Page 20 of Knocked up by the Mafia

I am approaching the city again at this point and drive straight for my old apartment. I kept it just in case. I also have more weapons stored there.

I’m not there for long when my phone rings, and I answer, “Ronan.”

“She’s being kept in North Riverdale in a shitty house off Castle Road. Definitely not the upper-class apartments she’s used to.”

“Thank you, please have your best shooters meet me there,” I say, standing up and cocking the gun I was loading to pass the time.

“Don’t thank me, Daniel. You owe me.” When he uses my name so seriously, I know he means it. This is a business transaction, not a family favor. I think I’ll neglect to mention that I’m using one of the hiding houses for now.

“I never forget my debts, Ronan Quinn.” I hang up and start putting my guns into their various holsters. I get into my car and take the shortest route I can find to North Riverdale. I know the area; many drug runners use the less-kept houses to deal their wares. It’s smart because everyone will be looking at the important family houses, not some run-down shit hole.

As I’m nearing the location, a text comes through from my younger brother Robbie. Ronan must have sent him with the men. It’s the exact location of the house. And another message with where they are a block away.

I pull up next to their cars and get out.

Robbie is smoking a cigarette; my dark red-haired younger brother smiles as he approaches me, flicking his cigarette to the side. “Danny. You look like an old piece of shit.”

I hold out my hand, and when he takes it, I pull him into a hug. “Not all of us are pickling our bodies with wine, whiskey, and women.”

He laughs and gestures behind him with his thumb. “They don’t seem to havethatmany guards, not decent-looking ones. They look foreign, though. So what’s the plan?”

“They won’t kill Ana. They’re not stupid,” I comment, looking at the house further down the road. “We walk in, we shoot everyone, we get the girl, we get out.”

“You taking her hostage?” Robbie asks as he takes his shotgun off the holster on his back and cocks it.

“No, I’m using her to pay a debt to Ivan Volkov.”

I don’t elabortae, and he doesn’t ask questions.

The men assemble around us, and Robbie grins. “Shoot everyone who isn’t Anastasia Volkov, get her to Daniel, and we leave. No witnesses, no loose ends.”

The men chuckle amongst themselves; this is their favorite type of job.

While the hitmen from the Sorvino and Volkov families might be more subtle, hell, even I am more subtle, Robbie and my brothers are not. They like to make noise.

We walk toward the house in a line. The guards out front are talking and laughing, sitting around a small fire they’ve made in the ground. When one of them casually looks up, it’s too late. He leaps to his feet, but Robbie gives a happy shout and blows his head off his shoulders.

As typical with my brothers, the firefight ensues is a bloody massacre with lots of swearing and competition. As I make my way through the house, shooting the guards I encounter, I hear my brother yelling that he wonders how many men he can take out at the knees before he kills them.

I roll my eyes. There’s scurrying ahead, and I know I’m on to something. It sounds like there are numerous guards up in the next room.

“Robbie,” I yell, “I found her.”

Robbie and two of his men come jogging to where I am. “And?”

“Sounds like a few guys,” I comment. “Maybe six.”

Robbie chuckles. “Hell, Danny, that’s hardly anything, boy.” He drops his shotgun, reaches for the two handguns holstered on each of my sides, and pulls them out before he takes a short run and dives across the floor, opening fire.

“Fucking idiot is going to get himself killed,” one of the guys says.

I shrug. “Probably.”

I pick up his shotgun and follow him. Robbie’s taken down four guys and has rolled into another room for cover. I walk out with the shotgun while they concentrate on him and blast the other two out. We make sure all six are dead before I kick down the door they were protecting.

Sweeping the room, I see a girl tied to the radiator in the back.

“Anastasia, your father sends for you,” I say as I toss the shotgun to my brother and go free her.

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