Mafia Princess Returns novel · Chapter 7 of 24

Chapter 7: The Bats

We ran the three blocks to Third Avenue with Adamo's phone still lit in his hand.

Eight men stood in front of the bakery.

They wore dark hoodies and carried baseball bats, and one of them had a gas can.

The green awning hung half off its frame.

Enrico stood on the front step in his shirtsleeves with the pistol hanging at his side.

Nonna Concetta was behind him with the iron peel.

"Go back to Brooklyn, Rico," said the man in front, who wore a gold chain over his hoodie. "This isn't about you."

"It's my grandmother's shop."

"Then she should've kept her mouth shut about the girl."

Adamo caught my arm before I could step into the light.

"Two of my drivers are on the way," he said. "Thirty seconds."

"We don't have thirty."

The man with the gas can had started to unscrew the cap.

I looked up and down Third Avenue.

It was midnight, and the whole street was lit by yellow window light behind curtains.

Every one of those curtains was watching.

I had never been the kind of girl who shouted.

I took a deep breath and shouted.

"Third Avenue! Come see what they brought to Nonna's door!"

The man with the gold chain turned his head.

A window rattled open across the street.

Then another.

"That's Barbieri's men!" I called. "They're going to burn the bakery where you buy your bread! Bring your phones!"

For three seconds nothing moved.

Then the door of the Sons of Bari social club across the street banged open and four old men in cardigans walked out, with canes.

A woman in a housecoat came down from the second floor with a cast-iron skillet.

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