Page 5 of Vicious Little Princess

My soldiers, many of whom had woken up during transport, had been debriefed about the situation, told a version of the story that hadn’t involved the reality of Carlo Benzino organizing it all just to lure me to that meeting.

I’d told them that Milo and I had run them off and managed to save the shipment and also liberate my men from their clutches. I’d had to come up with a complicated explanation to make it believable that two of us had won out against thirty-odd supposed enemy soldiers. I mean, as their Capo, they’d accept my word and what I said, but I also didn’t want quiet suspicion right now, or any sort of dissent, albeit something they wouldn’t dare to act on. Soon, I would be testing their loyalty to the max as it was, when it was time to call on them to follow me through fucking hellfire with this war. To do that, I couldn’t afford anything impacting their faith and trust in me.

As I walked to my Ferrari, finally able to head home after one hell of a night, I turned on my phone, fortunately only finding one text message.

Julian:Out riding with Cat. Let the fun reign! Text me as soon as you’re clear, need to know you’re safe.

I winced when I determined that the message had come in nearly two hours ago, just after I’d had to turn my phone off for that meeting, and then been swamped afterward.

“Nico!” Milo whisper-yelled, rushing toward me down the steps of Rocco’s house after I’d just finished up filling him in. Milo had needed to take a piss, hence him trailing behind a little.

“I know we need to talk,” I said, as he reached me and my car. “About everything that was said tonight. Including what Carlo wouldn’t let you read.” How he’d known Milo was capable of that was concerning. How he knew half the things he did was.

“Yeah, we will, but there’s another priority.” Urgency was basically spilling off him like crazy as he held up his phone and spun the screen toward me. “Right now, there’s this.”

Adrenaline flooded my system yet again tonight when I took in the red flashing alert on his screen that indicated Caterina’s panic button beneath her engagement ring had been activated.

“Two fucking hours ago!” he cried.

“Have Julian or Caterina contacted you in any way since then?”

“No. I just got this text from him, the last one he sent.”

He basically shoved it at me in his worry and haste.

Julian:Out taking Cat riding. When we all get back to the house, I’m gonna be riding you, big boy. And while Cat swallows your cock and Nico takes her sweet ass.

“I thought him not sending any more was him not wanting to bother us or distract us while we were in the middle of what we believed to be a dangerous situation at the time, but clearly not.” He starting spinning around, then gnawing at his knuckles.

Usually Milo didn’t panic in the face of such circumstances, but when it came to Julian—and now Caterina—all bets were off.

I sucked in a breath, working on keeping myself calm.

The only thing that would help him, though, was to give him a task.

“Track the location she was at when she pressed the panic button.”

“Okay,” he murmured, getting to work, rapidly typing and swiping on his phone. “Yeah, I can do that… last known location… all right.”

I eyed Rocco’s house, considering bringing him in on this. But he was still reeling from the effects of the tranquilizers, as were the rest of my soldiers available to help, the others with Tony escorting another shipment tonight or safeguarding our territory.

“Got it,” he said. “Here.” I took in the specified location, then threw open the driver’s door of my Ferrari. “All right, let’s go.”

Fuck.What the shit had happened? Caterina wouldn’t activate the panic button unless the situation had been really fucking dire.

2

~Emilio~

It had taken close to a half hour to get all the way from the other side of the city to back near Charon Manor where Julian and Caterina had been riding and where the signal from Caterina’s panic button had been activated from. If it hadn’t been for Nico’s Ferrari and him driving like a man possessed, it would have even been a whole lot longer than that.

As it was, it had already been too long.

They were clearly in danger. I needed to be there instantly.

Not only had Caterina activated the panic button, but I’d also been calling them constantly since we’d gotten into the car and neither of them had picked up.

“Almost there,” Nico assured me, looking between me and the road as he finagled the dangerously winding back roads in the dead of night, just his headlights illuminating the way.

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