A size ten loafer kicks me in the chest, and my body flies back as Renzo shoves the woman speaking to him out of the way to escape. Groaning, I hide the gun in the folds of my dress, fairly sure she didn’t see it. Working by touch, I put the weapon back in my holster and carefully stand up.
Walking gingerly, I see that the woman is calling for security to remove Renzo from the hotel, and I wince as I see that there’s dirt on the front of my dress. I’ll never be able to get it out of the silk. Bastard.
Returning to the luncheon, I hold my head high and return to my table, prepared to lean into being the victim in this scenario if necessary.
“Verona!” Cassidy hisses, coming quickly to my side. “Where were you? Did you fall in the bathroom?”
“No, but a certain fire breathing mafia don found me,” I sigh. “He kicked me and ran out of the room.”
“I suddenly have a headache,” she lies. “I’ll find the organizer and let her know. Can you walk?”
“Yeah. I’m just a little out of breath. He kicks like a mule.”
Cassidy shakes her head as I follow her, his words spiraling in my mind. He can’t hurt Rosa, I know this. Once he’s dead, that’s it. Ghosts can’t come back from the grave, even when they’re crotchety megalomaniacs like Renzo Accetta.
I’ll still warn Rosa. Renzo is desperate, and those men are even more dangerous than they usually are.
* * *
Two days later
“Vero, you’re making me twitchy,” Rosa complains, wrinkling her nose. “Papa can’t hurt me. He knows the best way to scare you is to threaten me. I’m perfectly fine.”
“I don’t care. I have a bad feeling, and I can’t shake it,” I admit.
“Why don’t we do something to help,” Nico suggests. “Tomorrow is the event, and the pressure is on. It makes sense it would start to affect us all.”
Even Pablo has been jumpy lately, and Rosa is still having heat spikes. All of this is definitely affecting me, and thoughts of doom follow me into my dreams.
“There’s a street festival downtown,” I mention. “It’s probably not safe, though.”
“It is,” Ciro says. “Everyone will need to bring their weapons and we’ll stay close. Is there food there?”
“There is,” I chuckle. “I saw it when I was scrolling online this morning.”
We all finally have phones, though I’ve been enjoying not needing it. It’s a new number, allowing me to cut off my family members. My grandmother is a psychopath, and I’ll be happy to never see her again.
“Are these our dinner plans?” Pablo asks, amused when Ciro’s stomach rumbles. “I suppose they are.”
“Meet at the front door in five?” Dario suggests. “We should shore up some good moments with how busy things have been lately.”
“I’m glad we picked up our dresses earlier today,” Rosa says, changing her clothes for jeans and a deep v-necked shirt. Now that we can embrace more casual clothing, we both decided to try it out. I don’t know how I feel about jeans yet, as dresses really are the toddler equivalent of women’s clothing.
It’s so easy to throw it over your head and look as if you made an effort.
Everyone else grabs what they need, and we all agree to dress casually while hiding our weapons before walking out the door. Rosa entwines her fingers with mine, sighing as we walk across the back yard.
“We need a break,” she sighs.
“Maybe that’s it… I have all of this weird energy inside of me telling me something is wrong,” I groan.
“I didn’t want to say anything, but I think my heat is coming soon,” Pablo confesses. “I’m okay, I just feel crampy.”
“Shit,” Dario breathes. I can see that he’s walking through different scenarios, trying to find a solution. “We’ll get the keys to the house tomorrow morning. I can work on getting supplies delivered to the house so we have the essentials. There’s not enough room for a heat in the guest house.”
“We may also ruin the mattress if we both go into heat at the same time,” Rosa says with a deep blush.
Well no wonder I’m freaking out.
