Chapter 1 - Whose Room He Was Standing In
“You’ll want to unlock that door.”
Riley Hayes didn’t look frightened when Dominic Castelli entered her butcher shop after closing.
That irritated him immediately.
Two nights earlier, one of his collectors had walked into Hayes Prime Cuts demanding forty percent more protection money from every business on the block.
Tony Valente had expected compliance.
Instead, he called Riley a “fat cow,” grabbed her wrist, and put his hand on the old scale her father had taught her to use as a child.
Riley told him to move it.
He didn’t.
So she broke his kneecap with a meat tenderizer.
Now Tony was in the hospital.
And Dominic Castelli had come personally.
Rain hammered the windows while his two armed men locked the front door behind them.
Dominic was younger than Riley expected.
Dark hair. Charcoal suit. Quiet eyes.
No swagger.
That made him worse.
“You injured one of my men.”
“He injured himself.”
Dominic’s gaze moved around the shop.
Knives.
Hooks.
Steel tables.
One back exit.
He was studying the room.
Riley noticed.
Then he stepped around the counter.
“Don’t.”
He kept coming.
“You embarrassed somebody who carries my name.”
“Tony’s last name is Valente.”
“You know what I mean.”
Dominic stopped only a few feet from her.
“Pay the adjusted rate.”
“No.”
“Apologize publicly.”
“No.”
“Let Tony come back here so people see the matter settled.”
Riley laughed.
“No.”
Something cold entered Dominic’s face.
“You don’t understand your position.”
“I understand exactly where I’m standing.”
His men smiled.
Dominic moved closer.
Then he made the mistake Riley had been waiting for without realizing it.
He raised his hand toward her.
Maybe he meant to touch her chin.
Maybe her shoulder.
Maybe he only wanted to make her flinch.
He never got the chance.
Riley caught his wrist.
Dropped her weight.
Turned.
And used his own momentum against him.
One second Dominic Castelli was standing over her.
The next, his chest slammed against the stainless-steel prep table hard enough to knock the breath from his lungs.
His men reached for their guns.
Riley twisted his arm behind his back.
Her free hand closed around a narrow boning knife.
Cold steel touched the side of Dominic’s throat.
Everything stopped.
Rain beat against the glass.
The refrigeration units hummed.
Dominic breathed very carefully.
Riley leaned closer.
“Tell them to put the guns down.”
For the first time since entering her shop, Dominic Castelli did not look like a man who owned the room.
He looked like a man who had finally realized whose room he was standing in.
Dominic said nothing for one long second.
Riley pressed the blade just enough for him to feel the edge.
Not enough to cut.
His voice came out strained.
“Do it.”
One of the men hesitated.
Riley’s grip tightened.
Dominic’s tone changed.
May you like
“Now.”
Two guns hit the floor.
