35. Chapter 35
Chapter 35
Ronan
“ T here you are,” Giaco said when I walked into the warehouse with Nellie right behind me. When he saw her, his eyes narrowed. “And you brought a guest.”
Nellie gasped quietly behind me, and I could feel her nerves floating from her. I reached behind me, grabbing her hand and holding it tightly. It was comforting when she folded her fingers with mine, and when I squeezed, she returned the gesture.
“The FBI came to see Nellie at her shop,” I explained, walking into the room. Giaco was seated at the head of a long table. Next to him on one side was our father, and Enzo sat on the other, looking amused already. Carlo nodded at her, and the other guys at the table stared. I cleared my throat. “She needs to know what’s going on.”
I let go of my hand to wrap my arm around her, pulling her to my side. Giaco shook his head. “Not a chance.”
“There’s no choice,” I said, looking to my father for support. He looked at Nellie and narrowed his eyes before he nodded. “It’s for her safety… and for ours.”
“Don’t say too much,” he warned. Giaco grunted in protest next to him, but I ignored it.
“You remember my brother, Giaco, and my father, Anthony?” I asked, and she nodded. “I know you already know Enzo and Carlo. The rest of these guys are other important members of our business.”
“What is your business?” she whispered.
Giaco grumbled a warning when I started, as if I would say anything that would put us— or her —in danger. “Our family has had ties in the area for a long time. Decades. We love this city.” The men at the table all nodded, agreeing with me, and Nellie scrunched her nose, clearly still unsure what to think. “It’s not like the movies. We aren’t robbing banks or blackmailing people, and nobody is waking up with a horse’s head in bed with them.” Nellie’s eyes widened, and she took a deep breath. I squeezed her hand tighter. “We protect the neighborhood. We protect businesses and people.”
She looked around, taking her time looking at each man at the table and then scanning the open room. It was undecorated and mostly empty, just an old warehouse. “So you really are the mafia?”
I sighed. I hated the term, but it wasn’t wholly inaccurate. “Yes.”
“Why does the FBI think you’re bad?” She gulped, and her fingers fidgeted against mine, but she stood perfectly still otherwise.
I shrugged, looking to Giaco to reassure him. “Sometimes, we have to bend the rules.”
“Bend the rules like commit crimes?” The more I told her, the more the color drained from her face, but her chest still warmed with a dark pink blush. Her golden eyes locked with mine.
“Yes,” I said again, not letting go of her hand when her fingers twitched more.
Nellie glanced at the table from the corner of her eye before she straightened her spine. "Have you ever killed anyone?” She watched my face, waiting for me to answer.
“Nobody good.” I let her pull her hand back when she tried to this time, and she threw them in the air.
“Oh my God.” She took a nervous step backward, followed by two quicker ones. “I’m sleeping with a murderer!”
“Nellie, the important thing to know is that you’re safe. I’ll never let anything happen to you.” I matched her steps, not letting her get more than an arm’s length away from me. I gestured to the men at the table. “None of us will. You’re untouchable. Protected.”
She shook her head. Her hands quivered when she lifted them, weaving them into the hair at her scalp and tugging. Then, she closed her eyes, and when she opened them, she looked disappointed, like she had been expecting the warehouse to disappear when she did.
“I don’t think I can do this,” she whispered before she spun on her heel and ran for the door. Her footsteps echoed through the open room, joined by the gasping and panting that came with her nerves. When she slammed the door behind her, it echoed.
“Way to go, genius,” Giaco sneered, giving me a look that really said, “I told you so.”
I glared at him. “Don’t start.”
“She’s going to go back to those agents,” he continued to scold me. I rolled my eyes.
“No, she won’t.” I looked back over my shoulder toward the door that separated us. Would she still be standing outside that door? She didn’t have a car to get home.
Giaco leaned forward, and our father put his hand on his chest to calm him. “How can you be so sure?”
“I trust her.” I did. There was no question about that. No matter how scared she was, Carlo said she held her own with the detectives. She wasn’t going to turn on us.
“You better hope you’re right.”