Page 31 of Daddies of the Underworld

“Sir?” A guard stepped into the sunlight at the edge of the grove and stopped. He lifted one hand, showing a folder.

Emil released a pained sound that meant we’d found something he wished to keep hidden.

Dante pulled Emil to his feet. “Did you stash that, hoping we would not find it?”

I left Dante to handle Emil and strode toward the guard. “Thank you, Ricardo. Have you looked inside?”

“No, sir.” He released the folder to my grasp. “Carlo opened it to the first page, then sent me here straight away.”

“Good.” I turned to find Nina on my heels, her eyes locked on the folder. “I would rather you did not see this, but we have taken so much from you already. Do you wish to look at it with me?”

She seemed surprised by the question, like she’d thought I would send her away. I’d thought about that very thing, but Nina struck me as the kind of woman who worked like hell to protect herself. She couldn’t do that if we hid information from her.

“I want to see.” She sat on the concrete bench at the table in front of me and rested her clasped hands in her lap.

Very well. I remained standing, opening the folder to the first page, revealing another picture of Nina sitting in the window of her room, her knees to her chest and her cheek propped on her crossed arms. I flipped to the next page.

More pictures of Nina.

Some from her time as a servant, others from the gala and what should have been private moments like the one of her sitting in her room.

“Whoever took that must have been on the roof of the servants’ rooms with a long lens.” Luca took the top picture and squinted at it. “We need to sweep the entire villa for this camera. It would be difficult to hide.”

I turned to the last page, and we all froze.

Nina leaped to her feet. “What the hell? That’s my bus stop.” Her voice quivered, more in fury than fear.

Luca lifted his head, staring toward Dante. Less than two seconds later, Dante turned his way, releasing Emil’s chin in the process. That look was all it took for Dante to turn Emil over to Ricardo and join us. He plucked the picture from Luca’s hand and stared at Nina. “When was this taken?”

She gaped at him. “How am I supposed to know that?”

“Because you have a brain and an uncanny memory of events and people. Look at the people around you. You would have noticed them that day. How long before you came to the villa was this picture taken?” He was relentless but careful, a noted difference in that last quality from his usual tactics.

Nina frowned at the picture, her gaze flicking side to side before her eyes widened. “A couple weeks. I hadn’t gotten my letter or uniforms yet. I remember I was starting to worry that I wouldn’t get accepted this year. I took the bus downtown to put in more applications. I remember that guy. He got on the bus with me. Acted kind of weird. Didn’t speak to me, but he kept talking under his breath. I thought he was drunk.”

Dante met my gaze, and I read everything I needed in that look. We’d learned to communicate this way through the years, and as usual, it served a great purpose.

I tapped the folder with one finger. ‘Someone was looking for you before the summit. They found you, then they followed you here.”

Her face tightened, but she did not cry. She blinked once, the movement slow, then anger took hold. She looked at each of us before she spoke. “You said my rooms are no longer safe. Where can I stay?”

“In our private quarters.” I held her gaze instead of looking toward our rooms. “It is the safest place in the villa. It would be best if you are with at least one of us at all times.”

“Fine.” She didn’t want to agree. That was plain, but she did so to save herself.

10

NINA

I’d been living in their private quarters for three days, and with every passing day, the differences between us became more clear.

When Matteo said private chambers, I expected each of them to have a suite. And they did.

What I hadn’t expected was for all of those suites to be connected and for them to put me in Dante’s room, right in the middle, while Dante roomed with Luca.

I could hear them every night, shuffling around before bed, and I ate every meal with them in Matteo’s private dining room.

His rooms were more beautiful than I’d thought possible. Dante’s thick blue chairs and plush tapestries on the walls felt quaint when compared to Matteo’s opulence.