Page 43 of Kidnapped By the Boss

Chapter Fourteen: Katya

I was still feeling defeated by the way things had gone with Vincent, and I didn’t know if I was to blame or he was or both. But now we were being tossed into work without really being able to hash it out. We were newlyweds, not even six months into our marriage yet, and it felt like we were struggling so much more than we should be. I wanted to just take some time and talk it out and see if we could really get to the bottom of why we were having so many problems lately, but it felt like we were attempting to turn our relationship on and off like a light switch, and that wasn’t how marriages were supposed to work.

We werealwayshusband and wife, even when we were also a boss and a caporegime.

If what Vincent said was true and it was impossible not to blur the lines, then how were we supposed to do this? Was I really going to have to give up my job and just be Vincent’s dutiful wife? That was never what I wanted. That was what I did with my father. I did what was convenient for him when it was convenient, but I was still supposed to act like I was just his innocent daughter, falling in line and not causing him trouble.

I wasn’t that kind of woman.

Of course I knew that Vincent respected me far more than my dad did, but I was beginning to wonder if that respect was conditional. Did I have to be meeting certain wife or capo qualities for him to continue to think the best of me?

“Come in,” Vincent replied to a series of knocks on his door.

The door opened and all of Vincent’s upper ranks came walking into his office, save for Mario who was still on his way back from the attempted assassination. Along with Taylor, Annie, and Devrick, they each had a handful of their trusted soldiers from their ranks, and the head of Vincent and I’s security at the estate, Giorgio.

Vincent’s office was pretty big, but with all of these people inside, evenitwas starting to feel cramped. I’d moved from the chair I was sitting in and went to sit in the windowsill where I normally was when there were others in Vincent’s office, but eventhisfelt weird. If I wasn’t supposed to be his wife while I was his capo, should I be sitting back here behind him like his supportive wife. I wasn’t even his underboss. By his logic, Mario should be sitting back here behind him, or Devrick, his consigliere, not me.

“Where’s Mario?” Devrick asked. Immediately, Vincent and I exchanged a nervous look, that Devrick immediately attuned to. “What? What was that look? Did something happen?”

All Vincent had done was tell everyone to meet in his office immediately. He hadn’t shared the specifics of it with anyone, but we both just naturally assumed that Mario would have told his own husband what happened.

“Um,” I started.

“Have you not talked to Mario?” Vincent asked.

Devrick shook his head. “Not since he left a couple of hours ago, why? What happened? Is he okay?”

“He’s okay,” Vincent said quickly. “But The Wreckers tried to run him off the road while he was on the Brooklyn Bridge.”

“What?!” Devrick shot up out of the chair he was standing in. “When?”

Vincent opened his mouth to answer, but was cut off by the sound of another knock on his door. Instead he called out, “Yeah!” and Mario came walking into the office.

Devrick whipped around and ran up to Mario, giving him a deep kiss first—something they didn’t often do in public—and then punched him in the gut.

“Ow! Why?!” Mario barked.

“How could you not tell me you nearlydied?” Devrick snapped. “You think I want to hear about shit like this from someone else?”

“I didn’t want to panic you unnecessarily!” Mario yelped back, then glared around him at Vincent. “I kinda thought Vince would have had the frame of mind not to tell you about it until I could talk to you in person first.”

Vincent shook his head. “Don’t put this on me. You should have called him yourself.”

“Yeah!” Devrick said. He was the most panicked and uncool I’d ever heard him. Normally, Devrick was difficult to rile, but it seemed he had a bit of a weak spot when it came to his husband. “You need to not leave me out of things like this, Mario.”

“Okay.” Mario set his hands on either side of Devrick’s arms. “Okay. I’m sorry. You’re right. I need to be honest with you about this stuff.”

“That’s the deal that we made. I didn’t sign up for this for the shit you’re out there doing to be a mystery,” Devrick continued.

“I know.” Mario pulled him into a hug. “I know. I’m sorry. I’m okay.”

Devrick and Mario seemed like they were doing so much better than Vincent and I were even though they hadn’t been married that much longer. They worked together. In fact, technically, Devrick was Mario’s boss. He carried out a lot of Vincent’s actions on his behalf, so he was constantly in a position of helming control over Mario, yet their relationship didn’t seem to be crumbling under it. They communicated well and knew how to apologize to each other when they should.

Did it just mean that Vincent and I simply weren’t up to the task of being husband and wife?

“Listen, you two can finish hashing that out later. Right now, we need to discuss what needs to be done. I thought we were done with The Wreckers and now it feels like we’re back to square one,” Vincent said. “Come sit down.”

It was frustrating knowing just how right Vince was. All of the information we got from Lyn and my earlier espionage all applied to The Wreckers before they lost The Pharmacy and had to find a new place to set up shop. Henry, their Ace, was gone, but if Mario saw Shaina with someone new, then that likely meant that Antonio was already working to replace his lost manpower. For all we knew, he could have used these past few months to build a much bigger group now that he knew the size of the Costellos’ group. And even if we hadn’t brought our full crew, if Antonio had amassed anything even close to that size, we’d be in trouble.