Page 80 of Cara & Gian: The Guzzi Duet

She had been sure her aunt’s only reason for asking her over to visit was to pry information out of her, but so far, Daniele hadn’t done any of that.

Maybe Cara had been wrong.

Cara went back to helping her aunt clean out the flower beds, before they moved onto the railing pots that were sitting on the back deck. She was half way through filling the hanging pots with a fresh soil and mulch mix when her aunt starting talking again.

“Are you seeing anyone new, Cara?”

Her shoulders grew stiff at the innocuous question.

“Not particularly,” Cara answered carefully.

Gian wasn’t new, after all. And she wasn’t exactly seeing him, after their meet at the café the week before. They were a thing, sure, but that meant nothing for now. Or, that’s what Cara had been trying to convince herself for a whole fucking week.

“Claud mentioned you were having dinners with a gentleman.”

Cara resisted the urge to say her uncle should mind his business. “Did he?”

“Yes, and sleepovers, too.”

“Is that what you’re calling it, nowadays?” Cara asked, not bothering to hide her sarcasm.

Daniele laughed lightly. “Don’t get prickly, I’m only asking to be nice.”

“Being nice would be not asking, Zia. Personal business, okay?”

“I do worry about you, Cara. You weren’t your usual self these past few months, and then you seemed to be doing better. I still worry, though, especially if you’ve gotten yourself caught up in something of a mess.”

Cara’s brow furrowed as she regarded her aunt. “And what mess would that be?”

Daniele didn’t even blink. “Men have a way of causing all sorts of messes that we women are not prepared for. They like to blame the mess on us, of course, but that’s only because men fear the fingers pointing back at them when it’s all said and done.”

“I’m not caught up in any sort of mess, Zia.”

“For your sake, I sure hope not, Cara.”

The news program switched to the oncoming weather for the last few days of April, leading into May, and Cara shut the television off. She let out a hard breath, frustrated at herself that she had once again succumbed to her curiosity and checked the news.

She had been checking the news for three damn weeks now.

Every night, she swore that something new popped up dealing with the Guzzi Cosa Nostra family. Something violent—someone else shot, a body found, a drive-by on a restaurant—and another funeral coming up.

Cara never watched the news, if she could help it. But after her own shooting weeks ago, she had turned the television on while she ate her supper to see what was being said. It was then that she learned just how volatile and violent the streets of Toronto were becoming for made men in the city.

She stayed out of family business for a reason.

She didn’t ask questions.

She knew better.

This was exactly why …

Her curiosity once again got the better of her, and Cara watched the news over and over, checking for new stories that might be popping up. She read the Canadian news blogs, because more often than not, reporters hidden behind a screen had more information to offer about crime families and the goings on than what was offered on television programs.

The Guzzi family was in an uproar.

They had been that way for a while.

Gian had never told Cara about it, not properly. She didn’t blame him for that, because she had made it clear on more than one occasion that she simply didn’t want to know.