Chapter 7
7
ZARINA
Rome’s mouth pressed into a hard line to suppress the smile I could see she was battling to contain.
“Really?” she said on a strangled breath with her eyes closed.
“Baby,” Antoni warned in a deep voice.
“Sorry. Sorry.” She shook her head, probably trying to clear the cache of jokes she had lined up and ready to go in her mind.
Rome looked at Antoni and then back to me and then bent forward, looking to the floor but still gripping the kitchen counter with her fingers.
Her whole body shook, but not a sound escaped her. I rolled my eyes and crossed my legs, trying to get comfortable on the old wooden stool.
I had been bitching at Rome and Antoni to let me do some decorating and rearranging in their house for years, but none of them cared enough to do anything about it.
It was the original Santino family home.
It was the home my father grew up in. It was the home we grew up in. And when Toni took over as Don, it became his.
It was still a weird mixture of ‘ 90’s Mum’ decor and bachelor pad, but it had so much potential.
“Are you done?” Antoni asked her, crossing his arms.
“Not quite,” Rome squeaked, still shaking with silent laughter.
“Rome, I thought you, of all people, would understand how serious this is.”
Her head snapped up at that, her face pink from her strangled giggling.
“Of course it’s serious, Antoni,” she exaggerated his name as he did with hers. “But I’m also human and it’s a fucking hilarious coincidence. Lighten up.”
“Lighten up?” he scoffed. “My sister has… been with …” he tiptoed around the word, not wanting to imagine his baby sister in that way, I assumed, “a fucking Redliner.”
“Did she die?” Rome asked with wide-eyes, pointing at me sitting there in front of him. “She’s fine, Tone. It was a mistake.”
He rolled his eyes again.
“How did he react when he found out who you were?”
“He was as shocked as I was. I told him my name was Penny.”
“See!” Rome snapped. “He had no idea either.”
“Could have been a part of the whole plan!”
“They’re not that smart!”
Toni groaned into the air, throwing his head back.
“You two are fucking crazy if you don’t think this is serious,” he barked, pointing between the two of us.
Rome’s face morphed into a look of total calm and composure.
It was terrifying.
“Get out, Toni,” she said softly.
Antoni’s jaw hardened for a second before he shook his head, letting out a puff of breath like he had been holding it for some time.
With his hands on his hips, and his head hanging down, he shuffled towards his wife and gave her an almost shy kiss on the cheek before leaving the room silently.
Rome watched him as he left, pursing her lips.
“I don’t like being called crazy,” she shrugged simply by way of explanation.
I loved my sister-in-law.
I walked this thin line of wanting to be her and wanting to be around her all the time. But it was awkward to watch her and Toni like this.
They were always on the same page, to the point that it was kind of annoying to everyone around them. So this almost-argument was a little hard to watch.
I knew that the situation was probably uncomfortable for Toni, and I was sure he wasn’t enjoying the fact that his baby sister’s sex life was now a topic of conversation in what was essentially his business.
“He’s not handling this situation well,” Rome said once she was sure he was gone.
“What? Me and Ashe?”
She shook her head. “He thought we had dealt with them, you know? He thought it was over. His first big win as Don. But now,” she shrugged, “they’re back and more ballsy than ever.”
I frowned. “What do you mean?”
“They seem to be taunting us. Cryptic letters. Little figurines of motorbikes at our drop houses. Suppliers are magically ‘drying up’, but we still see and hear about their products out there. Certain long-time buyers no longer want to even speak to Toni or Ren. Not to mention the whole almost getting blown up thing.”
Rome got a faraway look in her eye then, and a few beats passed before she shook it.
”They’re making a show that they’re not gone. They want us to know that they’re somehow on our tail and waiting for us to fuck up.”
“What for?” I breathed, leaning forward in my chair.
It was so rare that someone let me in on this information that I was gobbling it up, hanging on Rome’s every word.
She looked at me silently for a few beats and then her eyes dragged away and she shrugged.
“Who knows?”
I nodded slowly.
“Look, Zar,” she sighed, crossing the room and sitting next to me. “Just, take the protection that Toni gives you, okay? It’ll make us all feel a whole lot better.”
“I don’t even know who this fucking guy is,” I snapped quietly, pointing towards the door where I was sure my new shadow was standing.
“Theo’s fine,” Rome waved a hand dismissively. “He’s new, he’s learning, but he’s here to serve The Family. And that means you.”
I pursed my lips.
“I don’t know what it is, Rome. But I’m serious. I don’t trust the dude.”
Rome looked at me again for a long while, contemplating. It was a tick of hers that I had to get used to, as it made for some awkward situations at first. Now, I knew that the blank stare was just her thinking face. And at least she was thinking about it, where Toni had just brushed it off completely.
“Okay,” she nodded after a while. “I trust your gut. I’ll talk to Tone.”
“Thank you,” I sighed, feeling lighter now that someone had fucking listened to me.
“But for now,” she stood, pushing the stool back in towards the bench, “just ignore him, okay?”
I rolled my eyes but nodded anyway.
It was a little hard to ignore someone who followed your every move. It was like being voluntarily stalked, but not in a hot way.
It wouldn’t be too bad at the shop, because I was busy enough that I could probably kind of fade him out.
I was just grateful that Toni had accepted my boundary that I would not need him at my house. I lived in the same apartment building as Larissa, so I always had someone nearby should I need help.
There were cameras in every hall and elevator, and no one even knew where I lived. I hadn’t taken Ashe back to my house. I went to his. If anything, he was the more vulnerable one in the situation because I knew where he lived.
I pursed my lips, thinking of all the things I could do with that information. But more so, I was surprised that Toni hadn’t asked about it yet, and I considered offering up the details.
No.
First, I was going to have some fun with it.