Page 14 of The Boss

And just like his father, before I can respond, he hangs up.

I need to call in reinforcements, so I call Ryan. Drew’s downstairs already and will need his help on this too.

Drew knows computers, and the Cambio brothers bring the muscle and violence, but Ryan truly is a genius in addition to his enforcer abilities. He can analyze financials and businesses like I’ve never seen before. Anything we think of doing business-wise, Ryan reviews. He can get his hands dirty like everyone else in this group, but he has the brains too.

“Gino,” he answers.

“Ryan, I need you over at the house. I'm going to need your help with something.”

“You got it, I’ll be over there in fifteen minutes.”

“Make it ten.” I hang up and throw my phone on the desk, groaning as my face falls into my hands.

“What are you planning?” Drew asks curiously as he walks into my office.

“I don’t know yet, but I think we need more than one approach.”

He nods his head in agreement.

Once Ryan arrives, we all head to the kitchen, and the three of us take a seat at the bar. Ryan and Drew sit on either side of me, and both open their laptops. Juliet is on the other side of the island, cutting celery.

I can already tell what she’s making.

When she’s stressed or upset, she always makes her version of chicken and dumplings, much to Ryan’s delight since he’s from the South.

Both look over to me expectantly, waiting for me to give a command or an order. Without thinking, I get up from my chair and walk to the other side of the island where Juliet is standing.

Now the two are staring at me, wondering what I’m doing, and honestly, I’m wondering that myself: what the hell am I doing?

I grab a cutting board and the carrots she placed on the counter.

Juliet stops and looks over to me, confused. Sure, when people aren’t in this house, I have helped her cook over the years. She taught me some dishes, so I don’t go hungry when she’s out of town.

She doesn’t say anything, though, just turning back to chopping the celery. But the other two in the room can’t fathom the fact that I'm helping.

“Well, shit, Gino, if I knew you could cook, I would have asked Juliet to move into my house years ago,” Drew says, huffing out a laugh.

I look at him with a death glare; there is no way in hell she is living with any of these assholes.

“I would never live at your house; it's a mess,” Juliet responds, not even looking up. “And you and Alonso are so unorganized. I would never survive.”

“You wound me,” Drew says, feigning heartache.

I cut him off before he says anything else to piss me off in relation to Juliet. “Drew, can you find a way to get access to anything about the Russos’ compound? I’m talking staff logs and who comes in and out. And Ryan, can you analyze anything he finds to see if there is something we missed or don’t know about them?”

They both nod their heads and get up from their barstools, leaving the kitchen to go to the security room around the corner.

“Thanks, but you really don’t need to help me with this,” Juliet says as she grabs an onion.

I take it from her. “I know you don’t need help, but I’m offering.” I smile at her and continue chopping.

We silently work for a few minutes, and Juliet starts adding vegetables to the chicken currently cooking on the stove. Then, I hear the front door open and close.

“Hey, you two,” I hear my sister’s voice as she walks into the kitchen, taking a seat at the bar.

“I didn’t know you were coming over?” I look over to her and say.

“Well, my house was too quiet, so I needed noise and people,” she replies, and as she does, Alonso enters.