Page 44 of Daddies of the Underworld

13

MATTEO

Facing down an entire committee of men whose money we’d been responsible for did not bother me. Knowing the shit show we were about to face had Dante cracking his knuckles in the hallway before he entered the room.

I walked straight to my seat, Luca coming in and sitting to my right. Dante remained behind me despite having a chair to my left.

“Why have you called us here?” Aleksander Vol sat on the other end of the table, his fingers steepled beneath his chin.

I nodded toward Luca and remained standing. “There has been a problem. Luca discovered several inconsistencies in the finances.”

“How much?” Peter, one of our American partners, eyed Luca, his brows pulled into a tense V that made him resemble a gorilla.

Luca held steady as he answered. “Eight point two million.” He braced one hand on the edge of the conference table. “The anomaly is spread across several protected accounts.”

Aleksander shoved to his feet so fast his chair slammed into the wall. “You expect us to believe this happened under your roof by coincidence?”

“No.” My hands were tucked into my pockets, and I refused to let my body tense as the accusations rose all around us. “Curious, don’t you think, that it happened now? If I was going to steal your money, I would not do it here.” Could they not sense the obvious setup?

Aleksander paused for several seconds. Perhaps he could think after all.

Dante and the guards behind me remained still, but all had hands rested close enough to weapons to make it obvious I would not put up with any of their shit.

They could scream and accuse all they wanted. They were only words, after all. But they would get set the fuck down at the first hint of violence.

They knew my rules, and as they all looked at one another, faces reddening, it seemed they were going to follow them.

Aleksander pointed at Luca. “You control the financial safeguards.”

Luca’s smile had an edge to it that none of them would recognize. “Yes, and as Matteo said, if I stole from you, I would not create a report showing where the money disappeared from or announce it to you. I would be gone.” He smacked his palms together, then tossed them out to the sides in his version of a ‘poof, gone’ expression.

A few men shifted in their seats. A couple nodded at each other. They were too angry for explanations, so I went straight for the kill. “All accounts have been frozen.

No one leaves the property.

No one accesses private records without clearance. We have every computer on lockdown, and you will receive updates every two hours.”

A man at the far end of the table curled his hand into a fist and slammed it onto the table. “We want names.”

“Would you like to pull them out of your ass? Because that’s about as helpful as your statement is at this moment.” Luca met and held the man’s gaze until he dropped his to the table. “You want revenge. Which we understand. You will have names when we have evidence and proof.”

Aleksander narrowed his eyes. “And if the evidence points to your own people?”

Heat spun through my veins, burning hotter with every passing second. I stared him down instead of knocking his fucking head off. It was not above the realm of reason that someone had betrayed me, but I did not like the way Aleksander said it. “Then my people answer for their crimes.”

Luca’s gaze moved to me. He knew what the promise cost, but I did not change my stance.

The alliance had survived bullets, betrayals, and men with more pride than sense.

Losing money frightened them more than death.

“That is all. You may resume the rest of your day.” I dismissed them without moving.

It took them several seconds to respond, the room going quiet, then chilly when they realized I meant it and I would not be answering any more questions.

I couldn’t because we had no answers.

Dante waited for the room to empty before he opened the door behind him, the one that led to our wing.