Chapter 30 Hollis
“I’m getting sick and tired of always looking over our shoulder.” Roman asks, “Did anyone get picked up?” He crosses his arms over his chest as he waits for Jude’s response.
Jude shakes his head. “No, because we’re better prepared, but we can’t afford for them to hit any of our extra stash houses.
We thankfully have the O’Connel properties in play now, but still.
Between the three Families, and all the product and people being moved around, sooner or later, our luck is going to end. ”
Roman curses out loud. “How many dealers have we moved from Dad?”
“About half, which is more than I estimated,” Jude responds.
Roman nods slowly. “Okay, good. I won’t push for more there.
Lio and the Martellis have been able to move all of their weapons operations to our side, as well as their whores.
Even with only half of the Amato drug profit coming in, we should be okay.
We don’t have a foothold in sex work, but I think we can be an equally contributing partner with things as they currently are. ”
“They don’t have a market in the drug world,” Jude points out.
“What little they do have, they left to Allesandro. So the balance of what revenue stream you have is the same. I shot my numbers off to Lio to get his opinion, but between the De Luca operations, and bringing our exclusive weapons clients with us, paired with the Martelli-O’Connel connections in the weapons and sex work business, we’re not doing too bad for ourselves.
Will we have to start over in some places, and build a reputation, of course, but you would have had to do that anyway when you took over from Cristian. This just expedited the process.”
Roman chews his lip, mulling over Jude’s words. “Okay. Do what you have to in order to make sure our people are safe. They’re already in upheaval because of Dad and Allesandro; the last thing they need is more cops bearing down on them.”
Waving my hand, I get their attention. “Leandro and I have already been combing over the cops that were on scene at the latest raid. Most of them are familiar to us, so it’s confirmation that it wasn’t random, but targeted from whoever is after us.
We’re in the process of doing deep dives into their lives, seeing if they’re being paid off, leveraged, or just hate us that much.
The motivations of the cops won’t help, but might give us something to stumble upon, especially those being leveraged or paid to fuck with us. ”
“They’ve been covering their tracks too fucking well,” Roman says, his signs animated as anger burns in his eyes.
“They have,” I agree. “But I’m better. They think they have the advantage, that they’re untouchable…they’re very fucking wrong.”
“What about the Jamaicans?” Roman asks. “I’m surprised Ten hasn’t been antsy over not being able to stake Campbell.”
I huff in annoyance. “I don’t know what they fucking did, but they’ve managed to hide him well. At this point, I’m about to let Tennant loose to torture his location out of someone.”
The bastard needs to pay for helping orchestrate Tennant’s arrest. That whole incident scared ten years off my life, and the fucker will be paying for it. There’s not an inch of this Earth where he can hide that I won’t find him eventually.
“Anything else?”
I shake my head. “Not on my agenda.” We both turn to Jude, who shrugs.
“Great. I’d like to go see Ignacio now. I’ve been given the all-clear for more visits from Dr. Ranlen, now that they’re letting him move around more. As long as I don’t ‘do anything reckless that’ll set my progress back’, I’m allowed to visit him.”
“Good, how’s your pain levels?”
“More manageable now. I still have weeks of healing on my ribs, but the pain isn’t as sharp, so long as I don’t move the wrong way.
My leg and arm are annoying, because it makes getting around difficult, but I’m adjusting.
I’m just hoping I don’t need further surgery on my wrist. It’s hard enough as it is to sign with the fucking cast on, and it’s my dominant hand… ”
“You’re managing just fine,” Jude tells him. “I can understand you, even if your signs are slower at the moment. We’ll figure it out when the ortho comes back to check on you in a few weeks, okay?”
“Yeah…” Roman signs and then sighs.
“Want us to help you into the chair?” I ask.
“I’ve got it. Leandro’s been showing me how to transfer. But can you push me? I can’t maneuver much, even if I try to use both hands, which is hard with the cast.”
“Of course.”
Once Roman is with Ignacio, Jude and I see ourselves out of the medical suite. “Are you busy right now?” I ask him.
He shakes his head. “I should probably see if anything needs my attention, but that can wait a few minutes, why?”
“Come with me.”
I lead him to the office Leandro and I have taken over, grateful my son isn’t in the room. Jude shuts the door behind himself and I lean against the desk, watching him for a moment before asking the question that’s been on my mind for days now. “Are you leaving us, Agnellino?”
“No,” he’s quick to say, his fingers closing rapidly a few times. “No, I’m not. But…Antonio needs me. You never have.”
“That’s not true, at all.” My signs are sharp. “We’ve always needed you. From the very beginning, you’ve been ours.”
“I’m not letting him—them—go.”
I watch Jude for a long moment, trying to gather my thoughts, trying not to give into the visceral reaction that tells me no. Antonio cannot have our little lamb. Not if he means to take him away from us.
Contrary to what some may think, considering I’ve allowed my lovers to have free rein with the Martellis, I am possessive of what’s mine. And Jude, despite how he doesn’t seem to fit with us, is mine. He has been since the day Leandro told me about him.
“You’re with Lio. You’ve seen past his exterior, past the monster Tennant likes so much.
Allesandro…he fucked them up. Antonio…he’s so fucking beautiful, inside and out.
You’d like him, he bends so easily. I want to love him, and I didn’t even know that was a thing I wanted.
Hell, I didn’t even want a relationship before you, Ten, and Roman.
But…I want to show Antonio what he deserves. ”
Jude runs a hand through his hair, tugging at the curls, before he loosens his tie.
“I know what it’s like to be ignored, to have your needs shoved aside because they were an inconvenience to someone else. Allesandro likes mind games, and sure, those are fun, but he only took, never gave. I want to give Antonio everything.”
“That’ll take time, and work. Tennant and I are already in the middle of the battle with Lio, and to a lesser extent, Benjamin. You really want to take the three of them on? Because I understand it’s not just Antonio, but the twins, too.”
“Yes,” he voices. “I…love him. And I might not know Nario and Nicolo well, but I care for them, too. Maybe it’s selfish to want you all, but I don’t give two shits.
I spent so long hiding who I was, and what I wanted, I’m not giving this up.
I’ll make it work. I just…might need to spend more time with them for now, get them to trust me, to understand that I’m not Allesandro, and I mean what I say. ”
He shakes his head, anger darkening his pale green eyes.
“Antonio said some things last night, unconsciously…that made me want to ram a knife into Allesandro and see how he felt being gutted. I didn’t catch all of what he said, but…
he’s so broken, so used to being left behind, he couldn’t hold his thoughts in. ”
“Allesandro molded them into what he wanted,” I remind him.
Jude’s mouth turns down. “And I want to do the same. Maybe it’s fucked up of me to say so, but…
it’ll be better for them all in the long run.
And I do mean all of them. Allesandro fucked up.
He tore his family to shreds. He calls himself The Master, but he doesn’t know what that word means.
If he did, maybe none of this would be happening. ”
“No…” I agree, a pang going through me at the thought of not having Emilio…
“We can do this,” Jude says. “We can give them what they need, while showing them a better way to live.”
“We’ll be just as manipulative as him,” I point out.
Jude shrugs. “A little, maybe. You can help Lio heal as you see fit. Show him how to have a healthy relationship with the type of play he needs and wants, and I’ll do the same for Antonio.”
“Okay,” I agree. Because how can I not?
The Martelli Boys have gone through so much already. It’s unfair of us to dangle everything they ever could have wanted over their heads, only to take it away so cruelly because they don’t do or react how we want.
So…if giving them what they need means inserting what we want into their lives, then we’ll do it. The difference between us and Allesandro is that we know how far we can go without breaking them…
Jude moves in close, and I draw him in further, forcing him to voice as there’s not nearly enough signing space between us. “Thank you, Hol.”
I kiss him, pouring the depth of my feelings into him, and hoping he understands the gift I’m giving him and his lovers. The Dom in Jude wants to care for Antonio, and I’m not in a position to deny him. Not if I want to keep him. Not if we want to keep Antonio from Allesandro.
“You’re mine,” I say. I move him back a little to sign my words. “You’re mine, and that means Antonio and the twins are under my protection now. Whatever you need, it’s yours, Agnellino.”
He grins. “If I said I needed you to fuck me?”
I start to grin, but then an alert sounds on my computer, as well as my smart watch and phone. “Fuck!” I gently push Jude further away. “Alarm,” I sign in explanation.
Sitting at my computer, I check which of the several alerts I have up is going off. I’m taken aback when I see it’s from the encryption program I’ve been running to decode the app that the mysterious “Organization Leader” who called Daniel used.
“What the hell?”
“What?” Jude asks.
A quick glance at him fiddling with his phone before putting it in his pocket tells me he put his hearing aids in—he had them out for our meeting with Roman as he needed the break.
Add “Make sure Antonio and the twins learn ASL somehow” to the top of my to-do list. If they want to be with Jude, they need to learn, and help the rest of us establish what we’ve been trying to do for the past year now: Not let him inconvenience himself for anyone else’s comfort.
It’s a habit we’re still working on when it’s just the four of us, and he knows we’re all fluent in his language.
The least I can do is make sure his other lovers are as well.
“I’ve been trying to track down the call placed to Daniel.
It was a long shot for a variety of reasons.
Prominent was that they registered it to someone not connected to them.
I also couldn’t rule out that they built their own communications app—after all, I did for us.
However…” I trail off as I double, then triple check what I’m seeing before turning back to him. “It looks like I got a hit.”
“You know who it was?”
“Not exactly, but…this is either a coincidence, and they have more balls than we thought, or they never thought I’d get past their layers of encryption and backtracing.
” Bringing up the screen I need, I gesture to the monitor, inviting him to look at the ID photo I found.
“Meet Special Agent in Charge Cecily Dowing…Head of the local FBI field office.”