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Greta—a woman I would have bet money on staying single until hell froze over—had recently hooked up with a biker. The president of an outlaw motorcycle club, no less.
“Don’t be jealous,amico.No one provides the kind of entertainment in my life that you do.” She was grinning like the Cheshire cat.
“So,” Cielo interrupted, “it sounds like your treasure-hunting was a success.” He settled back into his seat, his movements deliberate as always.
“Is that why you’re here?” I asked him, taking my seat opposite my father. “Treasure” was an odd thing to make Cielo come running; normally he removed problems rather than seeking out new ones.
“I’ve asked Cielo to stay close to home,” my father explained. “Matteo will remain at the college, but I’ve arranged for increased security there.”
My father was taking this threat seriously if he was putting Matteo—my youngest brother—on lockdown. Not surprising, I supposed. He’d managed to keep my sister protected from our world her whole life. Until now. And whether he wanted to admit it or not, it had him rattled.
Vito cleared his throat, drawing everyone’s attention. “I was just telling your father about the toolbox we took from the Regalton Arms. Our assessor estimates there’s roughly fifty million in cash, gold, and diamonds.”
“Si,that seems about right,” I said. I’d only gotten a brief glimpse before Heidi had flown out of the room like she wanted nothing to do with that shit—not a typical woman’s reaction to staring down at millions of dollars of gold and diamonds.
“That’s one hell of a find,” Cielo said, chuckling. “It explains why this Bianchi asshole was coming at us full force.”
“Si,” my father agreed, though it came out very much like a growl. “Now that we’re in possession of what he was searching for, I want him found and eliminated.”
I laced my fingers at the back of my neck and pretended the muscles there weren’t knotting up.
“We can’t do that,” I said, already cursing the bargain I’d made. Greta was going to have a heyday with this one.
My father cocked his eyebrow at me. “It seems like an odd time for a stroke of conscience, son.”
Well… just… fuck.
“I promised Heidi we wouldn’t go after Bianchi if she helped me find what he was looking for.” I spit out the truth; there was no sense in tiptoeing around it.
There was also no missing the way Greta’s eyes widened or the knowing grin that followed. She opened her mouth, but I got there first.
“Whatever you’re about to say,amica,don’t. Heidi was dragged into this shit with Bianchi unwittingly. The least I could do was get the bull’s-eye off her back.”
Thoughts of Heidi’s back flooded my mind with fresh and far more interesting images, her lying naked, her cheeks flushed, and her hands on her cunt. Christ, that was going down in the history books as one of the best sights ever.
But before Greta could use the silence as an opportunity to persist, I shoved the image away.
“We can’t go after Bianchi directly, but if we get word out that we’ve got what he’s looking for, it’s only a matter of time before he gets desperate and makes a mistake or even tries to come directly at us. And then he’s fair game. I never promised not to kill him; I only promised not to go after him.”
“But you never promised I wouldn’t go after him,” Cielo said, sitting up straight in his chair like he was ready to move. “If we can get a location, I can be in and out without anyone knowing. I’ll make it look like a heart attack, if you’d like, and no one will be the wiser.”
“But I’d know, fratello.”
Breaking my word wasn’t something I did lightly. I’d stand by it even if it meant stirring up shit here.
My father was silent, tapping the pads of his steepled fingers together. The pulse in his temple was throbbing, but he didn’t look nearly as pissed as I’d expected.
“You’ve become a better man than I expected, Deo,” he mused, still tapping his fingers.
I’m not sure if it was meant to be a compliment. What exactly had he “expected”? Then again, I wasn’t about to ask.
Eventually, he stopped tapping and sat up straighter, placing his hands on the desk in front of him.
“It’s not a promise you should have made without first discussing it with me, but I won’t cheapen your word by finding a technicality to get around it. We’ll—”
Giovanni stuck his gray head in the open doorway.
“My apologies,Signor,”he said to my father, then nodded politely to me, then Cielo.
