ChapterSeven
Looking over my shoulder, a smirk pulled at my lips as I watched Milo and Alicen sitting at a table across the little coffee shop from me. They both wore big black sunglasses, ball caps, and the collars of their coats pulled up around their faces. I don’t know why they thought that getup would keep them from being recognized, but it was hilarious to me. They stood out like sore thumbs in the busy coffee shop.
It was the same place I’d brought them when I told them all my secrets, and it was the place we’d come to meet up with Nico, Dante, Enzo, and Cole.
We were returning to school in a couple of days, and I hadn’t done any of the things I’d wanted over winter break. Instead, I’d spent almost the entire time in bed recovering. I’d like to think I was a little badass when it came to pushing through pain and getting shit done. Bouncing back after getting shot in the gut was a different kind of pain. One I hadn’t been able to function through. Even now, sitting at the table waiting for the Valentino boys, my body was screaming at me.
I've been trying to get up and around more and more over the last few days. If I was going to return to school and attempt to continue with plans to get to Gio, I would need to be able to move around with some kind of ease. I was moving slowly, but I was moving. That was better than nothing.
I’d made the decision to have this meeting with the boys, because I knew we’d be seeing each other at Carter P. Ellis High School come Monday. It would be best if we got this meeting out of the way. I didn’t want to have this conversation in mixed company.
I’d been surprised they hadn’t stormed into my apartment before now. I’d been expecting them to be waiting for me by the time I’d returned home from Santiago’s condo that first day. I’d never admit it to anyone, but as the days passed without any contact from them, I felt disappointment. I wasn’t sure what had been going on between us before the night at the docks, but there had been something there. Something that I thought would’ve had them coming to me. If not to try and get more of their questions answered, but to check on me at least. After all, Nico was the one to shoot me.
Jasper had not been happy about this plan. He was sitting at the table with Alicen and Milo. Minus the incognito dress up. He didn’t agree with me meeting the boys, but he wasn’t going to let me come here without him.
Since he’d rescued me from the warehouse, he hadn’t been too far from me at any given time. I knew he was wracking his brain to figure out a way to be with me at school. He agreed with my uncle when it came to me continuing to attend CPEHS. I still needed to graduate, and we would be remaining in Chicago until I got what I came for. Which meant it only made sense for me to continue to attend school. I could change schools but staying at CPEHS would allow me to keep eyes on Nico and the boys.
I still believed they could help me accomplish my goals. They might not want to, but they would do it without even knowing. When I’d sent the text message to Nico, I half expected him to blow me off. Since I hadn’t seen or heard from him in the weeks of break, I just assumed he wasn’t worried about what I was doing any longer. Perhaps he thought I would die from my wounds. Gain some kind of infection.
When I’d sent the text, he’d responded quickly. I could admit to myself that I felt good about that. It was almost as if he was waiting for me to contact him. It made a warm fuzzy feeling spark in my stomach. If he was waiting for my message, it probably had more to do with him trying to pin me down for the transgressions I’d committed against his family. It had nothing to do with him wanting to hear from me because he was worried about me.
The boy had me so twisted up in my feelings. It had been years since I had to worry about feeling anything other than anger and vengeance. Now I was feeling all kinds of fucked up things that I couldn’t even put a name to. Things that have me confused about what to do with the Valentino boys, and how to continue with my plans for Nico’s father.
Not to mention all the strange things that I’d started to discover about my uncle. Jasper was doing his research about the photo I found in the yearbook. Apparently, my Uncle Tony did attend school with Gio and my parents. He’d told me time and again that he didn’t know Gio before meeting him to help with his finances, but now I knew he was lying. He also never said that Gio and my parents were as close as they seemed in the photos from the yearbook.
Everything was fucking with my brain, but I needed to find a way to deal with it. I can’t focus on what I needed to if I was too worried about what I was feeling for Nico, Dante, Cole, and Enzo.
My expression went neutral, and my body went lax as the Valentino boys moved into the cafe and found seats in the space around me.
I wouldn’t let them know what their presence and absence did to me. This meeting wasn’t between me and the four boys at school that made my heart pound and my body sing like no one else ever had. This was between the assassin that had been leaving a bloody trail of bodies behind her and the men who she’s been waging war against for months. This wasn’t the time for heart eyes and coy smiles.
I could see the question in all their eyes as they stared at me. They wanted to know something, but they would have to ask the question if they wanted to hear the answer. I wasn’t giving anything away for free today. I kept my blue eyes locked with Nico’s as we sat in silence, daring him to ask what they all wanted to know.
“How are you feeling?” He didn’t disappoint. His question was asked in a gruff tone that was filled with an emotion that I didn’t want to look too closely at. It was an emotion that seemed just as shocked and confused as the ones that were running rampant through myself.
“Like I got shot, Nico. Like I got shot in the stomach and stitched back together in a dingy room by some backwater doctor that spends more time at the strip club than working in a hospital.” It’s possible that I was still a little salty about the whole situation. The fact that none of them had called to check on me or even show remorse for the whole thing might’ve been bothering me more than actually being shot.
There I went thinking about things that didn’t matter at the end of everything. They were protecting what was theirs from me. It would make sense that they would attack with guns blazing. I doubt I would show any remorse if I was the one to do the shooting.
“You look as if you’re doing alright,” Cole snarked at me from across the table.
“What can I say? I’m a survivor. It’ll take more than a little bullet to put me down. Try harder next time.”
“I didn’t know who you were. All I knew was someone was hurting, killing, my men, and we had to make it stop. Do you think I wanted to find you beneath that mask? Do you think it made me happy to find out I’d put that bullet in you, and that you were bleeding out at my feet?” Nico growled at me through clenched teeth. His fists were clenched on top of the table, and his eyes were staring into mine as if he could read my mind from that look alone.
“I don’t know what you want Nico. I do know that you strapped me to a chair and used the situation to your advantage so that you could torture and interrogate me. That to me doesn’t say you regretted anything that happened.” I wanted him to say he was sorry. I wanted to know if the boy I’d been letting close to me was real. He was Gio’s son, the heir to the family business, so it made sense that he would do whatever he needed to protect his family.
Yet, for months I’d seen short glimpses of someone else, and that was the person I needed him to show me right now. My wound was healing physically, but I was still festering about their involvement.
“Tell me you wouldn’t have done the same thing. Look me in the eye and tell me that if the situation had been reversed that you wouldn’t have done worse. From the moment you stepped into our school we knew there was something different about you, and now we know the extent of it. We’re the same. Two sides of the same coin, so I know what you would’ve done if you’d been the one to shoot me.”
He was right. I would’ve used him as I’d always planned to. If he’d been at my mercy, I would’ve done anything I could’ve to use him against Gio.
“School starts back on Monday. I figured it would be best to have this meeting now, before we cross paths in the hallways. I expect you to stay out of my way.”
“I don’t think so. If you think we’re going to leave you alone like we made the mistake of doing before you’re wrong. We allowed you to roam around our school, our city, without getting in your way for long enough. Long enough for you to take out members of our organization. I won’t let that happen again.” Dante leaned across the table and stared into my eyes.
Dante tended to keep his distance from me. He didn’t offer his opinion on any of Nico’s jobs. He did what was asked of him without hesitation or comment. He was going to make comments and demands when it came to me. I watched as his gaze trailed down from my face to the small bit of exposed skin of my chest. The red line of the cut he’d made just above my breasts wasn’t visible with my clothes on, but I could tell that he was imagining what that cut looked like on me. There might be some animosity from him towards me, but he still looked at me with desire.