“Sounds like everyone who’s someone will be there, including Georgie and the men he’s working with.”
The skin at the base of my neck tightened like I was an animal getting ready to pounce. I wanted out of this place and back to work. I clapped my hands together and unleashed a smile for Bastian. “When do I have to be ready?”
Searching my face, he didn’t answer. He stepped close to me and moved one of my messy curls from the side of my face. “You’re damn pretty when you smile, woman.”
My eyes rolled hard. “Be serious, Bast.”
“I am serious. You look like one of those big feral cats, ready to move in for the kill. To someone like me, it’s beautiful.”
If my skin was a tad lighter, he’d have seen my blush. “Are you being nice because I’m in booty shorts?”
“I’m being nice because I want to. If you want me to be nice for that, I’ll be happy to just carry you to my bed now. Show you how much you don’t really want nice.”
Someone could have cut the sexual tension in that room with a damn knife. He glanced at my bare stomach, and goose bumps popped up right where he looked. I eyed the plump lips he would bite every now and then, like he was doing right at that moment.
“Tell me what’s in the damn carry-out bag before we make this arrangement way more complicated.” I shut my eyes to try to shake off my urge to jump his bones and pointed behind him.
He grunted and grabbed it. “Ramen from the restaurant down the road. Made special just for us.”
“Someone forget to pay this month?”
“Nah. Their family’s finances are tight, and I’m not in the business of collecting on every territory every month. Not the small ones at least.”
He pulled out a white linen upholstered chair from the massive oak table and motioned for me to sit down. I ambled over and nodded as I slid in. He scooted it under me like I was fragile or something.
“You aren’t supposed to pity the small guy,” I said. “You take what’s yours, or someone else will.”
“Who taught you that?” Bastian inquired as he pulled out our bowls of steaming ramen.
“Your father did.” Mario Armanelli ruthlessly collected, and every part of Chicago knew that.
“A good leader is feared, Katie. A great leader is loved. And an exceptional one is one you never thought you needed. This city will one day operate like that because I’ll make sure they can say, ‘Look, we did it all on our own.’” He didn’t sit but rounded the counter to grab two glasses for us and filled them with ice water.
Bastian and I never drank at home. I didn’t know if he ever drank at this point. He worked, and with his coming and going so much even in the middle of the night, I don’t think he wanted to risk inhibiting his mental state.
“Without their acknowledgement, you lose their respect,” I said.
“Or I gain their allegiance and they become stronger because they believe in themselves.”
I shrugged. Our leadership views never coincided. He was philosophical while I was animalistic. The strongest survived, and cutting out the weak or pushing them until they were strong seemed to be the only way. “Or you wasted time on the weak when it’s survival of the fittest.”
“It used to baffle me how enamored my father was with you at such a young age. He even told me you sat in on some of the calls, that you gave advice.” He rubbed his five-o’clock shadow. “Can you imagine, a seventeen-year-old giving the family advice?”
I let the silence seep in around us. Most of the family didn’t know why I was wise beyond my years, but I’d lived with my daddy. He’d taught me love and pride. Then I’d been put into foster care where there was none of that.
I wasn’t sure any of these men ever had love ripped from them, if they were ever loved like a daughter could be by her own father.
“Did you, Cade, and Rome grow up together? None of you were ever on the calls.”
“My father wanted me to see the business, to know the duties of a boss. The calls were social, more of a diversion for those tapping our lines.”
I nodded. “They weren’t that important, but they were to me. I knew it was a way in for me. Jimmy coached me to never say anything too outrageous. He’d tell me someone could be listening, ready to take me away from him.”
Bastian scoffed. “Not likely coming for you. But he gave you the right idea. My father strictly taught his heir to this mess of a family the bloody side of it.”
“Cade too?”
Bastian shook his head. “Cade got lost in the world of the internet. He’s free of responsibility. Rome and I saw everything while he saw next to nothing.” His voice was laced with pain.