Page 69 of Forbidden Property
“You look like you’ve been around the block, sweetheart. You know how it works.”
The shorter one laughs and his laugh is scarier than the taller one’s stare. They’re serious and Nicki doesn’t seem like she’s grasping the gravity of this situation at all.Roman. Please be safe. I promise I’ll find a way home.
Nicki keeps arguing like she has the upper hand here. “For all I know, we could be cousins. I’m not getting married or doing anything.”
“Don’t be so sure sweetheart.”
The shorter one leans in and half-whispers to the taller one. “Where are the others? They should have been here by now.”
“Patience.”
The shorter one lights a cigarette while Nicki locks eyes with the taller one like a pit bull about to launch at his neck. They’re staring at each other with such angry fierceness that if it were just the two of them, I could use this moment to break away from the situation and disappear without them noticing. Instead, I take in the surrounding streets near this empty warehouse parking lot and realize… we’re not going to be alone for long.
Two vehicles identical to the one we just bounced around in the trunk of for the past few hours drive down opposite streets that converge at the warehouse.They have reinforcements.My stomach sinks as I watch my chances at escape dwindling away. An opportunity to run from two assailants might present itself, but I don’t know how many men are in the cars pulling up here.
The SUVs form a circle around us and the two masked men. If this scares Nicki, she doesn’t show it.
“I’m not marrying anybody.”
“Yes, you are. We have major fucking problems down here in Pittsburgh, princess. We don’t live like fucking kings the way you do. We have to work for everything.”
I tune out the rest of their conversation because the first SUV stops and the man who gets out is even more terrifying than the masked strangers who kidnapped us and brought us to Pittsburgh.
The taller man turns to him and nods with respect. “Franco. I brought Nicki Taviani, but we have a bit of a problem.”
He gestures towards me in a way that’s not as subtle as he thinks. The man who just got out of the car has silver hair and mean, pale blue eyes. He says something in a deep, guttural language.Obviously Italian.There’s too much adrenaline coursing through me for me to think quickly.
“You should have left the black girl,” Franco says, sneering at me. “But you brought Nicoletta and I brought a priest… so we don’t have much to worry about.”
Nicki puffs up her chest and I just know she’s going to say some shit to worsen our situation. I wish I could sink into the ground or at least drag Nicki back down to earth.
“HEY!” Nicki says, all but snapping her fingers in the terrifying silver-haired stranger’s face. “You need to bring me back to Buffalo because myfatheris Leandro Taviani and he is not going to like this.”
Really, Nicki? At least shooting at our assailants was more useful than whatever the hell is going through her head right now. The man who drove Franco here gets out of the car and I note as many details about him as possible. He has dark brown hair with streaks of silver, but even if he’s not as gray, he looks older than Franco. More wrinkles on his face and a deep tan. If I had to guess, I would say this guy spends a lot of time outside, but I don’t have much evidence except his deep tan.
Franco’s partner drags a woman out of the trunk. She’s tied up with a black eye and dark red hair covering her face. I didn't recognize her at first but then… is that…?
Nicki looks over her shoulder and gasps… “Angela…”
I’ve only met her once, but now that Nicki says her name the memory coalesces in my head and I recognize my best friend’s much older sister, Angela Taviani. She seems drugged, completely out of it and worse – battered and bruised like she’s been beaten. I shudder and try to make myself small.
This isn’t my fight, but if they find out my connection to this family is deeper than just being Nicki’s friend in the wrong place at the wrong time, everything about this situation could change for the worse. And it takes seconds for a bullet to kill.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Michael
We have a big problem. Myra sits on the porch with me while the thunderstorm picks up. I hold her hand and silently promise myself that I’ll never put her in this position again.
“Luigi called. I need to go to Pittsburgh.”
She looks up at me with those gentle brown eyes that I fell in love with when she first began to tutor my sister.
“Everything isn’t okay with CC, is it?”
I might have no longer had a mandate from my father to look after CC, but my uncle Leandro made it clear that it was my responsibility to keep her in check and out of trouble. I know she enrolled in McGill and for a while, she reported back to me about her classes and grades. Decent attendance. A solid group of friends.
She even had a love affair, which I wasn’t allowed to judge her for apparently, even if she ends up with a Canadian woman. If my father were alive, he wouldn’t really care for all of this “bisexual” stuff, but the truth is that I don’t mind as long as she applies herself to something that’s not degenerate and criminal.
