Fine. Talk all you want.

The first guy comes at me with a switchblade. I step to the side. I catch the blade between my fingers.

He yanks. Nothing moves.

I bend the steel in half like it's a paperclip.

His eyes go huge. He hasn't let go yet. Mistake.

I twist my wrist. The knife tears out of his hand. I flick it across the room like a coin, and it slams into his chest so hard he flies backwards into the row of iron sconces along the wall. Takes three of them down. Doesn't get back up.

The rest of them come at me at once.

One step forward. Punch. Kick. Elbow.

Twenty seconds later, half the room is on the floor.

One guy is holding his arm and screaming. Another is dragging himself away on his elbows. A guy in a nice suit is crying into the marble. Not one of them is getting up for round two.

My father's face has gone purple. A vein is popping at his temple.

"Useless. All of you."

He rips a dagger off the wall. The old one. The Sicilian stiletto my grandfather brought over from Palermo, the one that's supposed to stay in its case forever.

"Move. I'll do it myself."

He comes at me fast. Faster than I gave him credit for. The blade goes for my shoulder.

I lean. Steel whispers past my sleeve.

Behind me, another one of his guys tries to sneak up. I hear the footstep. I hear the breath. I hear the knife come up.

The guests scream. They think I'm about to get gutted.

I don't turn around.

I reach back with my bare hand and grab the blade.

The edge splits my palm open. Blood runs down my wrist. The tip stops half an inch from my spine.

The guy behind me puts his whole body into it. Veins in his forehead. Teeth clenched. Nothing. My hand doesn't move.

I close my fingers, slow.

Snap.

The blade breaks clean in half in my fist.

The whole room goes dead quiet.

Somebody in the corner whispers, "What the hell is she?"

I bounce the broken piece of steel in my hand, feeling the weight. Then I smile.

And then I'm gone.

One second I'm in the middle of the ballroom. The next I'm standing over Sabrina.

The broken blade rests against the soft white skin of her throat.

Half an inch. That's all it would take.

Sabrina goes still. Doesn't breathe. Doesn't blink. All the color drains out of her face.

"N-Nora…"

My mother screams.

"No! Please, God, no, not her!"

My father goes white.

"Get away from her! Put it down! Put it down right now!"

I look down at Sabrina. Those big wet eyes. Sweet, delicate Sabrina. The girl who's going to let my baby freeze to death in the snow.

I press the blade in a little.

A single red line slides down her throat, pretty as a ribbon.

The whole room is holding its breath.

And then, from the front hall, footsteps. Fast. Heavy. Somebody with authority coming through the front doors like he owns the place.

A voice cuts through the room, cold as a razor.

"Enough."