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5

ADRIANO

S tomping on the gas, I take a turn, chuckling as I lose the white BMW in my rearview mirror.

No sooner do I roar through the intersection than it swerves out of nowhere to my right, veering into me from the side and forcing me to jerk the wheel to avoid a collision.

And of course, Ciro guns it right past me.

“Asshole!”

He’s always been a decent driver. Reckless, like everything he does.

But I’ve always been a better wheelman.

And I know this city like the back of my hand.

Down here by the docks on the weekend there’s almost no one to witness our impromptu race, or any cop presence. That has a lot more to do with the Diamante cash lining their pockets.

Some things are still leftover from Alessandro’s days.

“How do you like this, guillare ?” Drifting around a corner, I cut him off, forcing him into the outer lane and almost onto the curb. I was waiting for that chance, right down the narrow road between two incredibly long lengths of chain link fence and three-story stacked shipping containers.

“Bye!” I shout, laughing as I floor it and take off like a lightning bolt.

The rest of the drive is old hat, one of the many routes I’ve taken hundreds of times to our secret meeting spot.

It’s an old, abandoned factory out on the water, our family’s land.

Aless and I purposely kept it vacant and condemned for this exact purpose. It covers the fact that we have a hideout underneath the place all too well.

I’m sitting on the hood of my car inside the warehouse when they pull in, Fiero scowling and muttering something to Ciro. Probably giving him hell for letting me win.

And he’s right if he’s saying he could have beat me.

Ero is one of the best drivers I’ve ever seen in my life.

Which is funny, because he doesn’t very often when we’re all together. Mostly because Ciro driving means Ciro’s occupied. I swear the kid’s ADHD. Not that we ever got him diagnosed.

“You should have seen that coming.”

“I did!”

“Don’t even try to say you let me win.” I point one finger at him accusingly before hopping up and crossing to my brothers. I take a moment to hug each of them tightly. “You look good.”

“I always look good, Nonna! You look like you always do too, tired, worried. I’d have thought having a fiancée would shake you out of your grandmotherly ways.”

“This grandma could kick your ass.”

“Shall we?” Ero tips his head toward the door.

“Not today. Being seen talking here is one thing. I don’t want to give away the safehouse if Dom’s people are tracking us.”

Even if they are, at this distance, there’s no way they’ll be able to hear. But just to be safe, I head out to the waterside, kicking on an old generator that basically only makes noise anymore.

“First, tell me how things went. We’ll talk about…other stuff in a bit.” I wave my hand noncommittally.

“Typical. Ero got sent to Amsterdam, the lucky bastard.”

“Not for fun.”

“And you got it?” I raise my eyebrows.

“Yep. Broke into the safe, got the bonds…” Fiero leaves it there, just in case, tilting his head in smooth affirmation to let me know he succeeded at his other mission too. Whatever we don’t have to say are things unsaid and unheard. And every mission Dom sends them on that I can add to benefits us.

In this case, a hack of several people that assisted Dom while he was MIA the past few years from one of Dom’s lawyers in the EU. Ero is a genius when it comes to that stuff. Never leaves a trace.

“Good. DV will be pleased.”

“Who gives a shit if he’s pleased?” Ciro scoffs, shaking his head and popping the top off a small bottle he produced out of nowhere. “Sip?”

“Yeah, sure.” I take a nip of the rum, suppressing a shiver. Still a little pickled from last night. “And we should be. The happier he is, the less likely he is to keep sending the two of you all over the world.”

“What’s the difference? I like staying out and about. Except when he sends me to Thailand. Fucking. Sweatbox.”

“And absolutely a hotspot for you to go wild,” I snicker. I see him grin and start to elaborate but I hold up my hand. “There will be time for inappropriate stories later. Thing is, I would like to have both of you here to have my back. And the reason I don’t like you so far afield is that…I worry. Dom could so easily double-cross you, have you taken out on a mission. And I wouldn’t know for days, weeks.”

“Not likely,” Fiero argues, twisting his lips in a rare show of criticism.

“Yeah, I mean, who else can do what we do?” Ciro wags his eyebrows.

“Good point. I just…”

“It’s okay to say you miss us, bro.” Ciro grins, taking a swig and knuckling my arm.

All I can do is grimace. Because he’s not wrong.

It was always the four of us.

And now it’s just me. Stuck dealing with an adversary that I am so not equipped to handle. Surrounded by Dom’s people on all sides. Kept close, but blind to so many things.

“You’re doing what needs to be done,” Ero reassures me.

“Yeah, well. I don’t like a bit of it. This arranged marriage, the bullshit street work collecting taxes.”

“Why did you agree to marry her?” Ciro leans back against the wall. “Not that I blame you for caving, she’s stunning.”

“I’m not gonna lie. That was part of it. After I met her on the train, it was mostly shock that had me speechless when he introduced her as his daughter and told me I was supposed to marry her. He took that as consent and…the rest just sort of happened.”

“That was her ?!”

“Fuck, I forgot that I never told you past meeting her in Paris. See? This is why I need you around.”

“To gossip? Sure. I do miss getting hammered and shit-talking with you.”

“Same,” Ero quips, smirking.

“You’d have to say anything to talk shit, Ero!” I spout, feeling a bit of stress relief being around the guys who have known me the longest and like no one ever could.

“Still. Seems like you’re just rolling over for Dom.”

“Well, the other thing is that Dom doesn’t take lightly to refused invitations and doesn’t like resistance to his orders. So, I have to play it carefully. Save my asks and refusals for when it might really matter.”

“I don’t envy you that position, Adri.”

“It’s just what we need to do. He would have never let us live if we hadn’t played ball. There’d be a manhunt like you wouldn’t believe. We’d never be safe. This way, he has eyes on us. Gets his vindication by subduing his greatest rival’s little brothers.”

“What a prick.”

“And that’s news? You’ve known the guy as long as I have.”

“Yeah, but he wasn’t the prick in charge back then,” Ciro spits.

“Tell me about Thailand.”

“Nothing to tell, other than two sumptuous, delectable ladies?—”

“You sure about that?” Ero mumbles and I almost choke.

“That was one time in the village!” Ciro bursts out, trying to kick his twin. “Anyway, I made contact with the Baan don guy. Nothing much to tell. They’re locked in a turf war with the Triad. Outsiders are not welcome. Not sure why he even bothered sending me there.”

“I know why, but it doesn’t matter now,” I muse, shaking my head. Diversions. And to attract the attention of the Triad, a much bigger ally to form ties with. Dom’s a fucking fool to try and deal with the Chinese mafia. They’ll eat him alive.

“So, what’s the other thing you wanted to tell us?”

“It’s…not good news.” I wave for them to follow, climbing into the other car I keep stashed in the warehouse and motioning them to join me. A few blocks away, I continue the conversation, making sure we aren’t being followed.

“You want to tell me what the fuck happened in Prague?”

“Oh. Shit. You heard about that?”

“Oh yeah.”

“We figured we’d meet back up. Save on hotel fare.”

“Bullshit. Ero?” I prod.

“It wasn’t that bad.”

“You broke the bar at Pulse 22.”

“No, Alto Osmani shattered the bar at Pulse,” Ciro corrects, his tone completely serious.

“After you threw him off the balcony.”

“After he insulted our mother!”

“Our mother is dead!” I growl, resisting the urge to shake my head, muttering under my breath, “ La terra ti sia lieve .”

“And so much so for her being a saint! He called her a?—”

“I don’t care. The whole point of you meeting up there was to get info on Dom’s layover with Darko’s group.”

“We did get info. Alto’s sister told me all about it right after we ditched the club and dodged the cops.”

“The cops?”

“I checked. They’re mostly all paid off anyway,” Ero chimes in, sitting in the back.

“Great. That doesn’t mean you can set fires everywhere you go. Sometimes I think you two aren’t taking this very seriously.”

“What is there to take seriously? We’ve got our thumbs up our asses while you try and figure out what to do about Dom.”

“Because I don’t want to make a wrong move, okay?!” I didn’t mean to shout. I really didn’t.

Stress is just eating me.

“The minute we take him out, there could be a dozen mob leaders ready to chop our fucking heads off with the promises he’s made. I need more time.”

“We weren’t criticizing, just saying.” Ciro sniffs.

“Yeah, well. Like always, it falls to me to come up with the idea, to concoct the plan. Then you two just come in guns blazing and take all the glory.”

“You can have some too.”

“I don’t want glory. Just a fucking nap.”

We’re almost to our destination, taking an alternate route to avoid attention. Even so, I know they know where we’re going.

It doesn’t make any of it any easier.

“What the?—”

“Fuck.” Ero clips, in as loud a tone as he ever uses. To us, it’s a gunshot coming from him.

The Diamante family compound was once an impressive estate. Walled, stretching for several blocks, it stood for decades, growing over the last fifty years into a fortress.

But inside, it was a haven. Sweeping grounds and gardens.

Now, it’s a burnt-out husk.

We stand there looking at the wreckage for a bit. I’ve already been here a half-dozen times. It doesn’t surprise me, however, that neither of my brothers reacts beyond looking grim.

They grew up in this world. This is how things go.

You lose people. You never take what you have for granted.

Even if we did grow up privileged compared to most.

Mob life is fucking tough. Especially for four kids without parents trying to find their place in a criminal organization.

It’s something I don’t think Alessandro ever really understood about the three of us.

He was already an adult, or almost, when we lost Ma and Pa.

We never knew anything else.

And the twins never wanted anything else. Me?

Whatever I wanted has never mattered. And I’ve accepted that.

“He’s gonna die for this,” Ciro says softly, his lip quivering slightly.

“We’ll make him pay. In due time.”

Ero’s silence is expected, but I know him. The pressure, the hatred, and the absolute cold coming off him is palpable.

“Why would he fuckling do this, Adri?”

“I’ve asked myself that over and over and over again. He could have just moved. Taken the house. He lived here too, for years. I think he just wanted to hurt us. See if we’d react. See if we would lose our shit.”

“And what does it say that you didn’t?” I can see it in his eyes, contemplating violence, even now.

“It says that we are playing a long game. Just like him. Which is why I can’t let my guard down. He wanted us to lash out, to make our move. Now that we haven’t, it gets complicated.” I lead the way through the broken gates and onto the grounds.

“Where are we going?” Ciro asks, following me through the rubble.

“I need to show you something.”

We make our way around the property, sneaking in through one of the crumbling sidewalls of a building and making our way around to the backyard, through the remains of the garden. It feels like so recently that we were all just here, that I watched Isabella meet Angelica and Gigi, her long lost sister-in-law and niece. It sends my thoughts to all three of them, and my brother, back in Italy.

I wish I was there, at the lodge in the mountains with them.

We reach the charred remains of the gazebo and I stop, crouching to sweep away some debris.

“What the fuck are we doing back here? You feeling nostalgic?”

“Yeah, something like that,” I say, reaching under what’s left of the bench and pulling a lever. A loud, metallic clunk shakes the floorboards, right before a door pops open in the center.

“Whoa, secret bunker?” Ciro’s smile returns, that childlike wonder he’s never managed to leave behind.

“Secret bunker.” I nod.

Climbing down the ladder, I thump the button to turn on the lights and the backup generators buried deep under the foundation of the Diamante Estate. It’s a secret that Uncle Gio shared with us years ago, and one that Alessandro and I kept, and added to when we could.

“No fucking way we had a panic shelter down here our entire lives and none of us knew about it.”

“Some of us knew about it,” Ero mumbles and I flash him a look.

“What? You and Aless weren’t that careful.”

Meaning that Ero’s unnatural instincts told him we were up to something and he followed us. And when Ero doesn’t want to be seen, he’s a fucking ghost.

“Well, we thought we kept it a secret. Alessandro and I refurbished it. Added to it when we fumigated the property to cover the construction.”

“Awesome!” Ciro marvels, stepping off the ladder and looking around at the modern, sleek lighting running along the top of the walls. “Classic Diamante legacy shit right here. This is the kind of under-the-radar movie shit that we always dreamed up as kids!’

“You should have seen it before. Looked like something out of a World War II movie.” I smile, waving for them to take a look around. The conference room centers the hallways, leading to various features. Sleeping quarters, armory, storage.

I continue talking as I head toward the main room.

“It’s actually a throwback to when the original mansion was here in the thirties. Our great-great-grandfather built it to hide out during the prohibition. Crazy, huh?”

“For once, your nerdy historical heritage mob shit is, in fact, interesting, Adri.” Ciro huffs, genuinely impressed.

“I’ll have to show you what we found back then. There are bottles in there from a hundred years ago that I know you’ll want to try.”

I let them browse for a little while, watching Ciro chatter on, Ero inspecting the guns, the gear. They’re excited, fired up.

Looking at my brothers, I wonder at the men they’ve become.

The twins barge right into an underground weapons depot like they own the fucking place. Even if they technically do.

It’s been this way our entire lives.

Those two practically burning down the house, taking things that don’t belong to them, stealing each other’s toys. I never really cared. It was easier to let them keep themselves busy.

Until it fell to me to handle them, discipline them while Aless was out on missions for our uncle. Then he’d come home, exhausted and try his best.

And he really did that, his best. And I followed up after.

As adults, they’re, well…

They’re still the exact same children that they were but now as they push into their late twenties, they’re a force to be reckoned with. They’re deadly, they’re smart, but they’re still impulsive.

And they still bicker like two teenage girls. Drives me insane.

Like the entire drive over here. And when they come walking back to the table and sit across from me.

“I’m just saying, you wouldn’t even have a conversation with me on the plane.”

“I was trying to watch the movie.” Ero’s voice is always so soft. Cool.

“Yeah. And then you were trying to do a sudoku, and then you were trying to take a nap.”

“You could find a hobby,” Ero says, rolling his eyes.

“My hobby is talking to you.”

“You need to find better hobbies.”

“I need to find better friends .”

“I’m your brother, not your friend. And no one can stand you for long. You get bored too easily.”

“Wow! Judas. People just can’t keep up, you mean.”

“No. I don’t.”

“See? No one gets me like you do, lil’ bro!” Ciro pours himself a glass of whiskey.

Where the hell did he get the glass or the bottle?

“Same age. To the day,” Ero continues, calmly.

“Right, but you’re a half-inch shorter than me sooo…”

“Whatever you say.”

“What?!”

“What?” Ero asks innocently.

“No, what did you just say?”

“I said, ‘Whatever you say.’”

Ciro’s eyes bulge, then narrow. “Ooh, I see what you’re doing. You’re trying to turn this thing around on me. Reverb psychology.”

“It’s reverse psychology, dingus.”

“Exactly, see?”

“Is there an echo in here?” I mutter, rubbing my face with both hands. “If you two want to just pretend I’m not here, I could actually just go…”

“And do what?”

“Anything else, literally,” I laugh.

“Oh, so leave us here to do your job watching Dom and marrying his hot daughter? I don’t think so, Adri. You know, you could stand to think about someone other than yourself every now and again.”

I glare at him, feeling my temperature rise quickly.

Ciro explodes into laughter after a tense second of staring me down. “Fuck! That look on your face could scare the stripes off a tiger!”

His laugh and his absurd comparisons break my irritation like nothing can.

“So this is it. This is what we got left. What we got to work with?” Ciro follows up, sobering some.

“This and each other. We’re a family. Never forget that.”

I can’t believe how much I sound like Alessandro.

“Right. A family minus one, minus an empire, minus millions and millions of dollars in assets.”

“Well, we got some assets. There are accounts Dom doesn’t know about, fortunately.”

“That we can’t really use.”

“For now.” Ero looks at both of us pointedly.

“For now,” Ciro agrees.

“The most important thing to remember right now is that we need to stick together, keep our heads on straight, figure out what we’re going to do next. One step at a time.”

“Gee, gosh, coach, that’s a good game plan,” Ciro snickers.

“Thanks for this, Adri,” Ero adds, nodding sincerely.

“I wanted you to know that I am trying. Let’s get moving before anyone wonders where I got off to, huh?”

We climb out, covering the entryway, and heading back to the car.

“Speaking of you getting off, how’s your fiancée doing?”

“She’s, uh, shut the fuck up?” I snap back.

“Oh, come on. Tell us about her.”

“I don’t know much. That’s the problem. I get the impression she doesn’t want to marry me any more than I want to marry her. Except when she’s acting just like her father. So yeah. Sometimes she’s a snake. Sometimes she’s…different.” I shrug, feeling frustrated and more than a little worked up.

“Alright, that’s fair. What do you know about her, though? What’s real?” I know what he’s trying to get at, and he’s not wrong.

But I’m feeling difficult.

“She has red hair.”

“Oh I saw the hair. Looked like someone had just sexed the hell out of it. You two getting in a few quickies here and there? That’s one way to get to know someone.”

“We are…feeling each other out.” I regret the words as soon as they leave my mouth.

“HA! I bet she feels?—”

All three of us stop dead in our tracks as we step out onto the street and the car parked down the drive. Right next to another car with its lights on and a man in a suit standing next to it. It’s a messenger. Likely from Dom.

And my spine locks up that they knew exactly where to find us.