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“Please, this poor fuck just had a booster,” I said. “When was that? The car accident? The cutting your hand open with the letter opener? When you were shot…”
“Oh, my God,” Avery said, wide-eyed, as I climbed in beside her, and Ant got in the driver’s seat.
“Yeah, Ant has shitty luck,” I said.
“Your shitty luck, my clumsiness, I think we will get along well,” she mused.
“I was rooting for you not to be the bad guy,” Ant said, making me whack a hand into the back of his headrest.
“Hey,” I grumbled.
“No, it’s okay. I mean, I’m going to have to own up to all of this,” Avery said. “I’m sorr—“
“Stop,” I cut her off, giving her knee a squeeze. “We don’t need to do that,” I assured her.
Though, yeah, this wasn’t over.
It was a decently long drive, and Avery started to doze with her head on my shoulder, so I took a chance to shoot off a quick text to Lorenzo, not giving many details—since we didn’t like to do that sort of shit in any form that can be traced—but said I would explain as soon as I got Avery home and settled.
“Baby, we’re home,” I said, pressing a kiss to her temple as I gave her a little shake.
The little grumble she let out made both me and my brother grin.
“Billy and Joel will be happy to see you,” I reminded her. “And then you can take a bath while we wait for pizza.”
That got her up and moving in a blink.
“You coming in?” I asked Ant. “Might as well tell you the details too.”
The guys all waited until Avery got in and went upstairs before they showed themselves.
Lorenzo, Cesare, and Silvano coming in from the kitchen, Brio making his way in from the garden.
“You won’t believe this shit,” I started, then launched into it.
“Fuck,” Lorenzo said with a sigh when I was done. “Yet another meeting with the Lombardis, I guess,” he said.
“Seems like it,” I agreed. “What do we want to do about the whole Irish mafia shit?” I asked.
“Let’s put a pin in that until tomorrow. I’m assuming we can meet with Renzo first thing in the morning. See what we can come up with as a collective. Maybe that’s what will finally bring peace between our fucking Families. We’ll head out. But let me know as soon as you make contact tomorrow.”
“Will do,” I agreed. “Thanks for being a voice of reason in all of this,” I said, to all of them, but especially Lorenzo, as I led them out.
“Glad you found your peace, Milo. We all need that in our line of work.”
It was crazy to think of someone as chaotic as Avery often was as my peace, but when I made my way back upstairs and saw Avery sitting off the side of the bed wrapped in a towel, still pink from the hot water in the tub, there was no denying that peace was what I felt moving through me.
The rest… it would all shake out eventually.
“Say it,” I demanded later, after we’d eaten pizza in bed. When we’d finished, I’d stripped out of my clothes, pulled off her towel, and had her curling up on my chest.
She didn’t play.
Didn’t pretend to not know what I was talking about.
“I love you, Emilio,” she told me, making my fucking heart squeeze in my chest.
“I love you too, baby.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Avery
I was half-expecting to wake up in my own bed, hungover from the sedative, and all of the happy things being a heart-crushing dream, not reality.
I did wake up alone.
But in Emilio’s bed, the spot next to me still warm.
Physically, I still kind of felt like shit. Dehydrated down to the bone, my eyelids still heavy, my cheeks still raw.
But emotionally?
I was freaking flying.
He loved me.
He loved me, and he forgave me for what I’d done.
Very little else mattered.
There was still Renzo and Cage to worry about, of course, but I knew that it would all be okay if I had Emilio at my side.
I got out of bed, trying to put cool compresses to my face for a moment, then deciding it wasn’t worth the effort, getting dressed, and going to feed the kittens.
They were so close to being let free in the house.
I couldn’t wait to have them rubbing up against my leg, or jumping on my lap, or just chasing dust bunnies around the house.
Once I was done snuggling them a bit, I made my way downstairs, hearing male voices in the kitchen.
I won’t lie.
My stomach tensed, anxiety prickling through my system, making my belly slosh around as I forced myself to keep putting foot in front of foot until I was standing in the entrance of the kitchen.
There was Emilio, already looking like a million bucks in his suit and one of his silly belt buckles. Next to him was a man with darker features and the air of importance that only a boss of a mafia Family could possess.
