Dogs Among Withered Roses - Chapter 22

Ah, it was Russo.

It really was Russo Gucci.

She was so startled that she didn’t even feel the pain surging through the back of her head and her back where she’d slammed into the wall. At a loss for words, she stared wide‑eyed at Russo in a dark teal work uniform, and the cold edge of metal pressed against her stiffened neck.

Russo raised a finger to his lips.

At the warning that if she didn’t shut up, the blade would dig into her throat, Berenice slowly nodded. The hand covering her mouth gradually fell away. She took a sharp breath she’d been holding, then asked in a heavily pressed voice.

“Russo, do you work here?”

“Where’s your bodyguard? I saw you coming into the gym.”

Ignoring Berenice’s nonsense, Russo asked.

But Berenice didn’t answer his question right away either. He said he saw her coming in. That meant he saw Berenice and her group enter this building.

So he knew I’d be playing tennis here today. I shouldn’t have lived so predictably. Suppressing her trembling breath, Berenice gave a small signal with her eyes.

“Michele and Andre are outside the gym. One is in the locker room.”

“…What?”

At her glance pointing to the locker room at the end of the hallway, Russo hesitated for a moment, tilting his head with a suspicious look. A bodyguard in the women’s locker room? He didn’t believe it, but to check, he narrowed his eyes and tightened his grip on the knife.

“We were planning to hook up in there. He’s waiting for me. Go check if you want.”

“He’s that bastard, isn’t he? The one who threatened me. Right?”

“How would I know? I’m not the one who threatened you.”

“Does this look like a joke to you? You’re two‑timing with that Lockwood bastard, and now even your bodyguard? You think I’m a joke? Huh?”

“…A joke?”

As if you should be the one saying that. Berenice, already back to her usual expressionless face, sneered.

“Idiot, put the knife away before you talk about jokes.”

“…What? Idiot?”

“I’m shaking in fear, really.”

After hiding like a rat for nearly a month to avoid the Valentiera Family members…. Of all people, he chose to come looking for her with that precious face of his. There was no way she could find it anything but ridiculous. She knew he came because he knew she regularly played tennis with Cecilia, so she couldn’t hold back the mockery.

Letting both hands hang neatly at her sides, Berenice stared blankly at Russo’s hollowed face. As if he’d been living in a trash heap, a damp, rotting stench wafted from him.

Holding her breath for a moment, Berenice put strength into her back to straighten the body that had been shoved against the wall. Perhaps not wanting her to be stabbed before he achieved his purpose, Russo flinched slightly and pressed his body close again.

“Do you even know how much trouble I’m in because of you? Vincenzo said he’d kill me…!”

“Is there any reason I should know that?”

“You bitch, you did that on purpose, didn’t you? Right!”

“That’s unfortunate. You should’ve finished introducing yourself when you were a kid.”

Ridiculous. If someone passing by heard this, they’d think he’d been deeply in love and then betrayed. Berenice barely held back the laughter rising in her throat and steadied her breathing.

His sudden appearance startled her, but she wasn’t afraid. There was no reason at all to fear a worm like him.

Still, he wasn’t completely stupid. He didn’t look like he believed the lie that Erkin was waiting in the locker room. If she screamed, Erkin would come running right away, but there was no way Russo would wait quietly until then. And the knife pressed against her neck.

If she’d noticed the suspicious presence just a little earlier, she could’ve at least taken out the dagger or the pistol in her tennis bag. Swallowing her regret, Berenice looked straight into Russo’s eyes.

At this point, there was only one way.

She didn’t really want to use it… but she was empty‑handed without a weapon, her strength was spent on tennis, and with her back against the wall, she couldn’t move freely, so she had no choice.

“Answer me. You were the one who deliberately fed me that kind of information, agh!”

The man, unaware of what was about to happen, pressed his body closer, and the woman’s hand, the one that still had some freedom, gathered strength for a strike.

Not missing the moment Russo let his guard down, Berenice grabbed his crotch hard. She wanted to smash his face with her fist, but this had a higher chance of success. And for a bastard who thought he was something just because he held a knife, this was the best move.

“Ah! You crazy— aah! Ah! Ugh! Ah!”

She never thought she’d ever put her hand on a man’s crotch like this in her life. Gritting her teeth, Berenice twisted and shook what hung between Russo’s legs as if she meant to tear it off.

With a squeal like a pig being slaughtered, the knife that had left a long, shallow cut on her neck fell, and Russo’s body collapsed helplessly. Folding in on himself like a snapped asparagus stalk, Russo clutched his precious part that fortunately hadn’t fallen off and let out groans.

Berenice ran her fingers along the blood flowing down her neck to check it, then bent down and grabbed the fallen knife. With tears clinging to his eyes, Russo glared fiercely, his jaw trembling.

“Y‑You, f‑fuck, you, you, you crazy….”

“You don’t know how to use a knife.”

Did the Marino Family not teach you that? Berenice, flicking the blade like a cigarette at the corner of her lips, warned in a low voice.

“If you point a knife at me like this one more time, it won’t end with just grabbing.”

If there even is a next time, others will step in before me. Having warned of a grim future, Berenice spun the knife in her hand like twirling a pen.

One of the things she could never put down since being adopted by Antonio and becoming a Valentiera was a Linferno stiletto. After she became able to handle the stiletto freely, enough to satisfy Antonio, she naturally took a pistol into her hand.

Swinging the knife as if it were a toy, Berenice drove it down beside Russo’s face.

“I won’t make you pay back the protection money you stole. I can cover that myself. I actually earned more than that. But my thoughts don’t always match Ricardo’s.”

As she was about to call Erkin, hearing Russo’s scream, someone came running in a hurry.

Short and forceful, rough yet decisive footsteps pounded the ground, rapidly growing closer. Berenice slowly rose, picked up her tennis bag, and headed for the nearest stairs. She had to get down before Erkin arrived.

Just as she was about to go down the stairs, Berenice looked back.

“I’ll tell the bodyguards something appropriate, so run before Ricardo moves. If you can, get far out of Belloc. Don’t think about coming back. This is the last thing I can give you….”

“You’re not getting away like that!”

Berenice let her guard down as well.

The limp, squishy feeling was disgusting, so she stopped herself from squeezing harder and shaking it again. Maybe because of that, Russo recovered faster than expected, got up, and violently grabbed Berenice’s tennis bag.

I should’ve just stabbed his crotch.

“If I’m going to run anyway, I might as well secure my share with your ransom, so come with me!”

As if he’d gauged the sound and direction of someone running, Russo urgently dragged Berenice in the opposite direction. Reflexively clutching her tennis bag with both hands, Berenice put strength into her whole body and shouted.

“Have you lost your mind, you lunatic? You’re not some demon‑possessed goat. I spare you and you try to jump straight into hellfire? Let go of this!”

At that moment, Erkin, who had run up from the opposite stairs, shouted sharply without even being out of breath.

“Miss!”

“Erkin!”

She never thought seeing Erkin charging toward her like this would feel so welcome. Color returned to Berenice’s face in that instant.

The moment he saw Erkin, who was only about three or four steps away, close enough to reach with one more push forward, Russo let go of the tennis bag he was holding without hesitation.

Berenice, who had still been putting all her strength into it, staggered violently. She hurriedly stretched her foot back to catch her balance as her body tipped backward, but it didn’t touch anything. It felt like stepping on air.

“Ah….”

The color drained from Berenice’s face as she realized she was standing on the stairs. With no way to stop herself, her body tilted back, and she reached out toward Erkin.

“Berenice!”

Erkin’s desperate shout rang out. The hand he urgently stretched toward her failed to reach her and only grasped at empty air.

Is this what Ricardo meant by desperation? Just as the thought crossed her mind, still difficult to understand, her body lost its direction and tumbled brutally down the stairs. She bounced as she fell all the way to the bottom, then slammed her head hard against the wall of the landing.

The violent impact felt like her skull was cracking, and her breath caught in her throat. The last thing Berenice saw was Erkin running down the stairs as if flying before she lost consciousness.