by Bethany-Kris
Cross.
His godfather.
Naz’s dad.
He thought, of course.
But also, why.
“We’re here for one reason,” Dare said, the first to break the silence and restart the conversation. “I was gracious enough to at least allow you to make an offer ...” The man’s gaze slid Luca’s way before he added, “And I understand why, so do so before I change my mind.”
Cross dragged in a hard breath. “You won’t even entertain Penny?”
“No.”
“Cross,” Zeke said.
Now, his father was looking at him. The worry in Zeke’s eyes was clear—bright like the sun on a summer’s day when the sky was wide, and blue. If he regretted anything, it was that. Sure, they had their issues, but Zeke was still his father at the end of the day. He tried to keep that in mind now.
“I know,” Cross told his best friend, before turning back to Dare. “Fine. Luca is returned—he is off the market and not to be touched otherwise. In return, I don’t interfere with your business in New York or make any calls to make it harder for you to do said business.”
Wait—
“They’re going to go after Penny,” Luca said, the words bursting from his mouth before he could stop them. They had to understand what it meant to do what they were doing here. “You’re going to let them—”
“Exactly that, yes,” Cross told him, nodding once. Then, to Dare, he asked, “Does that work for you?”
“It does,” Dare replied.
That was that.
The men in black backed off. Dare and Cree had already turned to head for the private hangar while the team of men who had been watching Luca followed behind. The three men—including him—that were left outside said nothing as the wind picked up again.
It sounded like a whine. Or maybe a howl. It reminded him of the sound an animal made when it was in pain. He hated to think that was God’s way of warning him of just how much this would soon hurt.
LUCA DIDN’T COMPLAIN when he was dropped off at the front entrance of his apartment building the night before, but only because he was two seconds away from falling over his own two feet. Exhaustion was a real thing. He wasn’t, however, impressed at the fact someone decided to knock on his door before the sun had even risen in the sky.
He was still trying to rub the sleep out of his eyes, and drop the bad attitude, when he ripped the door of his apartment open to see who was waiting on the other side.
Cross.
In nothing but boxer-briefs, Luca was in no way ready to wake up, let alone invite someone into his place, but his godfather stood on the other side of the threshold like that was exactly what he expected to happen. He couldn’t say that was going to work out for the man. Even if Cross did look like he was ready to start his day in a three-piece suit with his hair slicked back and shoes shined.
Luca held tight to the door, not opening it further or moving an inch when he said, “You need something?”
Because after the night before and the things he learned, Luca couldn’t say he was willing to provide anything Cross might need. The only good thing about not being made—at the moment—was the fact he didn’t actually have to answer to this man, anyway.
Cross gave him a look, and then the door Luca was keeping mostly closed against his side. “Are you going to keep me out here in the hallway?”
“Considering it.”
“Luca—”
“I’m busy. Places to be, Naz to see,” Luca said, shrugging.
Cross cleared his throat, sucking hair between his teeth after before he muttered, “Naz is busy, Luca.”
“Too busy to see me?”
His best friend?
Right now?
Luca didn’t think so.
“Actually,” Cross said, folding his arms over his chest and looking at Luca in the way he would when he was a kid. But that shit didn’t work on him anymore—not when this man did it, or when his own father tried it. Three decades of life under his belt made him immune to most of that nonsense, and he couldn’t say he was sorry about it, either. “Naz doesn’t even know you’re back in the city yet. It all happened fast ... I used that to my advantage.”
Yeah.
Luca bet.
“Something else you’re hiding, then,” Luca noted.
Cross didn’t like that.
He didn’t even try to hide it.
“Hey, watch your fucking tone with—”
Nah.
“I’m good,” Luca said, stepped back from the doorway and closing the door on his godfather, telling him at the same time, “Keep in mind, I’m not your man. Not made, remember? If I don’t want to do this, or anything else, with you, then I don’t have to.”
The door was about to click shut, but Cross’s next words stopped Luca from letting it close entirely.
“But if you want to help Penny, you’re going to have to do everything you don’t want to do and more,” he said.
Luca hesitated.
He didn’t open the door back up right away. In fact, his hand tightened around the handle so much that his knuckles turned white as he considered those words and what they might mean. The lump growing in his throat certainly didn’t help matters, either.
“And I know,” his godfather added, “about you and her.”
That took Luca an extra minute.
Maybe two.
Cross didn’t mind the silence because he used that time to his advantage to keep talking. “Thank The League for keeping me informed—part of their obligation to the old contract. See, I put a lot of money on the table for Penny to be able to do what she’s done in these past five years, and that gave me ... certain rights to information about her business.”
“Did she know that you knew—”
“Yes on some things. Maybe not on others. I wasn’t given the information to use it against her, if that’s what you’re asking. Sometimes, it was just good to be informed.”
“Naz doesn’t know that me and her—he doesn’t know shit about it yet.”
“I figured,” Cross murmured. “But the better question is what do you know?”
Luca swallowed hard as he swung the door open further. Leaning against the doorjamb, he crossed his arms and muttered, “A lot of it. Where she’s been, what she’s been doing ... everything happening now.”
“And her mother?”
He nodded once.
That was enough for Cross.
“Then you should also know what it means for her mother to do what she’s done in recent weeks,” Cross said.
Luca couldn’t help the harsh sigh that passed his lips as he scrubbed a hand over his freshly shaven face. At least, he managed that and a shower the night before. “I’m starting to figure it out, yeah.”
“She’s put herself back in the public sphere in a way that she hopes will protect her—or at least give her a wider space for safety—from Penny while she attempts to rebuild what remains of the organization she controls with her own father. Allegra Dunsworth is not an easy target, Luca. Penny knew it when she first went into it and—”
“Penny is in a bad position.”
“Especially because she decided to go AWOL now. Anyone,” Cross said, giving Luca a look, “anyone at all close to her or even attached to her name is at risk of being put on The Elite’s radar. A way they can get to her, if needed. The Elite is bigger than just North America—there was a reason she was overseas for as long as she was.”
“Except she needs to finish what she started,” Luca replied.
Because that much was clear.
Why else would Penny do this?
“I did what I could,” Cross said, flipping over one hand when he added, “and the rest is on her. The better question, is what does that mean for you. What are you going to do?”
Was that why his godfather showed up—just to ask that question?
Luca did think so.
“I’m going to help her. The same thing I’ve always
done,” Luca said.
It was the only thing he knew how to do. It was the how he planned to do anything at all that he hadn’t quite figured out yet. Unfortunately, he was running on limited time to get that shit worked out, and he couldn’t do that standing at the front door of his apartment.
If there was anything he learned about Penny in all the years he spent chasing her, it was that she knew how to disappear.
“But I can’t help her standing here with you,” Luca said, turning back to his apartment and ready to close the door again. “You already know that, zio.”
It’d been years since he called Cross that.
He heard the man’s sigh before Cross said, “You can’t tell him, Luca. Naz, I mean. You can’t say a word about my involvement with Penny or The League. He’ll learn in his own time, but not because you told him.”
Well ...
“I can’t promise that,” Luca replied.
He didn’t promise anything.
Not anymore.
5.
Luca
BY the time Luca did make it to Naz’s house just outside of the city it was well past dinner time, and the sun had already started to set. He didn’t exactly plan to be that late but shit happened. Like a phone call from his mother which ended up morphing into a chat with his father as well despite the man being on the tarmac the night before when Luca arrived back in New York.
After that, he needed an entire drink—and then a second—to compose himself before he was even ready to consider leaving his apartment. But then the landlord showed up with a fucking attitude because Luca hadn’t been around to drop off his rent for the month. As if he didn’t typically pay several months ahead, and this was the first time he was late.
If it wasn’t one thing, it was another. The saying rang true—when it rained, it poured. Maybe he was just getting used to the world dumping trash on him because Luca took it all in stride. Or, he tried.
He was still late to show up at Naz’s—too late, really. Even he knew it. He certainly didn’t expect to walk through the front door and find the house lit up in all corners with life bustling all around, but he didn’t expect to find the quiet, somber mood he did, either.
Nor did he think his sister would be sitting on the entry stairs with a mug of hot coffee between her palms, staring at him like he owed her something. Maybe he did, even if he didn’t want to admit it. It wasn’t just Naz that he had been keeping secrets from lately. Although, the choice not to tell Roz the truth about his business looking for Penny hadn’t been one he personally made. That was something Naz made the final call on—Luca hadn’t argued the pros or cons.
Not his wife, not his life.
Right?
“Naz told you, then?” he asked Roz.
It took his sister a moment to respond. Her fingers flexed around the ceramic mug while her throat bobbed with an audible swallow. A good sign that she was angry and trying not to show it. Family was important—it was a rule that had been drilled into the two of them for longer than Luca cared to remember. A good rule, though. At least, it allowed them to consider their words before they spoke them aloud to one another.
“I’m mad at him, too,” Roz whispered.
Holding back tears, he knew. He could hear it in her voice, but that was also why she wouldn’t look up at him. She didn’t want him to see the water in her eyes.
“I’m mad at Naz, too,” she said, louder the second time but still sure and clear. “Because he told me years ago that you had stopped looking—there was no hope. He didn’t have answers, and I should move on, Luca. And then what, I turn around and find out that’s all you’ve ever done—but oh, you found her, too. You found Penny, but she’s—”
“I’m sorry,” Luca murmured.
Roz shook her head, a sad laugh leaving her frowning lips as she gathered her thoughts. He let her. What else could he do?
“Naz says it’s bad,” Roz eventually said, the first between them to break the silence.
“He’s not lying.”
“Well, forgive me if it’s hard to trust—”
“Roz,” Luca said, stepping closer so that he could kneel down in front of his sister. She still didn’t want to look at him where she sat in her shorts and tank top pajama set on her stairs, but she eventually did. “You’ve known Naz for as long as you’ve been alive—don’t ever say you can’t trust him. You know that’s not true.”
She sniffled but nodded once. “Still mad.”
“Be mad if you need.”
“Yeah, okay.” Roz lifted one shoulder and looked upward when she said, “He’s in his office. We’re ... or he, is doing a thing. Letting me be by myself for a bit.”
“How loud did you yell?”
Because Roz never yelled. She was a lot like their mother in that way—Katya Puzza didn’t raise her voice unless it was the last option. And when she did yell, everybody knew shit was about to go down and to get out of the way.
“Pretty loud,” she said softly, ashamed.
Luca gave her a small smile. “Sometimes, we need that. Guys, I mean. Draw the lines, Roz, and fucking hold them.”
His sister didn’t respond, but Luca figured she didn’t need to. On his way past Roz to climb the stairs and find Naz, he dropped a kiss to the top of her head. She could be mad, like he said, and eventually ... she wouldn’t be. Perhaps then, they could really talk about this. The entire fucking mess. Or maybe they wouldn’t say anything at all. Whatever she needed, he was good with it. He owed her that, at the very least.
Luca passed his godson’s bedroom on his way to Naz’s upstairs office. He was sure he saw little Cross tucked comfortably under his blankets, but he didn’t dare linger at the doorway for too long. The boy should sleep, and just because Luca hadn’t seen the kid in weeks didn’t mean he had any right to wake him up when it wouldn’t be him putting Cross back to bed.
Naz was barking into the phone when Luca did walk into his office. He barely even passed his best friend a look as he told whoever was on the phone to, “You better get that fucking shit done—if I have to come down there and make sure you do it, I will, but I promise you won’t like what comes after, Lou. Don’t test my kindness. It’s quickly running out.”
He slammed the phone down to the receiver with enough force that a frame fell over on the desk. Naz didn’t even bother to correct it before his angry, sharp gaze turned on Luca.
“Dad handled it, then?” Naz asked.
Luca raised a brow. “Handled what?”
“You. I figured you were in some kind of shit when you called, so I got him on the phone. I didn’t have much to go on but here you are. Things worked out I see.”
Luca swallowed hard. “Yeah, you could say that.”
Or he could say how Naz’s father was one of the reasons why they were in this entire situation in the first goddamn place, but—
“I’m sitting boss,” Naz told him.
Luca stiffened. “What?”
“There wasn’t any warning. Dad stepped back at tribute a couple of weeks ago, and put me on the spot. It wasn’t like I didn’t see it coming—he already had me doing more shit than I should have been. So yeah, you’re looking at the boss of the Donati family. This life doesn’t stop for anything, Luca.”
Right.
Not even when the world did.
Luca knew it better than anyone—he’d grown up watching his father sacrifice his personal life and time to the mafia time and time again. Even when his wife would beg him to make time for her and the kids when shit was really bad, Zeke ended up saying the same thing.
Famiglia first.
Family business always came first.
Luca just couldn’t help but wonder if Cross putting his son in his place to handle the business side of things was circumstance—because it was time for it to happen—or something else ... like maybe another way to keep Naz busy and out of his father’s private affairs. Say, what was currently happening with The League and Penny.
Naz d
idn’t give him a chance to voice what Luca knew or even his thoughts before he asked, “What do you know—what happened?”
“You want it all, or cliff notes?”
Naz arched a brow. “Probably both.”
Well, then ...
“That’s fair,” Luca murmured.
“How long were you with her before ... what, she went missing again, right?”
“I think they didn’t give her a choice.”
“They?”
“The League.”
Naz nodded, and scrubbed a hand down his jaw. “And you—but you were with her.”
“For a little while. By chance, really. I didn’t find her because I did anything different. It just happened. I was fucking lucky, but it was also fast ... it wasn’t a good situation. She already had people hunting her down before I even came on the damn scene, you know?”
“No.”
Luca blinked, surprised at how sharply Naz said the word. “I—”
“No, I don’t fucking know! And you know why—because you didn’t tell me! Beyond the fact that you were doing this for me, that you were looking for her because of me, you didn’t even have the decency to let me know—”
“It’s not that simple, man. None of this was simple.”
“Fuck you.”
“Naz—”
“Fuck you.”
The unspoken I said what I said lingered between the two men, hanging heavily in the air like a poison that would easily kill them both. It was the Donati way, Luca knew. Donati men were all the same when it came right down to it, and Naz was no different than his father at the end of the day. Their stubborn streaks were legendary.
He knew when to push.
Or not.
Naz waved a hand, saying, “Start over—from the beginning. I want to know how this happened. I want to know why you’re standing here right now and she’s not. Tell me everything.”
Well ...
Luca would try.
He didn’t skimp on details—mostly. He started from the beginning like Naz wanted him to, from that night at the hotel, until the point the familiar man showed up to demand Penny return to Nevada. He kept out the personal shit, and he respected Cross wishes about keeping his involvement on the down-low but that was only because Luca didn’t know how to approach it yet.
