by Bethany-Kris
So, yeah.
That was true, too.
Naz got it honestly.
All that crazy intelligence shit came from God, though.
The Brother
Cece/Naz POV
Cece hid in the treehouse she hadn’t actually played in since she was a girl. Once, she had gone to a friend’s house as a child, and saw that they had a beautiful doll-like designed treehouse just for them.
Despite the fact that Cece hadn’t been very interested in playing as a child, like most other children her age, she had wanted a treehouse for herself something awful. She went home that day after visiting her friend, and told her father what she wanted.
Her father had one built before the week was out.
That was years ago, now.
She wasn’t so little anymore being fourteen. She had definitely outgrown the age where she should be playing in something like a treehouse.
And yet, she still used it.
It was still her safe place.
Sometimes, like today, it was just the kind of place she needed. It gave her somewhere to disappear to—so she could be totally alone.
Here, she wouldn’t have to explain to her mom or dad why she was crying.
It was stupid, anyway.
A stupid thing to cry over.
That was one of the many things that sucked about being fourteen. Or rather, being a fourteen-year-old girl.
Sometimes, stupid things made her cry.
“Cece?” she heard her father call out. “Supper is ready!”
Cece quickly wiped the tears from her face. “Okay, Daddy.”
“You okay?”
God.
Did he hear the tears in her voice, or something?
He always knew when something was wrong.
“I’m fine, Daddy,” she called back.
“If you’re sure …”
“I’m sure.”
Her father must have believed her because she heard the back door to their house close a few seconds later. She chose to stay where she was for a couple of more minutes in the treehouse. Long enough to dry her face, and make sure her eyes wouldn’t be red.
Cece was just getting ready to stand up when Naz popped his head up over the bottom of the doorway. Apparently, he climbed up the ladder without Cece hearing a damn thing. Like a little mouse or something.
Not surprising.
Naz was sneaky like that.
“What are you doing?” Naz asked.
“Nothing.”
Her ten-year-old brother’s gaze narrowed. “You sure?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
Naz climbed up the last couple of steps, and pushed his body into the treehouse. He sat down right in front of the door so that Cece couldn’t get past him at all.
“Supper is ready,” he said.
“So move, and we can go eat,” Cece replied.
Naz cocked a brow, and then shook his head. “Nah, I don’t think so.”
“You’re super annoying, Naz.”
He only shrugged.
Cece sat back down. “How was school?”
“Boring,” her brother muttered, “like always.”
Naz was crazy smart. People liked to toss around the word genius, but he didn’t really like being called that. At least, not to his face. He was so smart, though, that he could do Cece’s math and science homework—with a guaranteed A.
“So, what’s wrong?” Naz asked.
Cece shook her head. “Nothing, Naz.”
“Yeah, except you only come up to the treehouse when something is wrong. Like the last time—it was because Ma had to go to Cali last minute, and wouldn’t take you with her. So you sulked up here for half the damn day.”
“I do not sulk!”
“Okay,” Naz drawled.
“I don’t, Naz.”
“Point is, this is where you go when you’re upset. So—”
“It’s just something little and stupid,” she said, wishing he would drop it.
Naz frowned. “Is it stupid if it made you cry?”
“I’m not—”
“I know what you look like after you cry, Cece.”
Of course, he did.
Cece’s very first best friend had been her little brother. He looked out for her even though he was four years younger than her. Sometimes, he could be the typical, annoying little brother that never left her alone. Other times, he was the only person Cece cared to share her secrets with at all.
“It’s really nothing, Naz,” she told him.
Mostly, she just didn’t want her brother worrying, or getting pissed off.
“Want me to tell Dad that I found you upset?”
Cece scowled. “Blackmail, really?”
Naz smiled, and tipped his head down so that the top of his beanie was all she could see instead of his face. “It’s what I do.”
Well … crap.
“A guy I don’t even like called me ugly,” Cece muttered.
She kept her gaze on her hands instead of her brother.
“He wanted me to send him a picture, and I wouldn’t, so he called me ugly.”
“A picture?” Naz made a noise in the back of his throat. “What’s he need a picture of?”
Cece glanced up, and gave her brother a look. “You’re really smart, but sometimes, Naz, you’re also kind of clueless.”
“Hey!”
“What kind of picture, Naz, really?”
Naz looked upwards, and made a face. “Oh, like a bad one? Like … a naked one?”
“Basically, yeah.”
She knew better than to be sending pictures of herself like that to anybody. For one, because it was wrong. And for two, her father and mother would kill her if they ever found out.
“And he called you ugly?” Naz asked. “Just because of that?”
“It’s not that he called me ugly—that’s not why I am upset.”
And she knew she wasn’t ugly, either. She took after her mother, and Ma was the most beautiful woman Cece knew.
“It just … sucked,” Cece said lamely. “He had to seem cool, or whatever, when I told him, so he tried to hurt me, I guess. Like I said, that just sucks, and it’s stu—”
“Not stupid,” Naz interjected. “I’m sorry the guy’s a jerk.”
Cece smiled. “Make sure you never make girls cry, Naz.”
Naz nodded. “Promise. By the way …”
“Yeah?”
“Who was the guy?”
Naz POV
“Hey, Zeke?”
“Yeah, principe?”
His father’s best friend and right-hand man was the one tasked with driving Naz to school today. Sometimes it was an enforcer if everybody else was busy for whatever reason. More often than not, it was his mother or father.
But his dad had business in Hell’s Kitchen, and his mom had to fly out to California over the weekend.
So that left Zeke.
Naz liked Zeke.
“Do you gotta knife, or something?” Naz asked.
Zeke side-eyed him from the driver’s seat. “What in the fuck do you need a knife for?”
“Just because.”
“Naz.”
“Plausible deniability,” Naz added.
“Jesus, kid.”
“Well?”
Zeke scowled. “Are you going to kill someone?”
“No.”
“Cause property damage?”
“Try real hard not to,” Naz returned, though that was probably a lie.
Zeke grunted under his breath. “You get caught, then you didn’t get it from me, understand?”
“Swear on my life,” Naz promised.
“In the dash, principe.”
Sure enough, Naz found a switch blade in the dash. He flicked the blade out, and tested the sharpness of the edge with the pad of his thumb. Satisfied it would handle the business he needed it for, Naz slipped the blade into his pocket.
“Remember our deal,” Zeke said.
Naz nodded. “You got it,
zio.”
Zeke wasn’t his real uncle, but he still loved him like he was.
Soon, Zeke was pulling up to the drop-off line for the lower and upper Academy. Naz said goodbye to Zeke, and stepped out of the car with his backpack tossed over his shoulder. He could see Cece on the steps of the upper Academy talking to one of her friends. She almost always traveled to school with one of her older friends.
Naz waited for Zeke to pull out of the line, and then drive out of the parking lot before he headed for the upper Academy. Or rather, the parking lot the upper Academy students used.
Cece had given Naz the name of the guy.
Teller Masterson.
Stupid fucking name.
Naz asked some friends—Teller was a senior in the upper Academy. What he was doing asking a fourteen year old to send him pictures was anybody’s guess.
He sounded like a creep.
Soon, Naz found the car he was looking for, and the dick it belonged to.
Teller.
The guy leaned against the side of the car, and smoked a cigarette. He gave Naz a passing look, likely not recognizing him.
That was okay.
He would know him after this.
“Aren’t you on the wrong side of the Academy, kid?” Teller asked.
Naz smirked. “It’s Naz.”
He didn’t give the guy a chance to respond—instead pulling out that switchblade from his pocket, flicking out the blade, and ramming it hard into the guy’s back tire. All the way to the fucking hilt so the tire was ruined.
“Hey, what the fuck?”
Teller came closer.
Naz yanked the blade out, and pointed it at Teller. “Next time, it’ll be your fucking throat.”
“Wh-what?”
Yeah.
Naz bet it was some kind of messed up shit to be threatened by a ten year old. But … Naz was Naz. He had a mind like lightning—electric, fast, and growing more dangerous by the day. He was a Donati, and his life was not anything like this rich, spoiled brat’s life. The first time he saw a man die—he was seven. The guy shouldn’t have pulled a gun on his dad.
That’s just how it went.
“My name is Nazio Donati,” Naz said quietly, “and make sure you get it right when you spread it around. You ever fuck with my sister—Cece—again, and they won’t be able to put all the pieces of you back together once I am done with you. Just so we’re clear, asshole.”
With that, Naz walked away.
Teller didn’t follow.
The Boy
Catherine POV
Catherine stayed to the edges of the room and kept a close watch on the most interesting part of her fifteen-year-old daughter’s birthday celebration. Cece didn’t want to call it a birthday party because apparently, that just sounded too juvenile for her.
Whatever.
A celebration it was.
The house was decorated. The family had come. Cece’s friends had poured into the house to fill it full. Presents were waiting on a table—piled nearly to the ceiling in beautiful wrapping paper with sparkling bows.
A cake needed to be cut.
And yet, Catherine had other things to do at the moment. Better things, even.
Well, depending on who you asked …
“What are you doing over here in the corner by yourself?”
Catherine gave her mother a look, and put a finger to her lips. “Shhh, look.”
Catrina did, and found the same scene that Catherine had been keeping an eye on all night. Actually, if she were being honest, this whole thing was years in the making for Cece. It was only now that the distance was starting to close between youthful, innocent crushes to something entirely different.
“Oh,” Catrina said.
Catherine nodded. “Yeah.”
Across the room, Cece stood chatting with a group of her friends. Standing close behind her was Juan—Miguel’s oldest son. He had a plate of food in his hands, and every so often, offered Cece a bite to take from his fingertips.
It was sweet.
It seemed innocent.
Except her daughter smiled in that way every single time she took a bite. Cece was constantly checking over her shoulder to make sure Juan had not gone too far from her side. And if another girl tried stepping in Juan’s path during the evening?
Nope.
Cece stopped that fast.
“How long has this been going on?” Catrina asked. “You didn’t tell me anything about this, Catherine.”
“Because you’re a gossip, Ma.”
Catrina poked Catherine hard in the back. “Lies.”
“Ouch.”
“Well!”
Gazes moved in their direction, and Catherine turned fast to make sure her daughter didn’t see her spying. She didn’t want Cece to know that she was keeping an eye on these new developments between her and Juan.
“Stop looking,” Catherine hissed at her mother.
Catrina rolled her eyes. “She’s not even looking this way. She’s too busy glaring at some girl who keeps looking at Juan.”
“Really?”
Catherine turned around to look again.
Her mother had been lying.
Sort of.
Cece wasn’t looking at them, but she wasn’t glaring at anybody, either. No, currently, she was holding onto Juan’s wrists as the two of them talked. The seventeen-year-old boy barely gave anyone else around them any of his attention while he and Cece conversed together.
She was all he cared to see.
Only she mattered.
Catherine’s smile grew.
“You’re very invested in this … thing,” Catrina said.
Catherine shot her mother a look. “What, like you weren’t invested in my relationships as a teenager?”
“Supportive. Encouraging. I wouldn’t say invested is the right word.”
“I am those things, too, Ma.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Thirteen,” Catherine said.
Catrina raised a brow. “I beg your pardon?”
“She has had a crush on him since she was thirteen, Ma. And Juan was always … really sweet, and good to her. I overheard Miguel telling him once that Juan had to be respectful and not overstep his boundaries with Cece because she was two years younger than him, and it wouldn’t look right for a boy his age to be chasing after a girl her age.”
“I suppose that makes sense.”
“He listened, too,” Catherine added. “But she’s not thirteen anymore, Ma.”
Catrina laughed in that way of hers. “You are way too invested in this.”
Catherine shrugged.
Oh, well.
She made no apologies.
“Someone has to be.”
“Couldn’t you share this investment of yours with your husband?” Catrina asked.
Catherine fake pouted. “God, Ma, why do you have to ruin everything?”
“How did I ruin it?”
“Just …” Catherine turned to look for Cece and Juan again, but it seemed the two had disappeared. Not the other friends, though. Cece’s little group of girls were still in full teenage girl mode in their semi-circle. Cece and Juan, though? Gone. “Where did they go?”
“Catherine, let them have time alone. You know, like I used to do for you.”
She gave her mother a look. “I’m not … getting in their business, Ma.”
“Spying is the same—”
“Did you see where they went, or not?”
Catrina sighed, and rolled her eyes. “They went into the back hallway. I am going to go find your father. He knows how to mind his business.”
“Whatever, Ma.”
Catherine was already leaving her mother behind. She moved through the chatting people, and slipped into the back hallway at the same time she heard the backdoor close. A backdoor that led out to their porch.
Soon, Catherine had slipped into Cross’s music room, and was peering out the window to check on her daughter there. Cece and Ju
an were sitting on the porch swing—fingers woven tightly together, and swinging back and forth.
Still quite innocent.
Still closing distance.
That was enough for her, really.
Catherine stepped back away from the window, done with her spying. She really didn’t mean to intrude on her daughter, or anything like that. She was simply excited for Cece because she knew how long her daughter had been waiting for something like this to happen.
“Catty?”
Catherine nearly fell over her own two feet as she spun around. Cross stood in the music room’s doorway with a cocked brow. “Hi. Hey. Wh—”
“What are you doing?”
“Nothing.”
Cross gave her a look. “Right, okay.”
“Come on, let’s—”
Cross rocked back on his heels a bit, and peered out the back door. He probably had the perfect view of his daughter and Juan sitting together. Holding hands.
Catherine looked out her window.
Oh, wonderful.
They were kissing now.
A quick kiss.
Nothing more.
Cece initiated it, by the looks of things. And she quickly pulled away too with a sly little grin, and a laugh Catherine could only see, but not quite hear.
Oh.
“Spying, I think,” Cross murmured.
Catherine looked back to her husband. “Sorry.”
“You didn’t think to tell me?”
“I’m not even supposed to know, really.”
“Ah.”
Catherine moved away from the window lest the two outside notice her, and came closer to her husband. Cross, despite being very protective of Cece when it came to boys and dating, seemed to be doing okay at the moment.
Maybe that was the most surprising thing of all.
“How bad do you want to go out there?” she asked him.
Cross grinned. “I’m okay, actually.”
“You sure?”
“Well … you remember the last time Miguel came to visit?”
“Last month,” Catherine said. “Yeah, why?”
“Juan asked me then about taking Cece out.”
Catherine’s brow raised high. “And you didn’t think to tell me?”
Cross shrugged. “I told him no.”
She stiffened. “What—why?”
“Not no that they couldn’t … continue to be whatever the fuck they are. What are they, anyway?”
