Kidnapped by the Werewolf Mafioso

GIANCARLO The champagne flute shatters against my desk, Dom Pérignon mixing with blood that's not mine. Yet. Three Liu Syndicate assassins drop from my ceiling tiles like gift-wrapped vengeance, thinking they've caught Chicago's Dark Angel with his wings clipped. Their timing's perfect—midnight, skeleton crew, most of my soldiers dispatched on false errands I planted through compromised channels. They think I'm alone. I pour another glass one-handed while the first assassin's wire whispers toward my throat. "Gentlemen. You're forty-seven seconds behind schedule." The wire stops. Just for a heartbeat. Long enough. My Glock barks twice—silver-core bullets inscribed with dead names punching through the first assassin's skull. His brain matter decorates the Monet I bought at auction last spring, grey and red improving the composition considerably. The second killer pivots, tanto blade singing funeral songs, but I'm already moving. Glass shatters where my head was, champagne bottle becoming weapon as I drive crystal shards through his eye socket, twist until I feel optic nerve separate. The third one's smarter. Hangs back, assault rifle tracking. "Chen sends his regards." "Tell him yourself." Quinn materializes behind him wearing my face—perfect mimicry down to the white-blond hair and ice-blue eyes. The assassin spins, confused for exactly the half-second needed. I put three rounds through his spine while he's deciding which Morelli to shoot, watching his legs stop working before his brain catches up. The door explodes inward. More Liu soldiers, because dragons never do anything small. I flip my desk—eight hundred pounds of mahogany that becomes shield as automatic fire tears my office apart. Each bullet costs Chen another thousand in reparations he'll never collect. "Gianni!" Marco vaults through the window, my baby brother's idea of a dramatic entrance. Blood already painting his knuckles where he's torn through the exterior guard. His hands drip with something that might have been a throat. "You started the party without me?" "Fashionably late as always." I roll left, come up firing. Two more down, their tactical gear no match for blessed silver. "Check the elevator shaft. They'll have rigged it." Marco grins, all wolf despite his human face. Twenty-eight years old and still thinks violence is foreplay. He disappears into smoke as more Liu soldiers flood my penthouse, their coordination suggesting months of planning. Amateur hour. I've been expecting this since I took Chen's head three days ago. My office becomes a kill box. Quinn shifts between faces—dead Liu soldiers, my mother, Chen himself—sowing confusion while I work. One soldier freezes seeing his dead partner's face on Quinn's shifting form, long enough for me to separate his head from his shoulders with the katana I keep behind the bar. The blade sings through vertebrae, a sound like breaking promises. The Syndicate thought superior numbers would matter. They didn't account for a changeling who can be anyone, a wolf who treats combat like contemporary dance, or me. I am Giancarlo Morelli. I painted Chicago red before I turned thirty. My first kill was my father, his blood baptizing me into a world where mercy is weakness and weakness is death. These would-be assassins are insects attempting to bite a hurricane. The rifle I keep behind the Kandinsky speaks my language. Modified M4, every bullet carved with names of the dead. I make the Liu soldiers into modern art—one's intestines spelling warnings across Italian marble, another's blood painting Jackson Pollock patterns on walls that cost more than their families will ever see. Marco reappears dragging something that might have been human once, his wolf so close to the surface his eyes burn gold. "Elevator's clear. Found their demo guy." He drops the corpse, meat hitting floor with wet finality. "He was chatty before I removed his tongue. And fingers. And most of his non-essential organs." A Liu captain charges, thinking close quarters favors him. I let him get within arm's reach before driving fingers through his throat, feeling trachea collapse like paper tubes. His eyes bulge with the realization that touching me was his last mistake. I twist, tearing out his voice box, let him drown in his own blood while stepping over his convulsing body. Quinn coalesces beside us, wearing a Liu captain's face with bullet holes for eyes. "Sixteen down. But this was just the appetizer." Glass explodes as another wave arrives—rappelling through my shattered windows like action movie extras. I grab one's rope, yank hard enough to dislocate his shoulder, then feed him his own rappelling gear. The carabiner goes through his eye socket with a sound like stepping on snails. Another tries to flank. Marco catches him, demonstrates why wolves don't need weapons. His fingers punch through tactical vest like it's tissue paper, find heart, squeeze until it pops like a water balloon. The soldier's last expression suggests he hadn't expected his ribcage to open quite so easily. I reload, glass crunching under Italian leather shoes that cost more than most cars. My office looks like Hieronymus Bosch had a fever dream—abstract expressionism in blood, brain matter, and the occasional orphaned organ. The Monet's definitely improved. "Status report." Quinn shifts to their preferred form—androgynous, ethereal, deeply unsettling. "Chen's grandfather woke from torpor yesterday. Eight hundred years of dragon sleep interrupted by family obligations. He's already mobilizing." "Let him come." I straighten my tie, ignore the blood spatter and the chunk of someone's liver sliding down the window. "Dragons burn hot but they burn stupid. How many properties did Chen acquire before I caught him?" "Three. All border territories between you and the yakuza." I laugh, genuine mirth at the predictability of my enemies. Behind me, a Liu soldier missing most of his face tries to crawl toward the door. I step on his spine, feel it snap like kindling. "And Harrison Carver?" "Still planning to auction his daughter tonight. Virgin kitsune-wolf hybrid, trained by those psycho nuns to be a perfect killer." Quinn produces a tablet from nowhere, scrolls through surveillance. "Bidding starts at ten million." The pictures stop me cold. Not the tactical assessment—that processes automatically. Five-foot-four of lethal grace, moving through the convent's obstacle course like violence is her mother tongue. Dark hair that catches fire when she shifts, fox-fire dancing along skin that's never known a lover's touch. It's her eyes that hook through my ribs. Rage crystallized into purpose. A predator wearing prey's clothing, biding time until the trap springs shut. My wolf, silent for three years, suddenly surges against my ribcage. **Mine.** "Pull everyone back to core territory." I step over cooling corpses, decision already made. "Double security on the money-washing joints. Tell Dante to keep Nerissa submerged until this resolves." Marco cracks his knuckles, blood flaking like rust. "We're going shopping?" "I'm going shopping. You're staying here to redecorate." I gesture at the m******e. "Make it memorable. I want Chen's grandfather to see exactly what happens when dragons test Chicago's limits." My brother's grin could frighten God. "How memorable?" "Arrange them like a message. Let the old lizard know his grandson's death was just the overture." I leave Marco to his art, Quinn shadow-walking beside me through hallways lined with soldiers who didn't hear sixteen assassins die. My empire runs on calculated brutality and superior intelligence networks. Every guard I pass represents a potential leak, a possible weakness. After tonight, I'll purge half of them on principle. The garage holds my insurance policies—vehicles modified for supernatural warfare. I select the Bentley with reinforced everything and an engine that could outrun divine judgment. Quinn flows into the passenger seat, their features cycling through faces of the dead. "The auction's neutral ground. Even Castellano honors that." "Castellano's weak." I guide the Bentley through Chicago streets I've bled for since adolescence. "Boston made him soft. Too much negotiation, not enough massacre." Lake Shore Drive blurs past, city lights reflecting off water that hides Dante's people. My phone buzzes—Isabella confirming preparations. Smoke canisters in place. Soldiers stationed since yesterday. Everything choreographed because paranoia is just another word for experience. The marina stinks of fish and fae magic. My boat waits—twin engines that could outrun anything short of teleportation. I leave Quinn to handle the Bentley, already tasting jasmine and ozone on the wind. The ghost of her scent, carried twelve miles from international waters where she waits in chains. Other boats converge as I navigate toward the platform. Castellano's floating compensation, yakuza speedboats in attack formation, something that might be Liu Syndicate submarine testing boundaries. All the predators gathering for flesh markets that make the Silk Road look humanitarian. I dock solo, letting them think I'm curious rather than committed. Security theater with their frisking and metal detectors, as if anyone here needs weapons to kill. The platform reeks of omega terror and institutional bleach. Forty-three lots tonight. Selkies and dryads and wolves, all varieties of supernatural flesh marked for sale. But underneath the cacophony of fear, something else. Jasmine and ozone. Fox-fire and fury. A scent that makes my wolf pace its cage. "Mr. Morelli." The auctioneer materializes, neutral entity feeding on misery. "We're honored by your attendance. Will you be bidding?" My smile could freeze hell. "Depends what's on offer." They guide me to the VIP tier, one-way glass and direct platform access. Quinn's already there wearing a server's face, champagne steady in hands that recently strangled Liu soldiers. Below us, the arena fills with Chicago's shadow population. Dimitri Angeloff's representative radiates cold. Yakuza oyabun compare bloodline notes. Lesser predators pack general seating, hoping for scraps from bigger monsters' tables. "Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to tonight's special collection." They parade the merchandise. A selkie stumbles, handlers keeping her skin just out of reach. Twin cubs who haven't hit puberty yet. Some vampire's bastard get shaking through withdrawal. Each sells efficiently to the highest bidder. Then they wheel her out and my world tilts. She's sedated to the gills but still fighting. Half-shifted, caught between forms in ways that shouldn't be possible. Black hair shot through with red, fox-fire crackling along her spine despite enough suppressants to kill a normal shifter. The heat drugs have her pupils blown black but she's still snapping at handlers, still trying to tear out throats with teeth not quite human. "Lot thirty-seven. Akiko Carver. Age twenty-three. Virgin omega of exceptional pedigree." The arena detonates. Kitsune bloodlines are myth, legend, extinction event. Finding one intact, virgin, crossbred with wolf? It's like discovering a weapon of mass destruction with t**s and a killing instinct. Bidding starts at ten million. Jumps exponentially while my wolf howls beneath my skin, demanding its mate. I bid twice. Token amounts. Let them think I'm testing waters while inside I'm already planning their deaths. The Liu enforcer wins at eighty-seven million, gold teeth flashing victory. I stand. Quinn reads the signal. Time to paint this platform red. The first smoke canister detonates exactly on schedule. Then three more, Isabella's special blend of jasmine and funeral rites designed to confuse supernatural senses. Gunfire erupts from six positions, crossfire patterns turning the arena into abstract art. I vault from my box, already moving. The Liu enforcer spins toward me, gold teeth opening to speak. My knife opens his throat before words form, blade angled to sever both carotids and the voice box in one motion. His blood paints an arrow pointing toward my prize, arterial spray hitting the yakuza behind him. The platform erupts into chaos. Castellano's people clash with yakuza soldiers. Angeloff's representative freezes three guards solid before someone puts silver through his skull. I move through the c*****e like it's choreographed, because for me it is. Every death planned, every angle calculated. A yakuza soldier tries to block my path. I grab his wrist, redirect his blade into his partner's kidney, then snap his elbow backwards. The joint separates with a sound like breaking chopsticks. While he screams, I drive his own blade up through his soft palate into his brain. Two more converge. I let them think they have me flanked before dropping low, sweeping one's legs while driving an elbow through the other's knee. The first hits platform grating; I stomp his throat, feel cartilage flatten. The second tries to crawl away on his destroyed leg. I help him by putting my boot through his skull. Quinn flows through the crowd wearing death like cologne, their face shifting between victims' last expressions. Guards shoot their own allies, confused by familiar features. I use the chaos, moving steadily toward the platform where she waits. Three Liu soldiers make a final stand between me and my prize. Professional formation, overlapping fields of fire. I throw the knife through the first one's eye, roll under their bullets, come up inside their guard. My fingers find the second soldier's throat, thumb crushing his hyoid bone while I use his body as shield against the third's fire. When the magazine empties, I let the corpse drop, smile at the last soldier's widening eyes. "Your turn." He tries to reload. I close the distance, catch his hands, force him to beat himself to death with his own rifle stock. Takes six hits before his skull caves properly. Blood and brain matter pattern the platform in Rorschach tests of violence. She watches me approach through sedated eyes. Even drugged, even burning with synthetic heat, she recognizes another predator. Her lips pull back from teeth too sharp for human mouths. I reach the platform, step over the Liu enforcer's corpse. His blood pools around her bare feet, and something in her expression suggests she appreciates the offering. When I reach for her restraints, she tries to take my fingers off despite the drugs. Perfect. My claiming bite goes deep, tearing through skin to mark her as mine in the old way. The bond snaps into place like breaking bones—painful, permanent, perfect. Her blood tastes like jasmine and murder and home. "Mine," I growl against her throat. And feel her bite me back, marking me just as deep. That's my girl.