Page 20 of Promising Her Forever

“I knew her name and that she was opening a shop somewhere. I had planned on making her breakfast and finding out all these things…”

Zio Giacomo is still laughing as the others join us. I sigh.

“I feel like we’ve missed something,” Enea says as he takes a seat.

“Don’t we always? At least I’m not apologizing for something one of my boys did again.” Zeus laughs.

Zeus’ sons are always getting into some situation or doing something funny. Like Adonis and his pocket sammiches. They’re pitas filled with whatever he thinks of. And then he stuffs them in his pockets. I mean he does offer them to whoever’s around. But do you really want a squished something he pulls out of his pocket? We never know how long it’s been in there.

We all laugh as we agree with Zeus.

“So, what is it you need from us?" Panagiotis asks.

I ask all of them the same thing I asked my zio.

“Are you sure? Our secret is the biggest and I know the mamas have taken her under their wing. But that doesn’t mean they’d tell her our secrets,” Panagiotis says.

“I’m sure,” I say as I look at each of them.

“You have my permission,” Enea says to me.

Zeus and Panagiotis look at each other, then at me. I’m worried they’ll tell me no and I can’t be mad if they did. Their secret of being shifters is a huge one. And if everyone started finding out? There could be serious problems for them.

“We’re okay with it too.” Zeus nods. “And showing her our animals will be fun.”

We all laugh. Every time someone new has joined the family, introducing the shifters is always the best part. The most recent one to learn about them was Sawyer, Emerson O’Connor’s wife. She screamed a lot and kept saying we were all going to die. I wasn’t able to be there, but my cugino Francesco made sure we were all on the live when it happened. I’m pretty sure my Riley is going to be the same way. I can’t wait.

“Thank you all,” I say as I give each of them a hug. That went a lot smoother than I thought it would.

“How is Riley doing having Oliver as her bodyguard?” my zio asks.

“At first she pushed back. But I think she’s afraid of what Playboy could do.”

“She should be. After talking to Scrapper, he said that Playboy was a close friend of T-Rex. He was laying low and following the rules. But when Scrapper gets here, he plans on pulling his patch. Scrapper doesn’t want the Feral Raptors to lose their place with us and he knows this is the only way. So the three others with Playboy will have the choice to either stand with Playboy or with Scrapper. I’m also considering putting the family on lockdown,” Zio Giacomo tells us.

“I think that’s a good idea. And the ones that have to be out, we need to double the bodyguards. The O’Connors are all headed back this weekend too. They’ll be here for a couple of weeks. I’ll make sure they know what’s going on and the boys can help with security,” Enea adds.

The O’Connor family is part of Enea’s family. They don’t live in Lake Renegade full time. The four O’Connor boys are all MotoGP riders. But they come here between races and I’ve gotten to know all of them.

“When do you plan on telling her about the family?” Enea asks.

“I was thinking this weekend. Since everyone will be there.”

“Okay, we’ll plan another barbecue. That way we can make a big show of revealing our animals. Seraphina’s going to love it.” Panagiotis laughs.

Seraphina likes to fuck with everyone when she’s in her snake form. She and her family are Taipan snakes and they’re deadly. But her family is special, they have lethal and non-lethal venom. While she’s never actually bitten anyone in the family,she threatens to all the time. And she tries to make it sound cute by saying all she wants to do is nibble. Yeah. No thanks.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Riley

So far we’ve had a ton of customers coming into the coffee shop. Most of them work here in town and have told me how excited they are that I’ve opened the shop. I love hearing that from them.

“Hey, Riley, there’s a delivery for you. Are you expecting more things for the shop?” Oliver asks as he brings a box over to me.

“No, I’ve gotten all my deliveries for the week,” I say.

“Would you mind if I open it? We can’t be too careful,” he says.