Page 14 of Consequences
Afterwards, Carter holds me close, his still-damp skin sticking to mine, but it's still not close enough for my liking.
In the silence and near darkness of our bedroom, he says, “I want a baby, Amore.”
I suck in a breath and wrap my arm tighter around him. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah,” he whispers. “Spending time with Cole, helping you raise Roman… I like being a parent, Cris. I want that again. From start to finish, with you.”
Turning my head, I press a kiss to his hair. “Whatever you want, Caro. I want whatever will make you happiest. If that's a child of your own…then that's what we'll do. Once this is over, and we put those bastards in the ground, we'll work on having a baby.”
Carter lifts his face and presses a lingering kiss to my lips. “I love you, Cris.”
“Ti amo, Carter. Forever and always.”
“Are you ready to do this?”
I jump at Roman’s voice, and turn to face him from where I’ve been pacing in the hallway. Jude lightly touches his arm before disappearing into Cristian’s office. For a brief moment, Roman appears to be concerned for me, but his expression is quickly masked.
There are so many reasons I struggle with him, but his ability to hide pisses me off. I realize it’s important for a Boss, but fuck. He either shows too much, too many emotions, or nothing at all. It’s like being in quicksand. And now I’m supposed to help lead a meeting with him? Fuck. I need Lio here. So. Damn. Bad.
Straightening, I give a clipped nod. “Yes. I’m ready.”
Roman eyes me up and down, before giving me a half smile as he says, “Lo renderai orgoglioso, Paperotto.”
I hope to fuck that was meant to be encouraging. Being with the Amatos has me adding “learn Italian immediately” to my to-do list. For all I know, he could be telling me to fuck off. Still, I open the door for him, and with a deep breath, I follow him in.
It’s a weird sensation to be here, now that the Bosses are back. There’s a strange limbo where they’re not quite fully in charge, but neither are we. This meeting is supposed to help with the transition, now that everyone has had a chance to get some sleep. It’s a new day, and we need to figure out where we go from here. Unfortunately, since Lio isn’t available, I’m the one who needs to stand next to Roman and take accountability.
Fuck.
Il Padrone eyes me dispassionately, and I worry about what he sees. Those intense blue eyes never leave my face when I step forward. I’m not ready to tell him all of my secrets—although from the way he stares, it feels like he can tell every thought I have—but at least I can step in for the best friend I owe.
Ignacio gives me a nod of encouragement, which helps me breathe a little easier. Despite Hollis’s red eyes signaling he's had no sleep, he also lends me some support with a quirk of a smile that's there and then gone. When everyone falls silent, Roman and I know we’re up, and hopefully, this shit doesn’t blow up in our faces.
When Roman gestures to me, I clear my throat and start. “First, we are glad to have accomplished our main objective of finding—and rescuing—the Bosses. However, we do still have several issues pending. The first one being that we still do not know how the federal agent, Tom Court, was in possession of the names of our organization and locations. We don't believe he was in charge. Although he was killed during the rescue, so we are unfortunately unable to question him. Antonio has been working with the ground crew on finding any data, so it can be fed back to Hollis. Have we gotten anything from there?”
Antonio pushes off from the wall he was leaning on, as Hollis passes copies of the papers found in Tom’s house to Il Padrone and Cristian. Il Padrone hisses as he goes through the list, and Cristian’s rapid Italian likely contains more curse words than anything else.
“We’re still processing the scene. We have to do it quickly, but carefully. Right now, I’m only having small teams go through, in case the police start checking it out. We’ve already had the cleaners take care of everything…but really, taking it down completely may not be the worst idea.
“I believe, by this afternoon, we’ll have everything possible. I plan on going there after the meeting—along with Nario. Everything we’ve recovered we’ve been passing off to Hollis, as he’s compiling everything for us to go through. However, the longer we’re there, the higher the probability we’ll be caught.” Antonio steps back and I tilt my head in his direction, before turning toward Hollis.
“As Antonio stated, I’ve started processing everything that’s been brought to me. Some of it is loose paper, but they’ve managed to pull some electronics out, a few thumb drives. It’s going to take a while. They’ve routed most of their video feed to an off-site server, but with access to their equipment, we may be able to find it. It’ll just take time, due to the sheer volume of work we have to go through.” Hollis’s voice is wrecked, likely from no sleep and too much caffeine.
I purse my lips as I take him in further.Fuck. I’d better interfere. If I don’t, and Tennant and Lio wake up to him like this, there will be hell to pay.
“I agree as well that we should take the location out. It’s more drastic than I would have intended, but it sends a message, and I don’t want to run the risk of something popping up from there in the future.”
When Hollis sits down, Roman takes over, and I relax slightly, because fuck giving a presentation to two Bosses. “For demolition, Ignacio would be the best option. We also are investigating ways that list could have been generated. Jude and Benjamin have worked closely together on it. I know Marcus found a mole on the Martelli side, and Jude found some…problematic issues as well.
“We have been able to confirm that this was months in the making. They seem to target families, to put the pressure on our men to turn. We’ve been working with outside forces to help with misdirection. In our case, the Russians. In the Martellis, one of the gangs.”
“Thank you,” Ignacio responds with a small wink, before he takes over. And that wink? Yeah, there’s no way Il Padrone didn’t catch it. The entire room goes completely silent, but Ignacio ignores it. “Now, I’ve worked with Ely and we’ve had some success. We’ve been keeping Hollis, and his contacts, up to date with the information. As for demolition, Ely is happy to help me with that. Once you all sign off on it, I’ll make sure that building is taken down.”
The unhinged gleam to his eyes makes me shiver. I shake my head at Roman’s amused snort. At least Ignacio found another person that finds his brand of crazy sexy. Good luck to them explaining it all to the Bosses though.
Although…fuck. If Il Padrone finds out about Ignacio and Roman, that means he’ll find out about Ten and me.Shit.I need Lio awake for this.
My mind must have wandered because when I focus again, it’s Il Padrone and Cristian giving their updates. I’m curious what this artist will do, and from Roman’s expression, he at least knows what will happen. For as much as we’re tied together, we are still too fragmented. It’s not good if we’re going to find who is in charge of this bullshit.
