Filed to story: Submitting to My Bestie’s Daddy Read Online >>???
Olivia was gonna fucking hate me, if she didn’t already. She hadn’t answered any of my calls or texts since Gio had caught me in Elio’s room.
The worst fucking part was that, sure, I’d wandered off to get better plans of the house, but I’d genuinely been drawn in by Elio’s room. I hadn’t been spying or anything, just imagining what it must be like to grow up in a room like that, so beautiful and full of toys.
I swung a hard left, taking the long way home. It’d be faster in the long run–less crowded roads, fewer cops. I could outrun damn near anyone, but I didn’t want to know what Lorenz would have to say about that.
This was what I got for getting in bed with fucking Russians. I’d worked for half the families in Europe once or twice when they reached out, and no one had a good word to say about them. Vicious, they said, unforgiving, willing to go to lengths that turned the stomachs of some of the hardest motherfuckers I knew. I should’ve laughed in their faces and—
And what? Gone back to making pocket change? The truth was, Lorenz offered me a deal I never could’ve refused, and now I had to pay the fucking piper.
Any hope of seeing Olivia after this had been a pipe dream anyway. She was sweeter than her mom, but Gio had her ear long before me, and I just knew he told her everything. He always would’ve figured me out, and that always would’ve been the end of it. I wasn’t stupid enough to believe she’d forgive me, not after everything Dmitri did to the Valentinos.
I drifted through another turn, the speedometer pushing one-sixty. It was better this way, clean. I didn’t have to worry about being presentable enough to see her, or if any ill-timed phone call might be her. I’d spring the trap, blow the city, and she could go back to hating me like she had before.
I spun into my driveway and threw the car in park, grinding the engine. What difference did it make? I had two days left in the city, and my crap-ass car couldn’t really get any more crap-ass in that time. I turned it off, climbed out, and slammed the door behind me.
Without the roar of my straining engine, the sounds of the city at night filtered in around me–a few cars, laughter, faint music from a few doors over.
This city was too goddamn quiet. I missed New York, where you couldn’t hear yourself think if you wanted to. Maybe I’d go back when this was all over, and try to remind myself what a place I wanted to stay in felt like.
I certainly didn’t want to stay in Florence. Lorenz was a shit boss, and I wouldn’t have anything else keeping me here when all was said and done. Maybe I’d pack my bag tonight, have it sitting around when Gio showed up so he knew just how much I couldn’t wait to leave.
The rage carried me up my front steps, and I flung open the door. Maybe I’d just get piss drunk and hope I woke up in time to place the call tomorrow. Fuck the bag, fuck everything else.
I flicked on the light switch, and my heart skipped a beat. Instead of looking at my barren, crap-ass living room, I was looking at an extremely full crap-ass living room, full of Italian twenty-somethings, one of which crossed his arms menacingly over a robin’s eggshell blue suit, and the other of which took a step in my direction.
I didn’t check the fucking tape. And Lorenz already had the fucking baby.
“I can explain.” I put up my hands.
“That’s cute,” said the one who stepped closer. God, I’d met these fucking kids. What was his name? “You can give it to someone who cares. Tal?”
The one in the blue suit—Tallon, I remembered—brushed his jacket aside to reveal a holstered gun. “Do you want to walk with us, or should we do this the hard way?”
“You don’t understand,” I said. “I can—”
Tallon unholstered his gun and clicked off the safety. “Move.”
Fucking Lorenz. Fucking no-weapons policy. I backed out the door.
Tallon kept his gun on me as his brother plucked the keys out of my hands and got in the driver’s side of my car.
Fucking Florence.
At least maybe I’d get to explain myself to Olivia.
*Olivia*
I trudged into the living room with one of Elio’s blocks clutched in my fist like a talisman. I wanted his room set up for if—when we got him home, but I needed a little piece of him with me to keep that certainty.
Dahlia and Gio sat across from each other in the living room, staring blankly into the distance. Plates of food sat on the coffee table in front of each of them, both untouched. I collapsed into the armchair at the short end of the coffee table. I’d done my crying, my hugging, my curling up in my son’s things as though that would be enough to summon him home. Now, I knew, I needed to be strong until it was over. That meant I needed my own seat.
The allure of Gio’s or Dahlia’s arms would be too strong for me to resist if I was within reach.
Maria appeared from the kitchen carrying a steaming plate, as though she’d just been waiting for me–penne alle vodka, one of my favorites under normal circumstances. I accepted the plate, muttered my thanks, and put it on the table with the others as soon as she left the room.
Dimly, I noticed neither Dahlia’s nor Gio’s plate contained penne. Gio had spaghetti in a thick red sauce, and Dahlia a golden-brown chicken parmesan over linguine. Maria had made all our favorites, or at least as much as she could with no warning and the ingredients we kept around the house. When this was over, I had to get her another raise.
While it still happened, I couldn’t stomach a bite.
I checked my phone automatically. There was nothing from anyone, but I finally noticed it was nearly two in the morning. I swallowed. Elio had been gone for six hours.
I tucked my phone away. Counting minutes helped no one. We would get him back, no matter how long they had him.
But, God, I wished I could do anything to help with that. Anything had to be better than this endless sitting and waiting.
The front door slammed open. Gio shot to his feet, unholstering a gun I hadn’t realized he’d started carrying around in his own house. Dahlia shrank back into the couch as though she could disappear.
I remained stock-still in my chair. This, too, would be solved by other people and their guns if it got solved at all.
There was a bit of arguing at the door, but I couldn’t quite make out the voices. Gio clicked off the safety on his gun. I gripped the arms of my chair.
Talon and Alessandro, looking tired and pissed off respectively, stalked into the room, pushing a recalcitrant Sal in front of them.
My heart leaped into my throat, and a million thoughts shot through my head at once. Had my father taken Elio? Was he hurt? When I asked that, did I mean Sal or Elio? How in the hell was I going to talk to a man I trusted enough to allow into my home, who’d betrayed me like no one had before?
Alessandro shoved him down at my feet–not Dahlia’s, not Gio’s, mine. Sal landed on his knees, barely catching himself with his bound hands before his face hit the floor.
My pulse raced. I’d spent years wishing for a family, a father. I wanted my mom around more, and a sibling, and a fucking dad.
The unfortunate man who shared my genetic code struggled to his feet. Behind him, Gio sat, though he kept his gun propped on his thigh and pointed at my father.
I met his eyes, the eyes he’d given me. I wanted to read him, to see regret and fear and a hope to do better, but if I was able to read him, we wouldn’t be in this situation in the fucking first place.
This situation–the situation where he kidnapped or facilitated kidnapping my son. I spent all those years wanting a family, and when I finally built my own, my father came out of the woodwork to rip it away from me again.
Suddenly, I was on my feet, launching myself at him.
“How could you?” I shrieked. “He’s my baby!”
I landed on him, and he stumbled back a step. I pounded my fists against his chest, one of them still clutching the block, and wished desperately that I’d taken Gio up on one of his many offers to get me a self-defense trainer so I could do some real damage.
Sal didn’t react, didn’t try to push me away, but with his hands cuffed together, he couldn’t really.
Gio appeared on my left, gun gone, and wrapped his arm around my chest. “Shh, carina. I know, I know.”
He began to pull me back. His arm was warm, and I wanted to fall into the low timbre of his voice, but my rage hadn’t nearly boiled off. I squirmed in his grip, fighting to get back to Sal.
“How can you tell me to be quiet?” I tried to pull Gio’s arm off me. “He took Elio. He took our fucking son.”
I tasted salt, and I realized I’d begun crying again. Tears soaked my face, rapid and unreasonable.
Gio pulled me into an embrace, and I buried my head in his chest.
“Our Elio,” I whispered.
