The chamber fell eerily silent as all eyes turned towards the overhead monitors. Carmela steepled her bony fingers, allowing the quiet to stretch taut as a garrote for maximum dramatic effect.
Up on the screen, Feliz Lombardi looked like he'd just gone 15 rounds with a Mack truck and lost on split decision. His puffy, discolored face was a roadmap of contusions, coupled with a nasty gash above his left eye shoddily dressed with butterfly bandages. The image of Tuscany's most feared power broker laid so brutally low would've been comical if not for the grim reality underlying the situation.
"Signorina Vixen..." Carmela intoned at last, her smoke-ravaged vocal cords lending an unsettling rasp to the old cobra's hiss. "Perhaps you'd be so kind as to enlighten us further about this...altercation with il signor Lombardi."
