Page 66 of Twins for the Mafia Heir

When Paul gets me my water, I suck it down in one long gulp, then set the glass aside so he doesn’t feel compelled to get me another one. Paul chuckles.

“You don’t have to be nervous, kid,” he whispers, as more of Thomas’s generals file in. “It’s just like giving a report in school.”

“What makes you think I’ve ever been to school?” I reply faintly.

“Fair enough. Just tell it to me, then. Or Raleigh.”

I nod tightly. “I’ll try.”

The last of his generals sit down, and Thomas clears his throat to begin the meeting. “Let’s begin this meeting by first thanking and commending Emma Clarke for her service this past month.” He looks to me, and I want to shrink down into my seat at the intensity in his hazel eyes. “Your selflessness and bravery has left its mark on the Warwick family. It will not be forgotten.”

I am sure that my entire face is red. “Thank you. I-I mean, you’re welcome.”

I didn’t do this for praise. I don’t think I’ve ever been praised in my life, and now that it’s happening, I don’t think I like it.

No, that’s not quite true. Achilles called me incredible as we stood in his bedroom in Ashwood House, and while it was hard to look him in the eye as he spoke… it also made my heart feel warmer than ever before.

Perhaps I just like praise from a more specific source.

The meeting’s just started, and I’m already completely distracted by longing. Thomas is still speaking, but luckily, he’s addressing his generals now. When I tune back in, he’s just turning back to me.

“It’s admirable that you escaped unscathed on your own. I wish this had been an official mission, with a proper evacuation date. We were arranging the plane tickets for the team that was going to get you out-”

“You were?!” I blurt out, astonished.

“Yeah, kid,” Paul laughs, as if it’s the most obvious thing.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Raleigh snaps, her voice a little choked. “I wasn’t just going to let you martyr yourself for me. Thomas had to talk me down from being one of the people to come get you!”

I catch the exhaustion in Derrick’s eyes beside her. Clearly he had to put his two cents into that argument too.

“You had a hemorrhage,” Thomas says frankly, turning my blood cold.

“Thank you, Thomas,” Raleigh says acidly. “You try being in labor for three days straight and then make logical decisions directly after waking up from surgery.” When she turns to me, though, her expression softens. “The way he’ll tell it, I was about to drag my hospital bed to the airport myself, but I couldn’t even stand. And Roman was in the NICU for two weeks after. It was… hell. I wanted to come for you immediately, but-”

“Oh my god,no!” I gasp, horrified. “You don’t need to apologize for anything, Raleigh.Iwas trying to protectyou.”

“Don’t do that again, by the way,” Iris chimes in, leaning forward to look at me past Paul. “I lost ten years off my life when you threw yourself between that psychopath’s gun and me. I was wearing body armor, Emma. I was prepared to take a bullet or two.”

That might be true, but the office wasn’t that big a room, and Achilles was a real threat. Anything could’ve happened, andanythingwas more of a risk than I was willing to take.

I sit back in my chair, stunned by all this genuine worry for my sake. I never imagined Thomas would send people afterme, much less that multiple people would line up to volunteer. I’ve had no place on the estate. Thomas was even still waiting for me to prove that he could trust me at all, a former street thug who’d threatened his little sister on multiple occasions.

“You acted for the good of the estate,” Thomas says, regaining everyone’s attention. “At this stage, that’s hardly something you can be faulted for.Regardless, a dressing down is not the point of this meeting. Go ahead, Emma, please walk us through what you’ve learned.”

I swallow, but my throat is already dry again. “The first thing is that these people aren’t Warwicks. Not primarily, anyway. The boss, Fantasia, is the daughter of your uncle, Marcus Warwick,and a woman named Veronica Ashwood. She was a member of the Ashwood family, a rival gang in London. Achilles is- was- the heir to the Ashwood name before his mother remarried into the Warwick family and Fantasia reached maturity. Then he gave her control over the Ashwood businesses, and she led a coup against her father.”

Just saying his name hurts my chest, but I force myself to stay focused.

“Since then she’s been struggling to hold onto the family’s resources. From what I could gather, she hired a lot of outside muscle rather than trusting her supporters in the Ashwood or Warwick families, and in the end only really leaned on Achilles. All the men I saw in the house- in Wesley Hall- seemed to be men that weren’t actually connected with either family.”

I shudder as I remember my run-ins with the men in the hedge maze, and again on the terrace. “They were… volatile. I don’t know how much control Fantasia actually has over them. She also seemed regularly drunk and paranoid herself. She wanted your money so she could keep hunting down a man named Piers, who was adopted into the Warwick family and chosen by Marcus to be his heir.”

Raleigh sucks air in through her teeth. “Instead of his own daughter. That’s fucked up.”

I don’t disagree, but there’s more to it than that. “Fantasia was poisoned against her father by Veronica from a young age. She would’ve turned on him eventually- even if he chose her as his heir, she would have killed him to claim that inheritance sooner rather than later.”

“And then as soon as she got it, she squandered it,” Thomas muses.

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