Page 82 of Duty

Or, it seemed that way.

“Andino made a choice,” John said, “and given the circumstances, it wasn’t the wrong choice, necessarily, but—”

“It was the wrong choice,” Dante barked, “and nobody asked you, Johnathan.”

John stiffened, but quieted.

Andino, on the other hand, was just about done with this whole fucking thing. “So, it didn’t work out. The gun run was botched—it happens. Who the fuck thought the buyer was going to come back on us like he did? No one. It worked out, though. We all fixed it. And we got Catherine back, didn’t we? Alive.”

Dante’s jaw tensed, and his gaze hardened.

Like ice and fire.

Freezing cold, and burning.

“Yes,” his uncle said, “and lucky for you that my daughter made it out of that mess alive. You would have been the one answering for that mess, Andino. Family first—it’s our rule. Did you forget about it?”

Not really.

It just got lost in the mess that was everything else in his life at the moment. He figured his uncle was a fucking hypocrite in that way, anyway. Dante barked that family first bullshit like he meant it—but mark Andino’s words, had he slipped in business, his uncle would have let him know it; family or not.

Because yeah, the Marcellos looked out for one another.

They also liked money.

“And you didn’t answer the question,” Dante added, his tone dropping to that dark, angry timber again. “When were you planning on telling me that you deliberately disobeyed me by having Cross Donati run our guns down the Gulf because our usual man got picked up on charges? Go ahead and figure out another lie, Andino. I’ll wait.”

“Hey,” Giovanni said, his gaze narrowing. “Watch it, Dante.”

The boss didn’t even pass Andino’s father a look, but he did hold up a hand as to ask his brother for silence.

“Well?” Dante asked when Andino stayed quiet. “I’m waiting.”

Andino sighed, and shook his head. His uncle was not going to drop this until he got what he wanted—or at least, something suitable to his pissed off mood. “Maybe after it was successful, and the rest of the money was in your bank. Or … never?”

Dante scowled.

Did he want the truth, or not?

“Do you have anything to say for yourself?” his uncle asked.

“I did my job,” Andino said, shrugging his broad shoulders. “Shit didn’t work out, but the fact will remain the same in that I did my job, boss. The guns needed to be run, and you didn’t have to like who was running them as long as they got to where they needed to go. That’s the thing about this business, right, or so the three of you have been preaching to the rest of us for our whole life. As long as the fucking job gets done, and money goes in the bank, then the rest doesn’t matter. Unless,” he added with a bitter laugh, “Dante decides to get stuck up in his feelings about a certain person because then everybody’s going to have a fucking problem.” Andino scoffed. “Isn’t that how it seems lately?”

Silence answered him back.

His uncles were stunned.

His father was wide-eyed.

Beside him, John stared at the floor, silent but with a ghost of a smile on his lips.

Because yeah, where was the fucking lie?

“Leave,” Dante murmured.

Andino didn’t need to be told again. He turned fast on his heel to get the hell out of that house—it seemed like his best bet considering how much he managed to piss off his uncle tonight, and he really didn’t need to be going for a second round.

“Not you, Andino.”