Epilogue （One Week Later）
Massimo
We’ve barely settled in at the breakfast table when the doorbell rings, but the door opens before anyone has a chance to get to it. Leandro, Annabelle, Gino, Tristano, and Renato all walk into the foyer and traipse into the dining room.
I glance at Sophia who just takes it all in stride.
Another breakfast disruption, just not usually as many or as loud.
My family all start talking at once right over the top of each other and not making one bit of sense.
“Enough. You’re hurting my head. Sit, eat some breakfast. Whatever it is can’t be more important than our breakfast.”
Leandro’s jaw locks tight. My eyes meet his, now concerned.
“Sit, what is it, Leandro?” I ask, but my baby sister jumps into the conversation, her mouth running a million miles a minute.
“Desiree never showed up to the wedding. At first, I thought maybe she just decided it wasn’t best to come because…
” she trails off, looking at Sophia who’s listening intently while sipping on a coffee that Layna has placed in front of her.
“Of me?” Sophia asks, cutting through the elephant in the room like only my wife can do.
Annabelle blushes. “Yes, you know, I thought she may have thought it wouldn’t have been appreciated. You get what I mean.”
“Indeed, I do,” Sophia says graciously. “But you can be assured there is no need for her to feel this way. She was a part of this family for years, a close friend to you and your brothers, just like a sister from what I understand. There is no issue where I’m concerned, Annabelle.
I would tell you if I felt otherwise, promise. I told you that at the funeral.”
Annabelle nods, taking the coffee that Layna hands her. “I can see why Massimo loves you so much. But I called her, tried to reach her and she’s not answering her phone. Even when I called the number she left, hung up, and then did it two more times in rapid succession.”
My brow furrows. “What’s with that?”
Annabelle shrugs. “It’s our secret code to let the other one know we really need to talk. Even if we can’t talk, we at least text back a time that will work. It’s been that way for years, Massimo. Something’s wrong with Desiree. Ask Leandro, he agrees.”
My eyes fall to my younger brother, but it’s hard to think of the self-assured and fierce-as-fuck underboss of our family who deals with all the day-to-day operations as my little brother, but there’s something that someone isn’t fucking telling me.
I look at every single one of them. “Spill it all, right the fuck now.”
Layna serves breakfast, bringing out a large pan of one of Sophia’s favorite egg dishes with a Mediterranean feta and olive mixture over the top, enough for everyone and more plates while every single one of my brothers and sister make busy passing toast around, buttering it, and generally doing anything but looking at me.
The only one looking at me is Leandro, and there’s something in his eyes I’ve never seen before.
Pure unadulterated fear. “I had Desiree taken somewhere safe. A place no one could have known about except our family, and any rat we told. Georgeo knew. He was the one that placed the note under Sophia’s door that night to try and lure her out, and gave up Desiree’s location to her father. ”
My jaw tightens remembering my desire to get rid of the fuck a long time ago but stepping carefully because he was my father’s hire. I should have ended him right then and there.
Leandro’s voice draws my attention back to the conversation at hand.
“Georgeo regretted ever giving up her location and putting that note under Sophia’s door before he died, but he didn’t tell us that anyone had plans to take her.
It can only be her father. The rotten son of a bitch. We have to find her, Massimo.”
Now everyone is looking at me because they know the deal I made with her father. “Has her father crossed a line, gone back on his word?”
Leandro gets up and tosses his napkin on the table. “You worry about her fucking father, I’m going to find Desiree. Who the fuck knows where she is, Massimo?”