Shadow Flight (Shadow Riders 5)

“We’re in the living room, Stefano.” His voice carried, although he used a low tone.

There wasn’t so much as a whisper of sound, but Stefano entered, leading the way. Behind him, one man, tall with broad shoulders and a wealth of dark hair, the same piercing blue eyes that marked him as a Ferraro, followed. Severino, the oldest of his cousins from Los Angeles, was very reminiscent of Stefano in that he had taken over his family early. His parents were deceased, a terrible blow to riders everywhere, leaving Severino to care for his siblings at a young age. He had refused to allow other families to break them up. Like Stefano, he’d taken full responsibility.

Behind Severino came a beautiful woman, his youngest sibling, Velia. She was tall and elegant, looking every inch a supermodel. Her hair was braided in a thick long rope, but Taviano had seen it many times falling in dark waves to her waist. She had the inevitable curves of the women in their family, and the pinstriped suit emphasized her narrow waist and long legs. She flashed a smile at him in greeting and turned that radiant smile on his woman.

Behind her were two more of her brothers. Marzio, one of the toughest of the Ferraros, had a reputation among the riders for being someone ready to defend his family immediately. He was quiet, much like Vittorio, but he stepped in front of any of his brothers or his sister if there was trouble.

Beside Marzio was Tore. Taviano had known him all his life, yet he was the cousin he knew the least about. Tore stayed in the background, and he was no different now. He greeted them with a nod, acknowledging the introduction to Nicoletta, accepting the refresher and then stepping back into the corner, as if standing guard over all of them.

“Thank you for providing Nicoletta with clothes, Velia,” Taviano said. “We both really appreciated it.”

Nicoletta nodded, coming around to seat herself beside him. Taviano immediately took her hand and pressed her palm to his thigh.

“Yes, I was wearing only Taviano’s shirt, so I really needed them.”

Taviano was proud of the fact that she didn’t sound nervous. She seemed confident, a hostess in her own home. He liked that.

Velia smiled, looking somewhat amused. “I’ll bet you had to roll the pants up in order to walk in them.”

Nicoletta laughed. “That’s true. You are a bit taller. Otherwise, everything fit nicely.”

“I love the house, Taviano,” Velia said. “It’s different, but beautiful.”

“I’m not someone who wants to live in a city,” he admitted. “Fortunately, Nicoletta doesn’t mind escaping from all the noise and lights with me.”

“Let’s get down to business,” Severino said abruptly.

Velia heaved a sigh. “Seriously, Sev, you have to develop some kind of skills with people or you’ll never find a woman to put up with you. This is called being civil. We’re exchanging niceties.”

Marzio might have snickered. Stefano hid a smirk behind his hand.

“Well, exchange them another time,” Severino snapped, glaring at his sister.

She wasn’t in the least bit fazed. “Nicoletta will think you’re scary when you’re really a teddy bear.” She blew her brother a kiss.

He sent her a smoldering look, but Taviano could see that his dark eyes had softened when they rested on his sister.

“There appears to be a rift happening in the Demons with the leadership of the Valdez brothers,” Marzio explained when Severino nodded to him. “We have their main meeting house in LA wired, and we’ve picked up some interesting conversations. Tonio Valdez is president in LA, but he answers to Benito, just as all the brothers do. The brothers all have their own territories that they’ve worked hard at building up. It seems that every time they get ahead, making money for their own locals, Benito takes it. He says it is his due as the president of the Demons.”

Nicoletta inadvertently dug her fingers into Taviano’s leg every time Valdez was mentioned. He felt the tremor run through her body. He knew she was afraid of the brutish leader of the Demons. There was no way to prevent her from feeling that same terror she had felt when she was a teen and the president of the Demons was determined to have her as his “wife.”

“Nicoletta disappeared from the apartment, and the Demons had it completely surrounded,” Stefano said. “Benito had been watching to make certain she didn’t try to run from her step-uncles and him, so no one ever saw anyone going into the building or leaving it. No cameras or cells picked up anyone coming or going, yet all three of the Gomez brothers were dead from broken necks, and Nicoletta vanished. That left an impression.”

“Yes, it did,” Marzio agreed. “So, you can imagine what kind of craziness erupted when the same thing happened in LA, with Jorge running back to the warehouse and reporting that Armando Lupez, the man Benito sent out from New York and Tonio so graciously got tickets to the Kain Diakos concert for, was dead of a broken neck along with a member from LA.”