Noble Intentions: Season Four by L.T. Ryan Page A

as the obsession over the thought that the bodies had been
    found. It wouldn't take long for Charles to create a list of the places Paolo might go. He was fortunate that the bite of love had never infected him with
    strong enough venom to marry. He had no kids, as far as he knew. Aside from his two sisters, the rest of his siblings and his parents were in Brazil. And
    that was beyond Charles's immense reach.
    Ithaca, however, wasn't. And Charles had a team in Buffalo. A small group, for sure. But that didn't matter. They could be at Esmeralda's in half an hour.
    And they were all killers.
    He grabbed the portable off the wall and called the hospital.
    "How're you feeling?" Esmeralda asked him.
    "I've been better."
    "Are you going to walk up here, or would you like me to come get you?"
    "Surely you've seen this done enough times you can put a few stitches in me."
    "I can, but you're going to look like a medical experiment gone wrong with the scarring it'll leave behind."
    He glanced at his reflection in the microwave's mirrored surface. Scarring was inevitable. "I don't care about that." And he didn't. The desire to run,
    disappear drove his thoughts and actions now. The sooner he could go, the better.
    "OK, fine," she said. "I'll do it. But I don't want any shit from you later down the road. Got it?"
    "Yeah." He paused a beat. "Can you come home early, Essie?"
    "I'm supposed to be here until six."
    "I wouldn't ask if it wasn't important."
    Paolo had told his sister details about his life. She didn't know everything, such as how high up in the organization he was or the crimes perpetrated by
    him or his underlings, but she had enough knowledge that the meaning behind his words should be evident to her.
    "The mid-shift is at lunch right now," she said. "I'll leave as soon as they are back."
    After Paolo hung up, he walked to the front of the house and split the blinds vertically with his thumb and forefinger. A sleepy street, oppressed by the
    heat, stretched out before him. He repeated the process at the windows located on the side and back. Afterward, he walked through his sister's room and
    into her closet. The small space overflowed with dresses, blouses, skirts, pants and scrubs. He pulled the clothes off the railing, revealing a blank
    section of the back wall. Tapping, he located the upper seam of the cutout he'd had installed while she was on vacation a year earlier. He pushed on the
    cover, rocking it back and forth, until the top seam split. With two fingers wedged into the slim opening, he tugged on the drywall cutout. It tore away
    from the wall. Paolo reached into the dark space and located the LED light mounted to the top.
    The cutout was two feet wide, and a foot high and deep. Inside were four passports, two 9mm pistols, a tactical knife with an ankle sheath, twenty-thousand
    in cash, and the bankbooks to three domestic and two foreign banks.
    The wise man is over-prepared, Paolo.
    His father had said that weekly since Paolo was five or six years old. Didn't matter if they were hunting or fishing or woodworking or packing for
    vacation. The words were ingrained. A mantra of sorts.
    He pulled out the knife and a pistol, five thousand in cash, three passports, one of which had Esmeralda's photo in it, and one domestic and two foreign
    bankbooks, including one for the Bank of Montreal.
    On the closet floor was a duffel bag that contained a couple changes of Paolo's clothes. The kind of casual wear that would allow him to blend in anywhere.
    He placed the items from the safe inside and carried the bag to the guest room.
    Esmeralda arrived home a few minutes later. As she stitched his nose and forehead and attended to a cut on his upper arm, he filled her in on what had
    happened, neglecting to mention that one of the men he'd slain in self-defense had been their brother-in-law. She'd find out in time. As she listened to
    the retelling, her eyes glassed over. Mouth hung in a perpetual state of openness. Her breathing