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Chapter 14
Zariah
“Are you sure you don’t want to go out with us tonight?” Nova asked, standing in my foyer with a hopeful look in her green eyes. Dressed in a white romper with the shorts ending around midthigh, she was making me jealous of whatever bra she was wearing to make her girls look divine in the low-cut top.
My little cousin was an angel, with her blond hair and her ability to calm whatever monsters lived inside Ryan with nothing more than her presence. But she was also one of the most beautiful girls I’d ever seen, my sister included. Nova was only seventeen, but the moment she turned eighteen, Ryan was going to have his wedding ring on her finger and his baby in her belly. I didn’t doubt that for a single moment.
With anyone else, I would have rolled my eyes and done my damnedest to talk the couple out of getting married so young. But Nova was an old soul, just like Ryan. And I knew in my gut that one without the other simply didn’t make sense. Some might think it was weird that my cousin was marrying another one of my cousins. But there was no blood relation between the two of them. Ryan was my mother’s nephew, while Nova was my father’s cousin’s daughter.
The whole relationship was a long, complicated one. Nova had spent most of her seventeen years living on the West Coast, an MC princess adored by everyone. Summers, she came to New York to stay with us—but mostly to be close to Ryan. And then there was Christmas. Every year, Nova andTetkawent to Paris. They spent an entire week shopping.
I’d always been a teeny bit jealous of Nova when it came to that, but my baby cousin was anything but spoiled. She was, without a doubt, the sweetest person I’d ever met. Considering she’d been raised by bikers, and then smothered by mobsters, it was a miracle. If anyone knew her history, they would automatically assume that she was a hard-ass, that she would slit a person’s throat for even looking at her the wrong way.
I doubted Nova could hurt a fly, let alone a human being.
Although, there was that time the Colombians had sent assassins to kill her, and she’d somehow survived—and killed the two men who had tried to murder her…
But that was nothing more than a fluke. Her West Coast family had taught her self-defense. AndTetkahad given us all a few lessons in how to handle a knife and a gun. Of course Nova had been able to protect herself.
I gave her a tight hug. “Thanks for the offer, but I think I’m going to have a night in. I need to catch up on some work I let slip earlier in the week and then finish packing.”
“It’s true, then?” Nova asked with a sweet smile. “Vito and Bennie were gushing all over the place this past week about Nolan Krenshaw showing up at the gate. And then they saw his car come up here the other night. You two are a thing?”
My little brothers’ inability to keep their mouths shut didn’t surprise me. If anything, I was shocked neither of them had shown up at my house after seeing Nolan’s car. He’d spent the night, but he’d left before I’d woken the next morning. Again.
“We’re…something.” That was all I was going to admit to for the moment. “I don’t want to label us yet.”
Compassion filled her kind eyes. “I understand.” She gave me another hug. “Well, I need to get back to the house. It will take forever to entice Ciana from her room to the front door, let alone out of the compound walls.”
Concern filled me. “Is she still sleeping all the time?” Nova nodded with a grimace. “She seriously needs to see a doctor. Sleeping so much has to be a sign of something going on with her health. And…” I lowered my voice, somehow not wanting to say the next words too loudly out of sisterly love. “She’s gained some weight. Maybe it’s a symptom of, like, thyroid disease or something. Hell, I don’t know. She’s the nurse.”
Nova sighed. “It’s something, that’s for sure. Let’s talk to the parentals and maybe have an intervention about Ciana going to the doctor. Maybe Sunday night? Anya mentioned having a family dinner then.”
“I’ll be there,” I promised, making a mental note that I would have to leave the game early to get back in time. Luckily, my family liked to eat together late now that all of the kids were past the age of needing an early bedtime. My baby sister’s health was at issue. It was a hell of a lot more important than staying for Nolan’s full game and I knew he’d understand. “Have fun tonight. Love you.”
She blew me a kiss over her shoulder as she walked out the door. “Love you, Z.”
I’d barely closed the door behind her when Vito and Bennie showed up on my porch with three boxes of pizza and wearing Krenshaw jerseys. I didn’t get the chance to argue before they were pushing their way into my house and stomping into my living room.
“Yeah, sure. Come on in. It’s not like I had plans or anything,” I grumbled to myself as I followed them.
“Your man is in Baltimore,” Vito said as he flopped down on my sofa, unloading the boxes of pizza onto my coffee table, while Bennie grabbed my remote and flipped through the channels until he found the Yankees at Baltimore game that had just started. “If you have plans, they’re to bury your nose in your computer and work on contracts all night. Boring. We came to show our support for your boyfriend with you.”
“He’s not pitching tonight,” I told them as I took the chair perpendicular to them and snatched a slice of pizza from the top box. I grimaced when I tasted nothing but meat, but at least it was from my favorite pizzeria. They had the perfect dough, and the sauce to cheese to toppings ratio was perfect.
“Doesn’t matter,” Bennie said as he kept his eyes glued to the screen while blindly grabbing for a slice. I made a mental note not to let these two animals leave without cleaning up their mess later that night. “Yankees are playing. That’s all I care about.”
After I finished my pizza, I pulled my laptop from my briefcase and worked in between watching the game. I wouldn’t admit it to them, but it was nice having Vito and Bennie to hang out with. Between work and what little social life I’d had since law school, I hadn’t spent much time with my siblings. It felt like we bonded a little as the night went on.
And then my phone rang, and our lives were suddenly turned upside down.
I picked up on the second ring, just as both my brothers’ phones went off. Without taking my gaze off my computer screen, I lifted my cell to my ear. “This is Zariah.”
“Z!” Zayne sounded out of breath. “Tell me you’re okay. Please.”
I rolled my eyes. It wasn’t the first time he’d called me from Chicago, thinking I was in mortal danger for whatever reason. It was sweet but annoying, all at the same time. “I’m fine, Zayne. You know, you don’t have to call me in a tizzy every time your twin Spidey sense goes off. It’s just indigestion. Did you eat that salami again from the deli on—”
“Z!” my twin barked, making me jump at the sharpness in his voice. “Pop just called me. He said the girls have been in a wreck. He didn’t say if you were with them or not, so I didn’t know.” There was a catch in his voice. “The Colombians took Ciana and Nova. Pop said everyone else was dead.”
