Chapter 1 - THE LITTLE GIRL WHO WON THE IMPOSSIBLE GAME
The question fell through the smoke-filled suite like a stone through water. Twelve tailored suits turned in unison. Crystal tumblers froze mid-air. A lit cigar rolled across an onyx ashtray, scattering ash across polished mahogany.
Lorenzo Vescari, at 34 the youngest mafia boss in New Orleans history, lowered his glass without drinking. In six years running the Vescari family, no one had ever walked into his private rooms uninvited. Not a rival. Not a federal agent. Not anyone.
Yet here she stood. A little girl, no more than five years old, in the middle of his Persian rug. Honey-colored hair pinned with a crooked butterfly clip. A torn sea-blue dress. White socks pulled unevenly. A spiral notebook clutched to her chest like armor.
If I win, she said, her voice light but heavy enough to steal every conversation in the room, I get to do anything I want, right?
She wasn't frightened. That was what unsettled him most. Her pale blue eyes moved across the room with quiet precision—counting faces, counting exits. Then she looked at him, and only at him, as if the other eleven men didn't exist.
She pointed at a side table near the fireplace where someone had abandoned a box of children's memory cards.
You play with me, she said. I dare you.
Lorenzo stepped forward. He crouched slowly until his shoulders were level with hers.
May you like
Yes, little one, he said, his voice soft and cold as river stone. Anything you want.
She smiled. It wasn't a child's smile.
