Before Amara could give a response, she heard Morana’s voice.
“Oh, look Tristan, it’s your lizard ex,” Morana exclaimed from the door, rolling her eyes behind the glasses. She was in such contrast to Chiara, in black jeans and a blue printed t-shirt with ‘Nerd Life = Thug Life’. Amara felt her lips twitch at the quote and the way Morana openly glared at Chiara, coming to stand beside Amara in a clear show of support.
Tristan’s lips twitched too.
Damn, Morana was good for him.
Chiara glared at them, before going to the windows, leaving them alone.
“Is this Lulu?” Morana whispered, looking down at the slumbering cat in awe.
Amara nodded. “You wanna hold her? She’s very friendly.”
“Oh, I can?” Morana grinned at her, slowly taking Lulu’s soft body in her arms. The cat woke up in the transfer, turning to look at Amara.
“It’s okay, baby,” Amara cajoled her, rubbing between her eyes. “She’s a friend. You like new people, remember?”
Lulu meowed and turned to stare at Morana.
“She’s so soft,” Morana uttered, amazed. Tristan came to stand behind her and Lulu, the little attention seeker that she was, tried to climb over Morana’s shoulder to sniff him. Morana struggled to contain her.
“Traitor, I know he smells nice, but stay with me for a second!”
Lulu stretched towards Tristan. Tristan stared at the cat, before shaking his head and taking a step back.
“Get that thing away from me, please.”
Amara felt Dante enter the room, her eyes immediately seeking him out, and smiled as he came towards them. He scooped Lulu up in his arms and turned to Tristan.
“This thing is a fucking cat, dude,” he told the other man, rubbing Lulu behind the ear, so naturally Amara wondered if he’d ever had pets before. “She’s a cute little thing.”
“Can we get one, caveman?” Morana blinked up at him, putting a hand on his arm. “We’ll adopt a stray.”
Tristan sighed, sending a glare at Amara, and she burst out laughing.
It felt good. Life felt good.
Dinner had gone as well as one could hope, she supposed. Chiara had pretty much given her looks and her husband, Leo, had gazed off into the distance, clearly distracted by something. Another couple their age – she didn’t know their names – had given her polite smiles, while their three kids had been quiet but stealing looks at her and Lulu napping at the base of a sitting man’s statue. Dante had taken a seat at the head of the table – where his father had once sat – and had her seated on his left side. Tristan took the seat on his right, opposite Amara, with Morana beside him. It was strategic, a silent message to everyone watching that this was how he was rolling the ball.
Amara had enjoyed the dinner after a long time and observed her man talking in quiet tones with Tristan, or turning to ask one of the kids a question. In between, he had just touched her foot with his shoe, giving her a bit more of that affection she craved from him. With his stubble that darkened his jaw, contrasting with his impeccably-dressed body, Dante Maroni was a vision of masculine beauty and primitive badassery, with a dark gaze that missed nothing and a light smile that hid everything. He was contradictions and balances complimenting each other in one specimen; a slow, deceptive, undetectable poison to everyone except the people close to his heart. Small doses of him over the years had made her stronger, a resilient survivor.
Now, standing in his study, the same study where Lorenzo Maroni had changed her life, Amara watched the king of the underworld on his throne, a glass of scotch in his hand, watching the two other people he trusted talk.
“The airport guy gave me an address,” Morana spoke, sipping from her glass of scotch, sitting cross-legged on the couch, her eyes on Dante. “But when we got there, the house was empty. And just yesterday, I got an alert that it had burned down. Faulty wiring, they said.”
Dante leaned back on the table, swirling the scotch in his glass, his eyes on Tristan. “We’ll find her, Tristan.”
Luna.
Tristan’s little sister who had disappeared twenty years ago.
Amara felt her heart clench at the way he leaned against the window, rigid, looking down at the floor, and she walked to him. Hunched as he was, his head was the same height as hers. Amara put a hand on his bicep, giving him a squeeze, and he looked up at her with those focused blue eyes.
“Don’t lose hope, yeah?” she whispered to him. “You worked so many years to get control. You have the reins now. You have Dante, who has the reins here. You have Morana, who does stuff I don’t even understand. And you have me, who does nothing but for moral support. We’ll find her.”
His jaw clenched but he gave her a nod, straightening and walking to sit beside Morana, who snuggled into him like he was a bear instead of one of the most dangerous men in their world. But then, nobody knew how dangerous he was more than Morana.
Amara took Tristan’s vacated space and leaned against the windowsill, as Dante spoke up. “You notice too many fires in buildings of late, Tristan?”