Page 28 of The Leader

“I’m sorry to disturb you, Mr. Detta, but I just received a call from the bank about an unusual transaction with one of your credit cards. I wanted to inform you first before I canceled the card and called the police.”

He had a suspicion which one of his credit cards was in question. He couldn’t suppress a grin when he thought about the equally unusual person using it.

“I’ll take care of it, Gale. There’s no need to cancel it. It must be the new card I gave to my wife a few weeks ago.”

She blinked when she heard he was married and her eyes slid to his left hand where he was sporting a ring, but she was too professional to ask any questions.

When she closed the door behind him, he called Hector.

He was greeted with a curt, “Yeah?”

“I heard my wife went on a shopping spree today,” he said, to confirm she’d been the one using the card.

“She sure did. Your woman is determined to feed every shelter in San Francisco.”

Now, that was surprising. When he’d expected her to go on a shopping free, he’d expected it to be of the retail kind.

Hector cursed under his breath. “Damn it, woman, put that box down. It’s too heavy for you.”

“You better not be yelling at my woman,” Gio warned him, because friend or not, no one yelled at his wife but him.

“I was yelling at Mary. Fuck.” A few more expletives followed. Hector loved to curse. “Give me a battle zone any day over this shit.”

Gio wondered what had a former Marine cursing. He’d asked his friend to take on Jazzy’s security detail personally instead of assigning it to one of his employees. That is, until Hector’s best bodyguard had returned from a mission. He wouldn’t trust Jazzy’s safety to anyone else. Hector had always had his back and would take a bullet for his wife.

“What’s going on, Hector?” When he heard a man yelling in the background, Gio rose from his feet. “You can finish this,” he told Jackson, and went for his car.

Hector seemed to be running. “Some asshole came inside with a knife, looking for his wife and kids. Had I mentioned that your wife is at a women’s shelter in the bad part of town?”

“No, you haven’t. Text me the address,” Gio clipped. “I’m on my way.”

He arrived at the shelter, only to find Hector toe-to-toe with a not-so-timid-after-all Mary.

“Please stand back,” she said, pointing her finger at him. “You are scaring these women.”

Gio looked past her shoulder, seeing the group of said women sitting in a waiting room area, watching with concern in their eyes. Their gaze went from Hector to a man huddled against the wall, holding his arm and groaning in pain.

“Why? Because of my scars?” Hector snarled.

Mary looked confused. “What? I don’t see what a few paltry scars have to do with anything. They are scared because you broke that man’s arm and, had I not stopped you, would have kicked him within an inch of his life. In case you haven’t noticed: this is a women’s shelter. A lot of these women have fled a life filled with violence. Please back off and let the police handle the rest.”

Hector folded his arms in front of his chest, the heat instantly leaving his eyes. He stepped back when a police cruiser stopped in front of the building.

Gio was less quickly placated. He searched the room for his wife. Just then, Jazzy turned the corner. She was accompanied by a teenager she was discussing the best game console with.

He had to remind himself that she looked fine. Perfectly fine, even. It was difficult to admit to himself that she had given him a scare. When he heard that there had been a man with a knife anywhere near her vicinity, he had panicked. Although he knew Hector wouldn’t let anything happen to her, he still had to see her with his own eyes.

“What are you doing here?” He hadn’t meant for his words to come out that harsh, but he couldn’t stop himself.

Unlike the women behind Mary, his own woman didn’t look afraid at all. Her scowl told him she didn’t appreciate his tone.

“I came to fix the problem with the internet router.”

Gio tried to keep his temper in check. He really did. But didn’t she understand the danger she had been in? “There was a man in here with a knife.”

She glanced at the prick who was being hauled away by cops.

“Yes, well. It’s a women’s shelter. Sadly, stuff like that happens here sometimes.”

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