Page 13 of Vicious Fall

And while I feel for her and certainly think they were shitheads for their past views, I fucking love the New York crew. Because just like Lucia, they know how to fucking live. Wild, care free, and bold as hell, trouble calls them and I love them for it.

“Maximo, they are not coming here to party, and they may not even come at all. They’ll only come if wereallyneed them, which at this rate we shouldn’t. We’ve got the MC, the Yorks, the Damones,andthe Rossis.”

I scoff, “Yeah, but we both know that the Rossis are damn near collapsing in on themselves right now, we should have held out on the information on their brother untilafterwe got what we needed.”

The Rossi siblings have been in turmoil since their father, Antonio Rossi, was arrested but it’d only gotten worse after I’d revealed that one of the twins, Tullio, was the informant the police had been using to keep Old Man Rossi behind bars.

The last I heard, even the oldest brother, Tomasso, had been arrested. “I hate to be the reasonable person here, but we need to plan to be able to hold our field without them.”

Because fuck, but if all three Rossi brothers are locked up when we finally need them, there’s no way we’ll be able to get the rest of their family. The fuckers will be too busy trying to kill each other for the position at the top.

Giovanni’s jaw tightens. “Why are you just now saying anything?” he asks in irritation.

“You didn’t ask,” I tell him, biting down on my own irritation. “And we don’t have an ear in their family to keep us updated on what they have going on. Lucia pulled their police reports recently and that’s when I found out they were a hot mess over there.”

Lucia nods in agreement, “I was looking for some light reading,” she says with a shrug, “and then Tomasso’s name popped up on my screen. His stepmom filed a report about him stalking her. If you ask me, she probably saw the wrong brother, the twins are more likely to be stalkers.”

“I agree.” I add on.

Tomasso is the smartest of the three siblings, he’s more like my brother, calculating and patient when necessary. Meanwhile, the twins are the opposite. Tullio is a damn ghost who you rarely see but hear horror stories about, he’d definitely stalk a woman, though I doubt he’d get caught. Which leaves us with Tizzy. Tizziano is a repressed closet case with a loose trigger finger. Being careless while stalking his stepmom, sounds just like him.

Giovanni pushes a hand through his hair, muttering a curse under his breath. He looks over at Vito. “If we lose the Rossis, where does that put us? If they’re going down in flames, it may be best we cut ties, or else we’ll end up burned too.”

Vito sits up and I can tell from the way his nose scrunches that he’s crunching our odds. “I think we should be fine,” he says, “but only if the cousins from New York come.” The words are said with a bitter twist, and I know it’s because he doesn’t like the New York crew either. He and Giovanni had gotten into multiple tussles with them when we were growing up.

And he hadn’t agreed with leaving them be after they’d gotten their own gang started.

I think he and Ettore once fought over a girl, and I like to think that’s where most of his animosity for them comes from. It’s quite funny, the way Vito easily loses his mind over pussy.

Giovanni nods before sighing, bringing my attention back to him, “It’ll all work out,” he says. “And we’re still waiting for the outcome on Diamond. If we can get him on our side, this thing may be as simple as getting him to fire a single bullet into his father.”

I frown, “So is this war against Seven Quad or Dox?” I ask, not able to hide my irritation.

For years I’ve insisted upon the fact that we need to cut ties with Seven Quad, but no one has ever listened to me. And even now, when we’re preparing to go to war with the gang, it seems like it's an attack on a sole individual.

Giovanni’s eyes cut to me. “Our problem is with the gang, but if it comes down to us being able to kill one man and calling for the end of the war, we’ll settle for that. We can’t take another huge loss to our men.”

My jaw clenches. “So, this comes down to your daddy issues all over again, then?” I ask.

Because despite how evil of a bastard he was, Giovanni has, and always will, worship our father. While I’d pissed all over the man’s grave, literally, Giovanni had truly been in mourning.

It hadn’t made a lick of fucking sense to me.

Hell, if I had the chance, I would have killed him myself, me or Lucia.

Yet Giovanni still thirsts for revenge for the single death, despite the fact that his life hadn’t been the only one lost in the war. Not even close.

Giovanni’s eyes narrow, but instead of entertaining me and bringing up the age old argument about father dearest, he changes the subject. “How are things with you and Enzo?”

I blink. “What do you mean?”

“Is he still mad at you for nearly killing him?”

“Are we back on this again?” I ask in irritation.

The thing that happened in Winter’s room, where I lost my temper and maybe nearly killed Enzo, has been the least of my worries. It happened and now it's over. I don’t understand the big deal.

But multiple times others have brought it up, Giovanni, Lucia, fucking Bianchi.

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