Chapter 38
MASSIMO
While we were gone, the discussion seems to have gotten more involved. Not that I’m surprised staring at the amount of pages on the wall and the notes that keep getting added. I swear, Amara has missed her calling, because this shit is next level. The Feds would pay top dollar for her.
Good thing she’s on our side.
Still, I’m distracted by Lucy and the feel of her against me, the way her ass cradles my semi-hard cock, and the way she seems to be oblivious to it.
I get being distracted by Nico and Soren, but damn, the woman has no idea what she does to me.
I’m still reeling a little from what happened in the other room, and I want to repeat it as soon as possible.
That and much more. She might not be ready for full on sex yet, but we can get creative, and I want to try it all.
I want to see her bare for me, feel her skin against mine, and learn every dip, line, and curve she has.
Then, I want to find out what makes her as crazed as she made me.
But we’ll get there. I make a mental note to talk to Sofia about finding another room for Kida so that Lucy and I can be in my room together.
Speaking of her sister, I can feel Kida’s eyes boring into me, and I imagine I’m going to get a visit from her soon. She warned me once, but I don’t scare easily. I respect that she only wants to protect her, but Lucy is a grown woman and can make her own decisions.
I can also feel the interested and curious gazes from my brothers and friends, including Aurelio, but I ignore them. I don’t owe them any explanations, and I already have Papa’s blessing. That’s all I need. Everyone else can fuck off.
Unable to help myself, I press a quick kiss to the top of Lucy’s head, tightening my grip on her to offer her a little more comfort.
She shifts slightly, and I have to bite back a groan at the feeling of her ass rubbing against me.
Fuck, the woman is going to be the death of me.
My cock is still sensitive, and it’s craving to be inside her as soon as possible.
Maybe I’ll have to plan on a few spankings for her for teasing me…
Soren suddenly lets out an angry squeak, and I pull myself out of my thoughts as soon as Lucy pulls away from me. She walks up to Nico, her expression going from hesitant to determined in one breath. “He needs to be changed and fed,” she tells him, holding out her hands.
Nico nods, and hands her the baby without any fuss. Soren burrows into his mother, and I see the tension in Lucy’s shoulders relax. Before she can step away, though, Nico says, “I’ve set up a trust for his education.”
Lucy freezes, as does the entire room. None of us expected him to say that. I narrow my eyes at him. What the hell is he doing?
“What?” Lucy finally manages to get out, staring at him like she’s sure he’s lost his mind.
Nico scowls. “You think I’m so heartless to not take care of my nephew? You might not think it, but we’re family. And that’s the shit we do.”
“You don’t have to—”
“Yes, I do.” He nods his head at me. “He’ll have his own set up for him, but if things don’t work out between you, the money is there for him for his future.
Twenty million in there for now and he can access it when he’s twenty five, or earlier if you need it for something important.
I’ve also set up a fund of five million for you to access for anything you need.
Move out of that tiny ass apartment and get something better if you stay in the city.
If you move with these assholes to Sicily, you’ll have your own money since I’m starting to realize that all you women don’t like to be dependent on the rest of us even though it’s our literal fucking jobs.
” His annoyed gaze sweeps over all the women, including Kida, Rori and Sofia.
Sofia rolls her eyes, while Rori narrows her eyes at him in warning. Kida just looks downright mistrusting, like she’s waiting for the catch.
If Lucy was shocked before, she looks floored now. Even Gia looks surprised, but then her gaze turns soft, understanding.
I get what he’s doing, even if Lucy doesn’t yet. Nico isn’t one for an apology, and he isn’t one that will ever do feelings and easy conversations. He’s not built that way. This is how he’s going to build the bridge. With all of them, but especially Lucy because of Soren.
“Well, if I knew you were giving out money, Boo Bear, I’d have put in my request,” Alessio jokes. “Unless of course you don’t want that on the books because you’re still ashamed of us.” He gives him a dramatic pout, and we all snicker. Nico glares at him.
“You’re lucky I can’t shoot you right now,” he threatens. “Again. And this time, I won’t purposely miss.”
Lucy takes advantage of everyone being distracted and moves to the back of the room, grabbing a blanket to cover herself. Kida moves to sit with her, and I keep a close eye on them out of the corner of my eye. I don’t want Lucy stressed out more answering her sister’s questions.
Papa, thankfully, gets everyone else back on track in the conversation. “Alright, we have a lot of stuff here. After talking everything through, I think we have a consensus on what we know, yes?”
“We know that the De Lucas are a big pile of shit,” Sienna states cheerfully.
She looks at Gia. “You’re an Armani now, so you’re not included in that.
” Gia nods, smiling as she leans her head against Nico.
He’s got his arm tight around her, and the look on his face says he fully agrees with Sienna’s statement.
“We also know that all of this has been brewing for a long time. The whole thing with Nico and Gia kind of just lit the fuse and set it all off.”
“And we have so many families wrapped up in it all that it makes it a huge mess,” Amara agrees.
“But I think we have a timeline that we can work with. Esposito and Nico’s mother contrived this plan to create a human trafficking network, though to be fair they might use the routes for other things.
They needed to have routes in the other territories though, and it’s possible that Esposito saw this as a way of taking over the entire city without being obvious about it. ”
“Then when Seamus and Nico’s mother fell in love, they had the Armani and Irish networks to grow their businesses.
It worked, until they wanted to expand even more,” Rori agrees.
“She gets involved with Leonardo and Giovanni. Mostly Leonardo, but clearly there was some reason she got mixed up with Giovanni too.”
“Her journal probably has that reason when we eventually get through it all,” Lazaro points out.
Amara nods. “So, then we have all three territories involved, and Esposito has his sister doing all the numbers, money and other things to make sure things run smoothly, while being the one to talk to Leonardo, Giovanni, and possibly even Seamus. I know they loved each other, but would Seamus have really respected Nico’s mother enough to discuss the business with her so indepth?
To trust her? This world doesn’t seem to like women in charge. ”
“Very possible that’s exactly what happened,” Nico states. “My mother was fucking clever, I’ll give her that, and if she wanted something done, she knew how to push buttons and pull strings without making herself seem to be the one to come up with it. She did it with my father.”
“I think that’s the part that I’m not understanding.
What about Nico’s father? How did they manage all this without him finding out?
Look, I know that she was acting like a drunk, or an addict or whatever, but she had to have slipped up a few times?
No one can pull that kind of act off all the time.
Especially in private. Did they share a room? ” Amara asks Nico.
Nico shakes his head. “Not for as long as I could remember. She had her own private suite, the one Gia used to use. My father spent all his time with his mistresses or men. The majority of the time he ignored her.”
Amara frowns but nods. “Alright, so it’s possible then that he never saw anything.”
“But the staff would have,” Sofia points out. “And if any of the staff weren’t loyal to her and to Nico’s father, they’d have told him.”
“But even if they did, I doubt he would have believed them,” Nico argues. “My father thought my mother an idiot and addict. He probably would have wrote it off as her being on one of her binges.”
“Who did you kill first, your father or mother?” Rori suddenly asks, watching him.
Nico doesn’t even flinch at her question, but I see Lucy do it out of the corner of my eye.
I look over at her as Nico answers, “My father. My mother lived another six months before I finally figured out what was happening.” Lucy swallows hard, and then her eyes lift to mine and hold.
I give her a reassuring look, hold her gaze the entire time until she relaxes.
She might not like the discussion, but she knows it was for the best. Eventually things like this won’t faze her.
Or if they do, she’ll come to me to help her.
“So even if your father did know about whatever was going on, she had six months to run the entire operation without worrying about him. And she probably didn’t worry about you because you were too focused on filling his role,” Rori continues, watching Nico. Nico nods.
“Are you sure he didn’t have a journal or any place in the house himself that he liked to use where no one would disturb him?” Gia asks him.
“I searched the entire house after, including any of the smaller rooms and never found anything. Most of the time he spent in his office or out with his mistresses. I had their places searched as well, and I paid them to get the hell out of town. I didn’t want them around.
We found nothing at their places either. ”
“I don’t think he would have been quiet about if he’d known,” Gia adds.
“I always remember my father and uncle mentioning that Nico’s father had a wicked temper.
He was more into psychological torture, but he had no patience.
He got his territory by brute force when he took over from his father.
He expanded it and took the biggest two, while my grandfather fought to keep him out of De Luca territory.
If he knew about all of this, he’d have tried to take it over or he’d have killed Nico’s mother and probably his uncle for daring to hone in on his territory and give him nothing out of it. ”
“She’s right.”
“Then we’re right back to what we know,” Alessio remarks.
“Esposito, Nico’s mother, Leonardo, Giovanni, and Seamus were all working together to set up these routes and make piles of cash out of it.
But I’d bet everything I have that Esposito was just playing the long game.
He had everyone in the palm of his hand, and he could pull the plug and rule the entire city when the time came right for what he wanted.
We just butted in and fucked it all up. Dante rejected the contract for Gia, and Marco and Giovanni started doing shit behind Leonardo’s back. ”
“What I don’t understand is how Esposito is running this entire thing without Nico’s mother around,” Amara huffs.
We all look at her expectantly. “I mean, look at this operation. This is sophisticated, and she was the record keeper. Esposito and the others aren’t numbers guys, right?
They leave that to someone else to do. So who is doing it now?
Who’s been doing it for the last few years since Nico took over and killed his mother? ”
“My mother.”
We all whip around at Dante’s cold voice, and we still when we see him standing in the doorway, a woman at his side that I’ve never seen before, but looking at the blue of her eyes, it’s clear who she is.
There’s a look in her eyes that borders on terror, but there’s also relief, and she grips Dante’s arm like she never wants to let it go.