by Bethany-Kris
That was that.
Tom found his mother in her library. A massive, bookshelves from floor to vaulted ceiling, room in the mansion that Abriella hid in more often than not. Family portraits—young and old—covered one far wall. A wall of bay of windows overlooked the estate grounds, showcasing colorful leaves littering the ground.
His mother smiled over at him from her white chaise as he entered the space. She rested her book beside her, and waved him further in.
Old paper, leather, and ink wafted through the air. Vanilla and lavender followed right behind. His mother loved her candles and oils. Teas and sweets.
This was Abriella Trentini Rossi’s space.
Her room.
No one else’s.
Here, Tom knew his mother worried about nothing. She shed no tears. Other worlds sucked her in, and she only came out when called.
Like now.
“Hey, baby,” Abriella said.
Tom bent down to kiss his mother on the top of her dark-haired head. “Hey, Ma.”
“You look … stressed.”
“That obvious?”
His mother smiled a little. “Always, to me.”
“Dad said I need to take a break.”
“I bet he’s right, Tom.”
“I bet we won’t tell him that, will we?”
Abriella’s smile bloomed wider. “Never.”
Her hand patted his cheek with a soft touch, but she said nothing to push him on what was wrong, or how he planned to fix it beyond what he already offered. It was one of the many reasons why he loved his mother.
“Sit for a while,” she told him. “I’ll read to you.”
“What, like when I was a boy?”
“Reading is good for the soul, Tom.”
“Depends on what you’re reading, Ma.”
“A thriller.”
Tom could do that. He grabbed one of the leather chairs, and pulled it closer. Sinking into the seat, his mother started to read. Between the silence of the library, the familiar scents clinging to his every breath, and the comfort of his mother’s presence, he could almost sleep. He was relaxed.
Problem was, as soon as he left the mansion, it would all be gone.
That’s when Tom got it.
He was looking for something like his home. Or he needed something like it. He just didn’t know what in the hell that even was.
Tom unceremoniously dumped a black duffle bag on the foot of his bed as he dialed a familiar number on the phone, and put it to his ear. His two-level house just outside of the city limits wasn’t anything to scoff at, but it didn’t feel like home to him, either. He’d bought it on a whim, as his trust fund afforded him the ability to do so before he had been making decent money himself. He had wanted to be closer to business and family and not right in the heart of Chicago in a cramped apartment.
He hadn’t even bothered to really decorate the place.
In his ear, he heard the call click.
“Donati here,” a familiar voice answered.
Tom balanced the phone between his shoulder and ear as he grabbed a couple of things from the closet. “Cross, man, what’s up?”
“Not much, Tom. Something come up with the next run, or what?”
“Nope.”
Tom wasn’t surprised the first thing Cross thought at his phone call was business. It was just who Cross Donati was at the end of the day. Business first, and everything else was secondary. Cross came from a New York Cosa Nostra family—another boss’s son, like Tom. The two had made fast friends when Cross and Tom got put together as partners when the Outfit started trafficking guns. It helped that Cross was only a couple of years older than Tom, but didn’t treat him like a kid, or as though he was where he was because of his last name.
Their friendship lasted.
A couple of months back, Cross headed home to New York after living in Chicago for almost three years. He hadn’t been back, but a gun run was coming up soon. Tom figured he would see his friend then.
Fate had different plans.
“You busy?” Tom asked.
Cross chuckled dryly. “Man, I am always busy. Not more than usual, though. Heading over to my parents’ place today to see them.”
“No, I mean for the next week or so. Maybe more.”
“What?”
“I thought I might visit,” Tom said.
“Door’s always open for you, Tom.”
New York was a sufficient distance from Chicago to make it worth the cramped flight. A familiar face made it welcoming enough, too.
“My flight leaves tomorrow in the morning,” Tom said.
“Let me know when you land.”
Friends like Cross were hard to come by.
CHAPTER TWO
“THIS IS your wakeup call, Cam!”
Brothers—but especially older brothers—were things made by the Devil. Camilla Donati would fight anybody who tried to tell her differently. Her brother in particular was the very worst when it came to making her life a special kind of hell.
She still loved him.
He was one of her very best friends.
Soft thumps hit the wall as her brother came closer to the bedroom.
“Come on, Cam. Get up. Right now.”
“Fuck off,” Camilla grumbled from beneath the mound of blankets. “It’s Saturday morning, Cross. Go away.”
His voice came louder and clearer then. “Nope.”
“Oh, my God. He’s hot, but he’s so fucking annoying that it makes me want to kill him.”
“I did hear that,” Cross deadpanned.
Cool air hit Camilla’s skin a second before the blankets fell to the floor. Both Camilla, and her friend who had opted to sleep over instead of catching a cab home, glared up at Cross. August hadn’t lied—Cross was handsome, dark-eyed, black hair, and strong features. He didn’t lack in female attention, as far as that went.
Her brother just didn’t entertain the attention.
August groaned again and rolled over in the bed. “I hate your stupid, pretty face, Cross.”
“Pretty is kind of insulting. I’m not a boy.”
“Want me to call it ugly?”
“Yeah, but it’s not,” Cross replied. “Cam, get out of bed. You’re late for breakfast. Ma and Cal sent me over to yank your ass up.”
Camilla grabbed the blanket from the floor, and tossed it over herself once more. “Tell them I’ll be around.”
“You partied last night, didn’t you?”
“New club in Coney,” August answered. “It was the shit.”
“Cam, you’re not even legal age to drink,” her brother muttered. “And August is two years younger—”
“Almost two years younger,” August jumped in. “I turned eighteen in August, thanks.”
“Nice to know you’re legal for something else, now, but that’s not the point.”
Camilla peeked over at her friend to see August’s dark chestnut skin had flushed with a heated crimson hue at the surface of her cheeks. August took after her Nigerian mother in her features, while her Italian, lawyer father had taught his daughter to take no shit.
August had something akin to a crush on Camilla’s older brother since the two girls met in high school. Cross treated August with the same annoying affection he gave to Camilla—like a little sister he was paid to bother. Besides, Camilla figured her brother was still too caught up on somebody from his past to notice anyone else.
“Get out of my room,” Camilla told her brother. “Better yet, get out of my apartment.”
“Can’t. Promised Ma and Cal, I would bring you to breakfast.”
At the thought of food, Camilla’s stomach threatened to revolt. She should not have taken those extra three Jell-O shots the night before.
“August can come, too.”
Her brother said it as though he was dangling an offer Camilla couldn’t refuse. She knew better.
“Internship starts today with the Bared Brands,” August said as she climbed
over Camilla in the bed. “I’m … Shit, get up, Cam. I’m going to be late.”
“Why does that mean I have to get up?”
“Because your stupid cotton pillowcases are a bitch on my hair when it’s not in a protective style, and I like the way you fixed it up the last time.”
Camilla grumbled, but forced her way out of the bed.
Cross headed for the door with a wave over his shoulder. “Thirty minutes, Cam.”
“Make me coffee, Cross!”
“I’ll think about it,” her brother shot back.
He would make her coffee.
She knew it.
Camilla had two best friends in the world.
One was August—the Brooklyn native with the crazy curls. The other had always been her big brother.
August passed over the conditioning pomade she kept at Camilla’s place—considering the two might as well be roommates a lot of the time—and took a seat in front of the vanity. Camilla gathered August’s thick, coarse hair with a practiced hand.
“Just like last time?” Camilla asked her friend.
In the mirror, August nodded. “Big pom, but tease it out like a faux-hawk down the top and middle. I need to get my braids in before winter comes.”
Camilla had spent a lot of time with August and her mom over the years of their friendship. Some of that time had been sitting in salons because her friend’s hair needed to be maintained no matter if she wore it natural, in braids, or with a weave. If anything, Camilla figured that’s where she had picked up some of her talent for fixing August’s wild hair, not to mention, her own …
Right now, Camilla’s hair was a platinum blonde mess with a purple fade of curls that needed a good soak in hot oils. August’s mom—Ada—had taught Camilla how to take care of her hair to an extreme given the abuse she put it through monthly.
Next week, it might be red, or back to brown. Maybe Camilla would put colorful streaks through it, or cut it all off.
She never kept one style for long.
“You know you’re going to be amazing today, right?” Camilla asked.
August’s russet gaze met Cam’s dark brown eyes in the mirror. “Kind of nervous. I feel like Dad got me this, and not you know, me.”
“First, maybe your dad put in a good word, but who cares? Graphic design, marketing, and branding—that’s your focus for college. This one-year internship with Bared Brands is going to be fucking awesome for that.”
Plus, August was smart as hell. Skipped a grade in middle school, got a scholarship into the prestigious private school Camilla attended, and a full ride for college. Her friend could and would do whatever she put her mind to.
“Maybe.”
“Keep me updated through the day.”
August cocked a brow. “Girl, did you think I would do anything different?”
Not at all.
“About the club thing—”
Camilla held up a single finger to shush her brother without saying a word. She took a long sip from the coffee he’d handed over in a to-go mug from her cupboards. The creamy, sweet drink perked her up just enough to be agreeable.
“Never talk to me before coffee, Cross. You know this.”
Her brother’s familiar brown gaze rolled upward. He navigated the city streets to head east. Breakfast at a Newport restaurant on Saturdays was a new thing their parents wanted to do ever since Cross came home from Chicago a couple of months earlier.
“How’d you get into the club?” her brother asked.
Camilla smiled slyly. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
“Do you know the security at the door, or did someone get you a fake ID?”
“Both?”
“Cam.”
She shrugged. “Guess we’re going to pretend like you weren’t the biggest trouble making shit on the planet from the time you were thirteen, huh?”
Cross cleared his throat. “This is not about me. It’s about you. I’m … looking out for you. Yeah, that works.”
“Bullshit. I paid Zeke.”
“I knew that bastard got you a fake ID,” Cross bitched under his breath.
Her brother’s best friend was way off-limits for Camilla in any kind of way—though he was cute, and probably a good time—because the guy treated her like a little sister. A side effect of having grown up around the guy since she was born.
“Be nice. He was looking out for me since you were in Chicago and all.”
Cross nodded. “Right, by getting you into clubs.”
“Like you never used to go into clubs with Catherine Marcello when she wasn’t legal age?”
Her brother stiffened in the driver’s seat of his Porsche at the mention of his ex. Camilla half-smiled to herself, but hid it by taking another drink of coffee. The best way to get Cross off a topic of conversation was to put his ex into it.
“At least it was just August in your bed this morning.”
Camilla snorted. “I apologized for the guy, Cross.”
“He had nothing on, Camilla.”
“And the girl,” she added. “I apologized for her, too.”
That was the first time her brother found out Camilla didn’t have a preference when it came to hooking up with somebody. As long as the guy or girl was going to be a good time, she was all for it. They had to be gone by morning, or soon after—that was her deal.
Camilla didn’t do relationships. She was too young, and having too much fun being nineteen, in college, and out on her own to settle down with somebody. Any relationship she did dabble in was done almost as soon as it started.
She found boys to be like toys. Fun to look at, cool to play with, but then she quickly lost interest. Although, she had never gotten into a relationship beyond sex with a woman, she figured it would probably end up being the same.
Camilla’s interest just couldn’t be kept for longer than it took to have an orgasm … or five.
That didn’t stop people from trying, though.
“I mean,” Cross said, glancing over at his sister, “the girl definitely wasn’t too bad to look at other than the fact she tried to kill me with one of your crystals. You know, when she threw it at my fucking head.”
Camilla laughed.
So she had an active sex life. Her brother liked to pick on her about it sometimes, but he never made her feel like she was doing something wrong. He never shamed her for the choices she made, and instead, only asked if she was safe and okay.
She loved her brother for that, really.
“She thought you were breaking into my place or something,” Camilla said.
“Because we don’t look like siblings at all,” Cross replied wryly.
He was right. The two shared the dominate Donati features, but where Cross took a stronger, more masculine version, Camilla was the lighter, feminine side. He was sharp lines, and she was soft curves. She barely reached five-foot-six in heels, while he towered over six feet. Her brother smiled, and showed off cut-from-stone cheekbones, and she carried her mother’s delicate nose and petite figure.
A person couldn’t miss how much the two looked similar, though.
“Maybe she thought you were going to try to join in or something,” Camilla said. “Some people are freaky like that—the whole sibling get up, you know.”
Cross made a gagging noise in the back of his throat. “That’s enough of that. Jesus Christ.”
A dinging bell took Camilla’s attention away from her brother for the moment. A notification on her cell phone let her know that the paper she needed to have in on Monday was now pushed back until Friday. Apparently, the professor for the class had come down with some kind of wicked bug and would not be back in classes until Friday.
School was the one and only thing Camilla did not mess around with. Her social and personal life did not get in the way of her schooling. From Monday to Friday, she was ass-in-chair at every class, lecture, and whatever else she needed to do.
Her goal to become a NICU nurse—to take care of premature ba
bies like she had been once—would not be screwed up by any-fucking-thing. Camilla would make sure of it. No matter what she had to do.
“Yes.”
She did a little happy dance in the passenger seat.
“What’s going on now?” Cross asked.
“The rest of my weekend just opened up, big brother.”
Cross smirked. “Oh, how so?”
“Nothing due for school. Nothing to do. August is going to be busy, busy. Free weekend.”
“Zeke is having a house party tonight.”
Camilla did like the sound of that. “Who’s going?”
“Our people,” her brother said. “Some you know, and some you don’t. Better than a club.”
“That’s debatable. Besides, it’ll be awesome because I’m going. Anywhere I go is fucking awesome, thank you very much.”
“Yes, Camilla, because you vomit glitter and piss fabulous. I don’t need the lecture again.”
“Is it a lecture if it’s true?”
She grinned at him.
He just shook his head.
“You love me,” she said.
“Just enough not to hate you, sure,” Cross replied. “I don’t know how you manage to have a hangover and still be this annoying first thing in the morning.”
“Or is it that you don’t like how I turn conversations around on you.”
“You know what, it’s both.”
Camilla smiled sweetly at him, but said nothing.
She didn’t need to.
Her point was made.
It was another forty-five minutes of Cross and Camilla seeing who could annoy the other the most before her brother pulled into the parking lot of a familiar restaurant. Inside the cozy, homey decorated Newport bistro, they found their parents already waiting at a table close to the windows, and with a spread of food on the table.
Camilla’s hangover was all but gone.
Her stomach growled instead.
She put the thoughts of food aside for the moment to deal with greeting her waiting parents. They always came first when the two were in the room. She loved Calisto and Emma beyond measure because they never forgot to love her—ever.
