The Don’s Naughty List (25 Days of Christmas: Bikers & Mobsters)

Chapter 1

One

Andre

“No,” I snap into the phone. “I will not be at that meeting. You can either talk to Vito or you can fuck off.”

Vito cocks an eyebrow, shaking he’s head at my words.

“Andre, if you do it this way, it could mean war. How are you going to fare if we go to war when you already won’t leave that fucking fortress you call a farm? You need to be smart about this.” King’s tone holds an edge of a threat.

My free hand balls into a fist as I lean back in my chair.

“Kingston, please correct me if I seem to have misheard you here, but did you just fucking threaten to go to war? Do you really understand what it means when I tell you to fuck off? You will get nothing in or around this state—or any that border us. Do not mistake the fact that I don’t deem you worthy of leaving my home for meeting as me being fucking weak. ”

King growls in frustration because the man knows that I am not joking when I tell him he will have a really hard time moving his shit if Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee are no longer options. I say nothing else, waiting for him to finally make the correct decision.

“Fine, Andre. You fucking win. I’ll meet with Vito to send the information,” King finally concedes.

Smirking, I reply, “I knew you were a smart man. We’ll be in touch.”

“One last thing,” King says as I go to hang up the phone.

“Not in the mood and damn sure do not have the time,” I growl.

“I understand, but this is not about business,” King’s voice holds a hint of something I can’t place.

“You have my attention,” I state flatly.

“My sister Tinsley seems to have run off, and we’re having a hard time locating her,” he starts, and now he has my full attention. “I’m putting out feelers with all the families to ask them to keep a watch out for her.”

“Can’t say that I’ve ever met your sister to know what we need to be on the lookout for, but if you send me the information, I’ll share it with my guys and get back if we find anything.”

“Appreciate any help I can get on this,” King snaps, his annoyance at my lack of care rubbing him wrong.

I hang up the phone, tossing it on my desk and sighing.

“That man really does fucking hate you,” Vito tosses out as he types away on his phone.

“Hate me or fucking not, I will not bend for anyone. They need this deal more than we do at this fucking point.” I stand getting ready to leave my office.

“We’ve got the Irish from the north, our cousins from the south with their connections to the ports in Savanah, which means he needs us and not the other way around. ”

Vito stands coming to my side as we make our way out of my office.

“You’re not wrong about that,” Vito agrees just as his phone rings in his pocket.

He answers the call, and I watch as the man I’ve known for more years than I can remember goes from cold as ice to slightly less icy, as he talks to Loretta.

I turn to go to the kitchen, shaking my head.

Just as I make it to the kitchen, I stop when the voice that haunts my every moment of every day and night hits me.

I stand there and just listen to her talk, letting it warm my frozen heart.

“There is no way that Andre would do that,” Tinsley laughs freely.

“I’m telling you, girly, that he did! He and Vito were wild young men.

Nothing Andre’s father did could get them to toe the line or follow orders.

Now here we are many years later, and Andre and Vito are finally doing what they need to do.

Still not towing the damn line but making it happen in the end,” The tone of Silas’ voice tells me he is getting lost down memory lane.

Silently, I make my way into the room and across it until I can lean close to Tinsley’s ear. “I wasn’t aware that I was paying you to sit around and gossip.”

Tinsley jumps, covering her mouth as a scream tries to escape her throat. She turns and glares at me over her shoulder while simultaneously Grandpa bursts out laughing. Standing to my full height, I smirk down at her shrugging.

“You're such an asshole,” she says just above a whisper as she turns back to her toast.

My smirk turns into a genuine smile at her boldness. I lean back down and softly sweep her hair off the back of her neck. “Asshole I may be, but I don’t remember that being what you called me the first time we met.”

She shivers as my breath skims across the shell of her ear. Tinsley looks at me over her shoulder once more with eyes cold enough to cut. “I chose to learn from my mistakes, not to repeat them.”

My smile is genuine, as it always is when we get into these sparring matches. “With a mouth like that, Santa’s going to put you on the naughty list.”

Tinsley’s icy demeanor thaws just a little. “It’s a good thing the only nice list I have to be on is that of Silas’s.”

The thought of her wanting to impress someone other than me makes my blood heat.

Like the asshole she accused me of being, I react out of anger.

“I wonder what big brother Kingston would have to say about you wanting to be on an old man’s list of any kind,” I sneer, standing tall and storming out of the room.

Tinsley gasps at my words, and Grandpa consoles her like he would my grandmother and mother before their passing.

My chest squeezes at the thought of my mother.

The thought of her leads to my father—to the night that they were killed while on their way back from a New Year’s party that my uncle threw every year in Atlanta.

We still don’t know why they didn’t stay in Atlanta that night, like they typically would have done.

The walls around me start to close in the further I get down the hall.

I bypass my office, heading straight for the front door, needing space from the suffocation of the past.

I burst through the door, pulling my tie off as I fight to suck in some much-needed oxygen.

My head begins to clear, my breaths coming easier, and I drop my head back on my shoulders looking up at the ceiling of the porch.

Vito storms out the door with his phone to his ear, not even pausing to acknowledge me.

“What the fuck do you mean, Officer Jackson fucking picked her up? For fucking what?” Vito sneers into the phone.

I watch him as he marches across the yard to his SUV, still screaming into the phone, “That’s fucking bullshit! She went only because I made her go. Fucking fix this!”

He slams the door of his SUV before peeling out, kicking up dirt as he goes.

“Well, I’ll be damned. That will not end well for Officer Jackson,” Grandpa whistles low, as he shuffles out of the front door to his rocking chair.

“No, it won’t,” I groan, rubbing the bridge of my nose.

“At least he’s fighting for his woman, unlike others around here,” Grandpa says, and I can feel his eyes on me.

“Grandpa, I don’t know what you’re going on about.” I mumble with a sigh. Making my way down the stairs, I move toward the barn that holds our ATVs. I need time and room to think.