Page 40 of Groom Gamble

There is a moment dreaded by every mafia boss who loves his children.

In the open doorway to Sophia and my bedroom, seven-year-old Raina stands with a confused furrow in her brow and her hands on her hips. I glance between my eldest child and my wife, pleading with both to not make me do this.

“Daddy?”

“Yes, I heard you, Raina.” I try for the strict tone I used to use with my men who were messing about and now use for bedtimes that get raucous. Admittedly, I am usually to blame for starting the play at bedtime. I can’t resist another half an hour with my kids. All five of them. “Close the door as you leave. We can talk about this later.”

Or never.

Sophia snorts and continues unbuttoning my shirt.

“What happened?” Raina asks in a small voice. That nearly breaks me. Even Sophia’s clever fingers pause. “Are you hurt, Daddy?”

Most parents worry about their children asking about how babies are made, walking in on them having sex, insulting their uncle, or falling off their bicycles.

Most mafia bosses worry about their territory, power, and lives.

But the top concern these days for the London Mafia Syndicate kingpins—including me—is how to explain to our respective children that sometimes people have to die, and occasionally that process gets blood on our clothes.

“It’s okay, baby girl, I’m not hurt,” I say gently. I still have mylittle oneand mygood girl—Sophia—but I love that I now have three perfectbaby girlsand twolittle buddies. The five children Sophia has gifted me with to spoil and love.

“But Daddy, there’s blood.” Raina has switched with the remarkable efficiency of a child from utter distress like a puppy left alone all night, to a fully grown bloodhound tracking a scent. “Whose blood is it, Daddy?”

“Canary Wharf is right,” she says quietly enough that Raina can’t hear as she takes my wrist and flicks off the cufflinks. Her wry smile adds, “I told you so”. “You should change your shirts before you come home.”

I look down at my wife, and she looks up at me.

“For the younger kids, anyway,” she adds. “Maybe it’s time to talk with the biggest baby about the family business?”

Her undressing me when I’ve caught someone I’m after is a tradition begun after I killed the Essex Cartel man who shot at her—us—after the night that everything changed. I still have the scar, but it’s the memory of that night when I got revenge which really lingers.

Sophia helped me out of blood-stained clothes, then as a rare allowance, I allowed her to wash me in the shower. To cleanse me of all my sins.

Inevitably, her naked in the shower with me leads to her being pushed up against the wall, me getting to my knees and licking her out until she screams. And then sex, all wet and slippery, and soaking everything in the bedroom with water… and other liquids.

Very satisfying all round. I was looking forward to it.

I sigh. Catching up my wife’s hands, I kiss them. The shower sex will have to wait.

“Can you get me a clean shirt?” I murmur to Sophia, and she nods.

“Okay, baby girl,” I say to Raina. “Come in and close the door. Pop yourself onto the sofa and you can ask your questions.”

None of us will have any peace until my daughter knows more. She’s determined and brave, just like her mother. And she is seven. She can understand a little.

I hope.

When I’m in fresh clothes, I take my place next to my daughter on the cushions. This is our cosy private relaxing space, away from the hubbub of the rest of the house with the nanny and our younger kids. Sophia and I sit on either side of Raina, and we explain, in simple terms, about how some bad men want to hurt people, and sometimes we have to stop them.

I leave out the intricacies of how we brought down the worst parts of the Essex Cartel, and some of the details that are pure protective rage. My daughter doesn’t need to know that when I returned home to her and Sophia after dealing with the Essex Cartel assassin, it was like I’d been swimming in red.

I was very angry with the man who nearly shot Sophie.

“Sometimes we have to stop people from doing cruel things,” I finish. What we found in the container echoes through my head, and for a second, I imagine any of my family in that situation, and my fists clench. “It’s like we discussed about animals, remember? They have to die.”

She frowns, digging deep lines in her forehead.

“What is it?” I ask, with some trepidation. I hope my daughter hasn’t developed a strict moral code that I can’t?—