We climbed into my car, and disappointment flooded into me like the waves crashing out of a broken dam. My cell phone was sitting on my seat, and I had ten missed calls, all from of my brothers, Ricky, and Molly. It had to be important.
I opened my mouth, but Stacy held up a hand. “I know, and it’s okay, but I expect another orchid.”
That was the least of what I planned to bring her when we could finally consummate our newfound passion. “You got it.”
18
Gabriel
I drove onto my family’s estate with more than a little pep in my step. It would have been nice to have gone back to Stacy’s and celebrated our new relationship, but when I was finally able to dig into all of my family’s attempts to get a hold of me, they were all relieved to hear I was okay and ordered me back to our family’s estate immediately. When I pulled onto the property, I was shocked and a little afraid to see that both Alessandro’s and Marco’s trucks were present. Both my brothers were mysteriously in town now. I couldn’t have wagered a guess as to the severity of the situation I’d missed while I was off confessing my love to Stacy and reminiscing about my d
ad, but all three of my brothers were probably going to run me through for not being immediately available.
I climbed out of my truck and made sure I was expedient in heading in through the front doors, up two sets of stairs, and down to Luca’s office. I was out of breath when I was finally knocking on the doors a few minutes later, but it was worth it not to waste any more time.
“Gabe?” Luca called out.
“Yeah.”
The door opened for me, with Molly’s hand on the handle. I scuttled over the door frame into the room and was immediately crushed beneath the pressure in the room. The tension was thick and nearly visible, and everyone was staring at me as if I was a ghost.
“Are you hurt?” Luca started.
Alessandro and Marco were sitting in the two chairs that opposed Luca’s desk, but moving through the room to the couch was a little too ominous a task. I just stayed standing near the door after Molly closed it and returned to her typical spot at Luca’s side.
“No,” I replied. “I’m sorry. I was…” Making up an excuse wasn’t a good idea, but I’d been careful not to mention Stacy to Luca. Not having a legitimate reason for being late, the wrath that might bring was better than involving Stacy in the life any more than she needed to be. “I shouldn’t have been unreachable. I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.”
“We thought you were dead,” Luca continued his lecture. “It’s not that I want total control over your life. You have no idea how panicked we were. I need you to have your phone on you at all times.”
Now probably wasn’t a good time to mention that I wasn’t used to my brothers giving a shit about me at all, so I just opted for a dull, “You’re right.” I looked at the concerned expressions on everyone’s faces and finally decided to ask. “What happened.”
“The Binachis moved,” Molly responded. “On me.”
My stomach settled somewhere around my shoes. “What?”
“And Willow,” Alessandro said.
Marco nodded. “And Kelly.”
Luca’s hands were folded on top of his desk in that smug, business way, and his leer shifted from me to Alessandro. “It seems like the conversation Alessandro had with Anthony Carducci kicked something off.”
I felt my heart start to go faster and faster like someone was button-smashing the accelerator on a treadmill. “Are they okay?”
Molly was right in front of me, but if Willow and Kelly had been threatened, and the guys were here—
“They’re at Willow’s parents’ place. They’re heavily guarded. Ricky and Sasha took the kids. They…” Marco swallowed hard as he explained. “They won’t tell us where. They say it’s too dangerous.”
“All of them?” I asked, looking around at everyone’s pained expressions before I finally landed on Molly. More than being a wife, more than running part of the business, being a mom was her life. She loved her kids more than herself. “Anna and Antonio?”
Molly nodded slowly. “They were with me when someone approached me at the grocery store. I was armed, fortunately, but he tried…he tried to take them from me.”
“Kelly was at a check-up. She had Amanda with her because I was at work. She walked into the doctor’s office, and they’d slit the doctor’s throat and were standing there, waiting.” I could hear the wood splintering under the arm of Marco’s chair as he gripped it tightly.
The world was spinning around me, and I felt like I was going to be sick. I looked at Alessandro, and he perked up immediately. “Willow was at the park with Alexis. She had a gun on her, and the guy didn’t want to draw attention, so he left.”
Relief filled me, knowing they all were safe, but I could feel my brothers’ rage. Whatever fleeting ideas any of them had about wanting to be out of the business were long gone, they were going to storm after the Binachis with everything they had, legal or not.
“Before the guy left Willow,” Alessandro continued, “he said, ‘No kids yet for the last one, right?’”