Page 69 of New Orleans Collection

I fucked up.

Big time and I’m going to have to figure out a way to make it up to them.

I only hope they give me a chance to do it.

“Well,” when I look over at Mom she’s almost jumping up and down in her seat, “it seems you’ve been holding out on us.”

“No kidding,” Viola snorts from her seat next to me.

When I look over at her, the shock has been erased from her face and there is only joy looking back at me. Still, I find myself whispering, “You’re not mad?”

Viola’s eyes widen for a second before they narrow on me. “Mad that my best friend makes my brothers happy, and they do the same for her?” She reaches out and grabs my hand before asking, “You do make each other happy, right?”

“I can tell you I’ve never been happier,” I admit.

When Viola beams at me and Mom gives me a smug smile, I know I’ll be alright at least when it comes to the ladies in my life. The men? The jury’s still out on that one.

CHAPTER 13

LEONARDO

I try and look cool, calm, and collected as I sit at a table in The Sanctuary and nurse a beer, but I’m far from any of those things. How could I be when I came home to find Giovanni passed out in bed and Fleur nowhere to be found? If Rocco hadn’t come home when he did, I probably would have beat my brother to death and then torn about the house from one end to the other in a fit of rage.

Rocco was the one who found Fleur’s note on the fridge. While I’m glad she didn’t leave without a trace, I was still pissed at her for leaving the house without one of us. Gio would have been easy to talk into being her shadow during girl’s night.

He would have been the one who would probably have been all for it. But no. Instead, our woman fucked him, waited until he was asleep, and then slipped out of her house.

There might be worse places she could be than a bar owned by the DSMC, but it’s still an unnecessary risk and I hate how she felt she needed to sneak around instead of telling us she needed some time out of the house. I get it, I do, because we’ve been keeping her locked up. It probably wasn’t fair to her, but it’s not like we didn’t have a reason to do it and it was all to keep her safe.

“I’ll tell you this right fucking now,” Rocco grumbles, his eyes moving around the room instead of fixed on our woman even though I know he’d rather be watching her, “she’s going to be at our place tonight and going forward.”

I grunt in agreement and hear chuckles coming from our sister’s three men. When we glance over at them, there’s amusement dancing across two faces out of the three. Massimo only ever smiles if Viola is involved, so I’m not surprised that he’s watching us with a stoic expression on his face.

“So,” Marco begins, and I’m already annoyed at the man, “you guys and Fleur, huh?”

I grunt, “Yeah, she’s ours.”

The three men who we never wanted to have in our family, but had no choice in accepting, nod with looks of understanding on their faces. I’m sure they do fucking understand. From what I heard about how Viola and the three of them got together, they didn’t expect to be knocked on their asses by the Guidice princess. Just like we didn’t expect the same to happen to us with Fleur.

Considering how happy they are with Viola, I don’t think they regret it. I might be pissed at our woman, but I don’t regret being with her either. I’ll get over being mad, probably after I spank her ass until it’s a pretty red color and she winces when she sits down for a few days, but I’ll move past it.

I notice Rocco tense and I look over at my youngest brother to find him looking at someone across the bar, his eyes narrowed and his entire body practically fucking vibrating with rage. When I follow his gaze, I’m surprised as hell to see the man Fleur was talking to at Club Sin.

Giovanni must recognize him because he lowers his voice and asks, “Isn’t he that Henri fucker?”

“Yes,” I hiss and fight the instinct I have to stand up and stride across the room.

It’s not just the fact that he’s here, which is bad enough, but it’s the way he’s watching our woman which sets my teeth on edge. He’s looking at her with obsession shining in his eyes along with a hunger only my brothers and I get to feel for our woman.

Massimo leans forward and asks softly, “Who is he?”

Without looking away from Henri, who hasn’t noticed he’s being watched because he’s so fucking enamored with Fleur, I answer. “Rocco sent Fleur a necklace as an apology because we cornered her at Viola’s birthday dinner after the comment about Club Sin. We wanted to know if she really went there and was a member. She wasn’t pleased.”

“Our women are stubborn and independent,” Massimo states with a hint of annoyance in his voice which I know comes from the love he has for Viola.

“No fucking kidding,” I scoff. “The necklace had a tracker in it.”

“Fuck, why didn’t I think of that,” Mateo muses and I want to look at him, but I can’t tear my eyes away from Henri.

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