Chapter 7 – Poppy
“Ican’t believe you’re already leaving! You just got here,” Penelope protested, wrapping her arms around me.
I gave her a small squeeze. She was looking a touch green this morning. The excessive amount of relish, onion, and sauerkraut on her hot dogs last night must not have sat well with her.
“I’ll see you for the Red, White, and Blue Festival, Penny,” I said again, knowing the Fourth was just a few short weeks away.
A rodeo was coming to town. There was going to be a truck pull, fireworks, and the whole town would get stinkin’ drunk to line dance in the street.
My cousin sighed. “I just wish some of the family lived closer, ya know?”
“You have your friend Annaliese living in town,” I countered, smiling at the memory of the buxom blonde who brought cookie dough and had us staying up way too late last Friday night.
“It’s not the same.” Penelope pulled back and gave me a beautiful pout.
That meant the world to me.
Coming from a large family and being the one to move away must be hard for her.
I know I missed the Greenbriars. The ranch, the small-town community—hell, even the local parish—had welcomed me with open arms, making me feel like one of them.
But for Penelope to feel this way about me made me feel really good.
“Come on, she can’t miss her flight,” Alessandro rumbled.
We weren’t in danger of being late. In fact, two hours entertaining Brady at O’Hare was going to prove a feat. At least he enjoyed watching the planes take off.
The don opened the back door of the SUV, setting the sleepy kiddo in his car seat. Penelope looked like she wanted to say something, so I hung back, waiting for any last-minute revelations.
In the back of my mind, I had a secret hope as to what it was. Little things had been off during this trip. I noticed details and wondered if my addition was correct.
But I wasn’t going to ask. If I was wrong, it would open a sore spot that I had no business picking at.
The revelation never came. Just as Alessandro was closing the door, a rumble of vehicles sounded along the drive. Some instinct, heightened by maternal concern, had me whipping my head in the direction of the gate. Shouts in Italian sounded, and the don stiffened.
I was too busy watching the lead vehicle ram the thick iron barrier to hear what the Made Men were saying.
The next moment, Penelope had my arm, and we were kneeling behind the vehicle as the newcomers tore through the opening and up the drive.
“Brady!” I gasped.
“The SUV is bulletproof,” my cousin hissed, tugging me to her side.
There was a pause as Don Mancini and his guards faced the lead vehicle, guns drawn.
In the silence, my heartbeat thundered like a machine on crack. I couldn’t draw a proper breath, couldn’t see straight.
A door popped.
Boots crunched on the gravel.
Another pause ensued.
I wet my dry lips. Prayers that were more feelings rather than words ascended into the bonny, bright blue skies. This was why I lived in Carrington, avoiding the underworld life. We weren’t safe here. My son wasn’t safe in this world.
“This is unexpected,” Alessandro growled. “What did I ever do to you to warrant such an outburst, Mad Dog?”
A rough laugh bounced through the air. The tone was pitch and brimstone, seasoned with ire. It sent a shiver to rattle my very bones.
“You have something of mine, Mancini. Something that’s been missing for a very long time,” the voice responded, accent shaking with spite. “And I’ve come to collect.”
“I’ve taken nothing from you,” Alessandro spat. “You have ten seconds to turn around, or I’ll water my lawn with your blood.”
“Nothing? Nothing!” the voice of death rang out.
I blinked. I knew that voice.
It was the lack of the characteristic smile that kept me from recognizing it at first.
Inching out of my cousin’s claws, I risked a look around the front bumper.
To my horror, Ivan stood beside his truck, staring with a vicious intensity at my cousin’s husband.
A black tee hugged his massive frame. Such simple clothing for an act of aggression.
He must have caught the movement, because his gaze flicked toward me. I hunkered back with a whimper.
“Explain yourself. You have five seconds before my men open fire,” Mancini clipped out.
“That is my son, and I’ve come to take him home.”
The words hung in the air.
Through the blistering panic, it took a moment for them to register.
My worst nightmare come to life. No, no! It wasn’t possible.
And yet, I knew the truth in an instant. Similarities snapped into place. Details from our interactions danced through my mind with fiendish glee.
Ivan had recognized my son via that birthmark.
“No,” I hissed as I clutched at the tire for support.
I knew when I adopted Brady that this was always a possibility. A foundling didn’t show up at a country church without a terrible backstory placing him there. Hell, the priests had asked me to take him in because I was also a child of the mob.
But I’d kept him hidden, kept him safe!
A violent curse stabbed my heart at my own stupidity. I should have stayed in the country. That was where we were safe.
“You have no proof,” Alessandro argued, recovering from his own shock.
Ivan’s voice was harsh. “I ran the DNA test last night. We just got the results.”
Thump-thump.
Thumpety-thump.
My blood battled through my veins, making it difficult to think or breathe.
“And now, I’m bringing him home,” Ivan continued. “Step aside, don.”
My fingers clawed at my throat as the refusal exploded in my mind, unable to be formed into words. I would grab him. I would run! We could drive away, find somewhere no one knew him.
“He’s my cousin’s child,” Alessandro said coldly. “I cannot allow you to harm a member of my family.”
Another vicious laugh crackled through the soft morning air. “Family? You speak to me of family, don? I don’t know how my son—my own flesh and blood—found his way into the life of your cousin, but even you can’t deny I have a blood claim on the boy.”
Alessandro growled.
“He’s my heir!” Ivan roared.
Tears blurred my vision.
This couldn’t be happening. We were supposed to be protected here. And yet, if Alessandro honored that pact, if he protected us, his men would die. He could be hurt—
And Penelope.
I shot a look at my cousin.
There she was, a queen of the underworld. Her face was unusually pale. She clutched her belly, horror radiating from her like a putrid stench.
No, I couldn’t allow her or her husband to be hurt because of me. Once upon a time, she stepped up to save me.
I rose now, forcing my shaking legs to hold me. “Ivan, calm the hell down,” I snapped. “Let’s just talk about this, okay? No one is shooting anyone.”
For how terrible my reality suddenly was, at least my voice was steady. In fact, it almost sounded commanding to my ears. Or maybe that was just how I wanted it to sound.
His black eyes, like twin daggers, slid in my direction. The feel of his gaze on my skin was the cold lick of an icy whip.
I refused to back down in the face of this monster.
Because that was what he was. I was delusional to be swayed by his smiles and unholy, breathtaking body.
“You stole him.” Gone was the man who brought me flowers. I looked, but didn’t see him in the mask of pure, unadulterated blackness.
“I did no such thing,” I bit back. “A priest contacted me about an orphan. I adopted Brady five years ago and have raised him as my own ever since. Not me, nor any member of my family, was involved in taking him from you. So lower your weapon.”
“What weapon?” Ivan mocked and raised his hands.
I didn’t look. Fine, he wasn’t actually pointing a gun at my cousin’s husband, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t freaking lethal.
“Brady is my child, and I’m not letting him go with a stranger. Not even if that DNA test proves you’re his father,” I countered, letting him feel the full weight of my displeasure.
“Then I will take him.”
It was suddenly cold. No cloud veiled the sun, no wind fluttered off the lake. And yet the temperature dropped dozens of degrees. It whispered over my skin, sinking down to the bone.
“He’s coming with me,” Ivan insisted.
I could see it in his eyes. The certainty of the claim. There was no good way out of this. There would be a fight. Blood would be spilt. And in the end, Brady might be stolen.
“As if he’s better living with you?” I countered, letting out a manic laugh of despair.
“You should have kept that information to yourself, let him come back with me to the country where no one knows who he is. Now your men know. That means your enemies will too. However he was taken from you can repeat itself—and that is something I cannot allow.”
“I’ll keep him safe.” For the first time since he stepped out of his truck, Ivan’s voice took a different tone.
Maybe it was the maternal instinct coursing through me, but I thought I heard the echo in this man’s tone.
“Keep him safe?” I snarled. “By kidnapping him? Scaring him half to death!”
Ivan’s lips drew in a flat line.
“You should have come to me privately.” I threw my hands up. “We could have figured this out.”
“You would never have allowed the boy you raised to come to me,” Ivan sneered. “You would have figured a way out of it, and that isn’t happening. The boy is mine. And it’s time I took him home.”
That was the sad, bitter truth.
Made Men were pridefully protective of their heirs. If what this man said was true, and there was no room for doubt in my mind, in a cruel twist of fate, Brady belonged to this man.
But he was also mine. My son. The infant I soothed, the toddler I cuddled, the child I raised.
“Fine,” I said, not even giving myself a chance to think through what I was saying. Because if I did, I might just faint. “Since you’re so willing to kill whoever stands in your way to get what you want, Brady can go with you peacefully. But I’m coming too.”