Page 63 of Tito

She chuckled. “Dang, you are adorable.”

I sat up with her in my lap and growled. “I am not.” I moved her red hair away from her neck and kissed her skin there. Then I made small snarling noises and pretended to bite on her neck.

Giggling, she exclaimed, “Ok, ok…You aren’t sweet and adorable. You’re a growly bear of a man.”

We laughed together.

“I’m just so in love with you, Valen,” I whispered into her ear.

With a shiver, she replied, “Same as I’m in love with you,Mr. Adorable.”

I tisked in fake disgust.

She laughed again.

“Ok, I think we’d better get to breakfast.” I scooted us both to the edge of bed.

“Yes,” she agreed. “Zia doesn’t like it when people are late.”

“She’s always been that way,” I told her. “She’s even cussed Uncle Stephano out if he’s late. Like even if there's a mafia war going on.”

“That's not real, is it?”

“What?” I asked.

“Mafia wars,” she replied. “I mean that’s just in old movies. It’s not normal these days, right?”

“Well, the last skirmish here in New Orleans was just a couple of weeks ago.”

“Oh, that thing with Deacon and that Pippo guy?”

“Yes, you were the one that told us about that.”

“That Deacon planned to meet with him, yes. And it turned out to be…” She nodded. “Was that a mafia war?”

I nodded. “Yeah, must have been. When bullets flew, that made it a war.”

She tightened her grip around my neck. “I could have lost you.”

“Rocky and I did our job and we all made it out okay.”

“They said it was an actual shootout and that Della and Dante could have been killed. I was scared for you when Julianna told me about it.”

“You were?” I asked.

“I was,” she replied. “I just couldn't believe people were shooting at you guys.”

I kissed her cheek and said, “It happens.”

“H-how often?” she asked a bit nervously.

I stood from the bed then sat her down. “Not often. Like you said. That kind of thing happens less now. Like even a few years ago there were more incidents. The last incident I heardabout was a few years back when Gezeppi Farentino wanted to knock off the top three guys on the Council.”

“Really? A mob hit type thing?”

“Yeah, something like that. Only it never came off like poor Gezeppi planned,” I said as I looked around for her robe. “He ended up dead but not by the mob.”

“Really? What happened?”