32. ~Nico~
32
~Nico~
I tore into the courtyard of the Leone Estate, Milo just behind me on his Harley and Julian ripping in too in his Porsche.
I’d barely come to a complete stop before I bolted out of the car, rushing over to Dante and Matteo, feeling the boys just at my back.
“Shots fired,” Dante was speaking calmly into his cell phone. “Yes. Proceed cautiously. Search for the hostage.”
He might have been managing to put forth a calm and controlled front on the phone to the few soldiers he still had in his pocket who were infiltrating the mansion as we spoke, but it was obvious from just glancing at him that he was anything but. He was tapping his foot frantically and shoving his free hand through his hair.
Meanwhile, even the usually stoic Matteo was showing a visible reaction, dragging on a smoke, his eyes darting every which way as he tried futilely to make out what was happening inside.
Shortly after I’d arrived home with Milo and discovered there had definitely been a home invasion that had both taken out four of my soldiers and led to Caterina being taken, we’d put out feelers, beginning our search for her, only to have Dante Rivera contact me. He’d obtained intel from one of his insiders that Santino had sent hired guns to retrieve Caterina and brought her here to determine where she’d hidden his funds.
To determine through torture.
As if that hadn’t been bad enough, he’d also discovered that a kill order had been given.
The screeching of tires caught my attention just as I reached Dante, and I watched as Rocco arrived with my soldiers. They were piled into two unmarked black vans and as soon as they made it into the courtyard, he and twenty of them rushed on out, pulling automatic weapons, decked out to the hilt.
I’d been able to deploy and have them ready so quickly without my father’s resources at my back because of Caterina. We’d used that storage facility that she’d taken us to and kitted them out that way.
We’d been under the impression that we’d be taking on a fucking army of security personnel and several Leone soldiers.
But as I took in the scene, including what I’d heard Dante report to his men, things clearly weren’t as we’d been expecting.
First off, no one had come out to give us one hell of a violent greeting, even though I, now a known enemy, was right on their Boss’s turf.
“What’s the status?” I demanded of Dante.
He and Matteo spun toward me.
Dante informed me, “There was an SOS call placed from the mansion by one of Santino’s security guards twenty minutes ago, but to bring in reinforcements, protocol dictates that the Boss has to verify it. That verification never came.”
“He’s not living here at the moment because the place is still under restoration after the Lone Gunners attack on your wedding day,” Matteo added in. “But he came here with a few soldiers and two unknowns—mercenaries, we think. It’s possible the mercenaries turned on him, hence the SOS call. Maybe Caterina got to them? Do you think that’s possible?”
Did I think that was possible? “Of course.”
“She has control of Leone Family funds,” Julian told them.
“She’s technically got more power than him, especially if the guys are mercenaries like you believe,” Milo said.
I didn’t like this, all these assumptions.
We needed more concrete intel.
“Put me through to your guys doing recon,” I ordered Dante. “I want a location on Caterina now.”
“Jesus,” Julian uttered, tugging at his hair, really fucking distressed for her.
I was right there with him on that. All three of us were.
But I had to fight through it and focus. Too much was at stake.
And right now, I needed information before I sent my soldiers into a potential massacre situation. Especially if Caterina had managed to turn the mercenaries, and they were now protecting her, sending in the cavalry could be assumed to be Leone reinforcements and they could end up gunned down as a result.
“Hold up,” Dante said, just as he was about to pass me his phone, and contact came in from his team. He took the call and listened, frowning, and looking shell-shocked by whatever was being reported. “No, don’t engage. Stand by for further instructions.” He eyed me and reported, “Caterina’s no longer in danger. But she’s not… approachable.”
Not approachable? Oh, fuck.
I exchanged a look with Milo and Julian, the two of them understanding what he was getting at.
“Stay here. Watch for incoming,” I told Rocco and my soldiers. “And call in a cleanup crew.”
“Got it,” Rocco said, pulling out his phone, then having them stand guard while he called it in.
“Come,” I told the boys, and the three of us headed off into the mansion.
We stepped around the boarded up front bay window that was still under construction, and the scaffolding near the entrance doors, then pushed inside.
The moment we did, familiar snarls and shrieks inundated us, echoing through the otherwise deathly quiet house.
Deathly was definitely the word for it.
Because as we took in our surroundings, a carpet of dropped bodies lined our way.
First, one downed from a shot to the skull between the foyer and the main space where we’d had our wedding ceremony, then several more actually in that space itself, much more bloodied, speaking to a brutal battle having taken place.
I caught sight of Dante’s men and they gestured down a corridor to our right.
The screams grew louder. Thuds and sounds of a whole lot of destruction, too.
“Santino’s office,” Milo spoke.
We burst down there and in through the open door.
And the sight inside even had me pulling up short.
More blood.
More damage.
More fucking death.
There were four bodies sprawled out through the room and one hidden over on the other side of the desk.
And there Caterina was, bloodied, her hair matted, her emerald eyes wild, smashing her hands into the shelves of Santino’s cabinet and sending everything crashing to the floor, destroying everything.
The couch was already torn apart, shredded by a knife, it looked like.
His desktop computer was crushed to shit, a bullet even embedded in the screen. Chairs were overturned, paintings off the walls and sliced to pieces too.
Milo eyed the fallen four. “His security,” he confirmed.
“Check behind the desk,” I said, as I went to approach Caterina, holding up my hand and keeping Julian back. With what was going on with him, I didn’t want him interacting up close with her while she was this far gone in her animalistic state.
“Fuck,” Milo uttered as he rounded the desk, pulling my attention from Caterina losing it all over the cabinet. “It’s him. It’s Santino.”
“What?” I bolted over there and took in the sight of the notorious Boss of the Leone Family stabbed to death, drenched in his own blood.
“Christ, she killed him,” Julian gasped, coming up behind me and taking it in for himself.
Milo eyed me with a whole lot of worry. “This wasn’t supposed to happen yet. It’s too early. This means that—”
“Later,” I said, holding up my hand.
I pushed away and walked to Caterina.
I brushed her arm, and she jolted, then spun toward me aggressively.
But then she pulled up short, her wild eyes managing to meet mine.
“Nico?” she uttered, through harsh breaths.
“Yes, it’s me. Milo and Julian too. We’re here.”
She pulled at her hair and started shaking her head, then went to blow past me, and I was very aware of the knife in her hand as she zoned in on one of the dead guys right near us. Even though they were all dead, she clearly wanted to do more damage.
“Do you think it’s a boy or a girl?” I called out quickly, while blocking her path.
She stilled again and blinked up at me. “What?”
I couldn’t stop her or bring her back from this physically.
Not when she was this far gone. It would take some intense restraining and force, something I couldn’t stand to use with her at the best of times. Last time in that garage had been bad enough. But now that she was pregnant, it was a whole other level. The thought of it made me sick to my stomach.
But there was something else that sometimes worked for me when I was in one of my feral states similar to this.
And that was being jolted out of it by a strong emotional trigger.
I was hoping that our child would be that for her, even at the early stage of things.
“Our baby, Caterina. Do you think it’s a boy or a girl?”
She blinked again, but her hand holding the knife was still clenching it tightly.
“It’s gotta be a boy, or Nico’s gonna lose his shit and be the most overprotective dad known to man and beast alike,” Julian commented, forcing a light tone that I could tell he really didn’t feel right now.
It worked and Caterina swung her head toward him, frowning, stumped by that intruding into her current monstrous state.
“I…” she murmured, blinking rapidly.
“No, it has to be a girl. A mini-Caterina would be incredible,” Milo spoke.
I watched carefully as she took a step back and pinched the bridge of her nose. “I… he was going to take her away, going to kill me tonight,” she uttered, her voice cracking, emotion beginning to break through.
Her?
I wanted to revel in the moment of that.
But of course I couldn’t, because we never could with anything in our world.
It was always tainted, always fucking poisoned by something or someone.
Always taken from us.
Fuck.
The three of us exchanged a look, and I saw the rage I was struggling to keep buried for now reflected back at me.
I forced an even, calm tone that she needed so badly right now as I said, “I know. But he didn’t. You stopped him. Our baby is safe and well. You’re both well.”
“It’s okay,” Julian added, coming near now with Milo joining us, until the three of us were essentially all standing before her.
“We’re here now, we’re here,” Milo uttered, his voice cracking with emotion.
It had come far too close.
And it made me fucking sick.
The knife she was holding clattered to the floor, and she collapsed into the three of us.
“I had to,” she cried. “I had to end it… end him.”
As we held her to us, I looked over at her father’s corpse.
In one shot, our strategic approach had been ripped to shreds.
And we were in really dangerous fucking territory now.
Santino Leone was dead.
Now all bets were off.