Page 60 of Matched into the Mob

Yeah, I would have been dead, which would have been bad for me, but my brother could have grieved and gone on with his life.

I hadn’t spoken to Ranger since that day apart from one text. He’d been lurking ‘cause boxes of groceries and food orders and other bits and bobs arrived at my door. Each morning, the doorbell would ring and coffee and danish pastries would appear outside my apartment. His scent was everywhere in the building, but I blocked my nose and pretended it wasn’t.

I suspected once my police protection ended, Ranger had his men looking out for me. Not that I ever saw them.

He didn’t call or text, so that was something. I’d have changed my number or left town and joined Josh if he’d harassed me, and while I told myself he couldn’t be part of my life, I longed for him to trace his finger over my mark. While it was common after a breakup to think I couldn’t fall for anyone again, when I studied my mating hand, I sensed I’d never be in another relationship.

I cried myself to sleep every night, believing I’d be betraying Josh if I got together with Ranger.

But this morning when I opened my eyes, I was faced with interacting with someone I’d rather not. Tony had shoved a note under my door with a time and place for a brunch at a shifter-owned café. He’d added, if I didn’t come, he’d sit outside my place until I agreed to see him.

I’ll bring the kids if I have to and it’ll get loud pretty quickly.

That was the clincher.

I’d never met Flint’s mate, and I was eager to hear things from his perspective. But if this was a switcharoo where Ranger was at the restaurant instead of Tony, I’d scuttle out and refuse to engage with him.

I stood on the other side of the road and observed people eating outside the café and the ones I could see through the huge windows inside. Tony must have recognized me—my face had been plastered on the TV—and he waved. I made an attempt at a smile before crossing the street.

He opened his arms and embraced me. I’d missed the comfort that was paired with a hug, and we made small talk about the weather and the menu before ordering. He yawned as his baby, Kendric, was teething and he hadn’t had much sleep.

He was easy to talk to, and we avoided the elephant in the room, or the mobsters, until we were halfway through the meal.

“When I mated with Flint—once we got past him wanting to kill me…”

I hadn’t laughed in a long while. Since that day at the cabin, and what Tony said wasn’t funny, not remotely, but it was comical, and I cackled. I dabbed my mouth with the napkin, hoping to hide my amusement, but I couldn’t stifle the giggles.

“I’m sorry. I don’t know why I’m laughing.”

“Because it is funny. I agree. We joke about it all the time, though not in front of the children. We catch ourselves disagreeing and I’ll quip, “At least you no longer want to kill me.” He leaned closer. “It’s mafia humor.”

“How do you reconcile the Flint you adore, your mate and the father of your children, with a guy who might come home one night after his beast has killed someone?”

“There are so many moving parts to a relationship and even more when a human mates a shifter, especially a mafia shifter.”

Flint was the pack Alpha, so Tony was the Alpha Omega, an additional responsibility that I wouldn’t have had if I’d been with Ranger.

“But I’ve come to understand that Flint doesn’t kill for thrills or just because he doesn’t like someone or they’re a business rival.”

My thoughts went to Dane as usual. That man was in my head more after he died than when he was alive.

“Yes, he administers his own law, his form of justice for people who threaten the family or the pack. But that’s pack life. Not mafia.”

Tony offered to take me to bear and fox dens not far from their home where the shifters lived a more traditional shifter lifestyle and where disagreements and wrongdoings were an internal matter.

“It’s not only the mafia lifestyle but the pack law you have to accept, Matt.”

“I can’t.” I pushed my plate away, my appetite ruined, and fumbled for my phone to pay for the meal.

But Tony grabbed me and flipped my hand over.Thatone. The mating hand.

“This is not merely a mark, Matt. It’s a commitment.”

I pulled away. “My involvement almost got my brother, Josh, killed.”

“You don’t love Ranger? Is that what you’re saying?” He stabbed a cherry tomato and ate it.

“It’s not a question of love. I can’t be with a mobster when another mafia guy caused my brother to run the heck away. He might never recover.”

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