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The next day, I moved toward the kitchen on stiff legs, restless from a sleepless night, and began making breakfast for all of us. I had Damien, Andrei, and Nadia all waiting in the kitchen so we could get introductions out of the way. That, and everyone needed to be together when I revealed my game plan. Ciara needed to know whom she could trust when she’d be spending so much time here, and my top three people were at the top of the list. Andrei did all my dirty work, and he was the one to terrify my enemies out of poor ideas, but he was loyal to a fault. Nadia and Damien, despite being bickering siblings, were a part of the previous boss’s team, and when he died and I took his place, they followed my rule and worked their way up to my trusted advisors.
“She sure likes to sleep in,” Damien chastised, tapping his pocketknife on the glass countertop in an unsteady beat. “Boss, are we sure bringing in the enemy’s daughter is the wisest move.”
“Especially when they’re highly motivated to take her out,” Nadia added, smacking her hand down on the backside of Damien’s blade to stop the tapping. He scowled at her, but she ignored him.
I glanced between them. “Don’t question me on this,” I ordered. “She means a lot to me, and her father’s dead. That means she’s no longer an enemy to us, no matter how you spin it.”
Damien huffed, and Nadia shrugged.
Hearing them agree with one another was a rarity when Nadia made such a habit of inconveniencing Damien. From girlfriends to missions, she had a habit of taking it all from him. They may have been siblings, but one more inconvenience would convince Damien to kill her. And after ruining his engagement six months ago—a scheme that was meant to be a joke—Damien was done. He’d been frustrated with her for years, but he hated her now. There was nothing I could say to convince him otherwise.
“Is there anything we should know about her?” Andrei asked.
They knew her name and the reason she was here. They knew the fundamental information. “She has a son who will be welcomed here, too. She only knows that a hit was placed on her head after her dad’s death, nothing more.”
He nodded. “Do you have a protection detail assigned for when they go out?”
I ran my tongue over my teeth and shook my head. “We’re keeping them here as much as possible, but if they have to go anywhere, I want you to stay on them. Keep them safe.”
He nodded, and the pattering of two sets of feet moved in our direction. I turned just in time to find Ciara and Sean, standing in the kitchen’s doorway and looking between all of us. Sean looked as wary as Ciara, but he moved forward directly toward me. “Thanks for helping us last night,” he said to me, pulling himself up on one of the barstools as if he belonged here and had done it a hundred times before.
“Protecting you and your mother is an honor,” I said, my eyes meeting the honey brown of Ciara’s. “I hope you both slept well.”
“That bed’s more comfortable than the one I have at home,” he admitted, and Ciara rolled her eyes, finally moving forward and seeing where my team sat at the table.
Damien looked her up and down wordlessly and Nadia did the same, only with less obvious gusto in her expression. I hoped he cut the bullshit and accepted her as I demanded for his sake. I didn’t care who he was; he was just as expendable as everyone else if he couldn't follow orders.
It was Andrei’s expression that stopped me. He turned and glanced at her before straightening and offering her one of his rare smiles. “Cee,” he greeted.
She looked at him, clearly taken aback as she chuckled under her breath and moved forward, offering him a knuckle tap that he accepted with ease. “If it isn’t my favorite regular. This is the last place I expected to find you.”
He chuckled deeply as she moved to Sean’s side, absentmindedly stroking his hair away from his face. He pushed her hand away like any young boy, and she leaned into the counter. “This is the kid you talk about all the time, huh?”
“This is Sean,” she replied. “My smart little guy.”
“I’m tough, too,” he added, clearly trying to fit in with the crowd.
“Sorry,” Ciara said down to him. “My smartandtough little guy.”
I finally shook my head, looking between them. “You know one another?”
Andrei glanced back at me and nodded at the same time as Ciara spoke. “He’s a regular at the bar I work at. One of my best customers, and probably the only one able to get the patrons to calm down when a fight breaks out.”
I raised my brows at Andrei, and he shrugged. “I like to let loose sometimes, Boss.”
Then, I glanced back at where Ciara stood beside her son, both of them eyeing the pan full of eggs in front of them. “You need to stop working at the bar until we get all of this figured out,” I told her. “It’s dangerous being in a place like that when anyone could know about the hit on you and want to cash in.”
She shook her head. “I’m not quitting.”
“Until I get this figured out, you’re not going anywhere without protection,” I said, leaving no room for argument.
I didn’t know how I’d forgotten about the take-no-shit attitude she’d had nearly a decade ago, but clearly, nothing had changed. With strangers, she was a light full of sunshine and rainbows, but the moment anything inconvenienced her, that smile flipped, and she raised hell. “I’m staying here for our protection. I’m going to give up most of my life to keep myself and my son safe, but I’m not quitting the job I’ve had for the last five years because of this, and you’re not going to make me.”
The room fell silent, and everyone looked between us uncertainly. The one thing I had never allowed was for people to talk back to me. Nobody got away with it, but Ciara had somehow wormed her way into me in a way nobody else ever had. “No,” I said.
“Yes,” she retorted.
“How the hell is she not dead?” Damien asked under his breath, and Nadia smacked him in the arm. He pushed her back hard enough that she nearly toppled from the chair.
