The Watcher
Tony's POV
The binoculars slipped from my hands and crashed onto the rooftop.
"Boss, you okay?" Marco whispered beside me. My best soldier looked worried as I scrambled to pick up the equipment.
I wasn't okay. Not even close. What I'd just seen through Isabella Russo's window made my blood turn cold.
A woman in black had entered her room. A woman with a knife. And it wasn't one of our people.
"Change of plans," I said, checking my gun. "We go now."
"Now?" Luigi asked from behind me. "But the security shift doesn't change for another hour. We agreed to wait until—"
"I said now." My voice came out harder than I meant it to. But something was very wrong inside that house. Something that wasn't part of our plan.
I'd been watching Isabella Russo for three weeks. Every night, sitting on this same rooftop, studying her routine. Learning when she went to bed. When she turned off her lights. When the guards walked past her window.
Tonight was supposed to be simple. Wait until she fell asleep. Climb through her window. Take her before anyone noticed. By morning, her father would get my message and the war would finally end.
But nothing about tonight felt simple anymore.
"Boss, talk to us," Marco said. "What's going on?"
I looked at my three best men. Marco, Luigi, and Sal. They'd followed me into hell before. They deserved to know why I was suddenly acting crazy.
"Someone else is in her room," I said. "Someone who's not supposed to be there."
Luigi raised his own binoculars and looked toward the Russo mansion. "I don't see anyone."
"The lights are off now," I said. "But I saw someone go in. Someone with a weapon."
Sal cursed under his breath. "You think Vincent Russo found out about our plan?"
"I don't know what to think." And that was the truth. My mind was spinning with possibilities, and none of them were good.
Maybe Isabella's father had discovered our plan and decided to move his daughter somewhere safe. Maybe a rival family was making their own move tonight. Or maybe someone was trying to hurt Isabella before we could take her.
That last thought made my chest feel tight. Which was stupid. Isabella Russo was supposed to be my enemy. The daughter of the man who killed my mother. I was here to kidnap her, not protect her.
So why did the idea of someone hurting her make me want to punch something?
"We stick to the plan," Marco said. "If someone else is in there, we deal with them."
I nodded, but my hands were shaking as I put the binoculars back up to my eyes. Isabella's window was dark now. I couldn't see what was happening inside.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. A text message from a number I didn't recognize.
"I know you're watching me."
My heart stopped beating for about three seconds. Then it started again, twice as fast as before.
"What the hell?" I whispered.
"Boss?" Marco moved closer to me. "What is it?"
I showed him my phone. All three of my men stared at the message like it might explode.
"How does she know?" Luigi asked.
"How does she have your number?" Sal added.
Those were good questions. My phone number wasn't exactly listed in the phone book. Only family and close friends had it. So how did Isabella Russo get it?
Unless...
"It's not from her," I said slowly. "It's from whoever's in her room."
That made more sense. Some kind of rival gang had gotten to Isabella first. They were sending me a message to back off. To let them finish whatever they came to do.
"We're going in," I said, standing up. "Right now."
"Tony, wait." Marco grabbed my arm. "This could be a trap. What if they want us to come running? What if they're ready for us?"
He was right. This had trap written all over it. But I couldn't shake the image of that person with a knife standing in Isabella's room.
"I don't care," I said. "We're not leaving her alone with whoever that is."
"Since when do you care about Isabella Russo?" Sal asked. "I thought we were here for revenge."
Since right now, I wanted to say. But that sounded crazy, even to me.
The truth was, I'd been having weird feelings about this job for days. Every night, watching Isabella through her window, I'd started to notice things. The way she moved. The way she brushed her hair. The way she sometimes stood by her window and looked sad.
She reminded me of someone. I couldn't figure out who, but the feeling got stronger every time I saw her.
My phone buzzed again. Another message from the same unknown number.
"Third floor. Blue room. Come alone or she dies."
"That's it," I said, putting my gun in my belt. "I'm going."
"You're not going alone," Marco said firmly. "That's exactly what they want."
"Then what do you suggest?" I snapped. "Let them kill her while we debate it up here?"
Marco, Luigi, and Sal all stared at me. I could see the questions in their eyes. When had Tony Moretti started caring more about saving Vincent Russo's daughter than getting revenge on Vincent Russo?
I didn't have an answer for them. I didn't have an answer for myself.
"Fine," Marco said finally. "We all go. But we do this smart. Luigi and Sal take the first floor. I'll cover the second. Tony gets the third."
It was a good plan. But as we started moving across the rooftop toward our ropes, my phone buzzed one more time.
This message was different. Instead of words, it was a photo. A picture taken through Isabella's window, showing her tied to a chair with tape over her mouth. Her eyes were wide with fear, but she was alive.
Below the photo, one more message: "Too late."
I looked up from my phone toward Isabella's window. The lights were still off, but I could see a shape moving around inside. As I watched, the curtains moved aside.
Isabella was there, pressed against the glass. But she wasn't tied up anymore. She was free, and she was looking directly at me.
Even from this distance, even in the darkness, I could see her mouth moving. She was trying to tell me something.
Then she raised her hand and pressed it against the window. In her palm, she was holding something small and white.
A note.
As I watched, she pressed the note against the glass so I could see the words written on it.
"Help me."
But that wasn't the part that made my world stop spinning.
The part that changed everything was what I saw behind her in the room.
The person with the knife wasn't holding Isabella, but Isabella was the one holding the knife.