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“Yeah. Is that a problem?”
Annoyance pokes underneath my skin and I resist the need to bristle. “Why didn’t she call Nic? Or me?”
Rome scoffs. “Have you even reached out to her—or Mary?” He doesn’t give me time to respond. “Think about it from her perspective, man. She doesn’t know us.”
“Apparently, she knows you well enough to call you and invite you to her big day.” I don’t even care how fucking petulant I sound right now. I’m a fucking great brother, and she should be calling me too.
“The invite was for all of us, asshole.”
“Huh. No shit?”
“No shit, brother. So we’re meeting at Lulu’s Café in an hour. We need a plan to get Dad out of town for a few days. You in?”
A chance to stick it to my dad and see my baby sister? It’s a no-brainer. “I’ll see you there.”
Rome hangs up, and I tap the end of my phone against my chin. Lulu’s is only ten minutes away, which means I have a solid thirty with our boy Eric here.
“So you’ll let me go?”
The sound of Eric’s pleading voice pulls my focus back to him.
“What? Of course not, dick-for-brains. It’s just one of those things people say, ya know? Fuck knows where it came from. Probably the movies, eh? They always portray us as womanizing douchebags with no morals.” I scoff.
With measured steps, I eliminate the space between us and pluck the steel-tipped darts from the asshole in front of me. One hard yank, and they’re free with only a little bit of blood and tissue and drywall on the ends. I turn around and find my spot again, lining the tip of my sneaker with the slash I drew on the carpet earlier. I settle my weight and mime the throwing movement.
“You ever see Die Hard?”
“N-n-no.”
I pause and straighten up. “Really? It’s been out for decades.”
Eric lifts his shoulders as much as his starfish position will allow him. “I don’t see many movies.”
“Shame. John McClane is a good guy who has to do bad shit sometimes.” I expel a breath and shift my focus to Eric. “I can’t let you go now, you know that right?”
He starts blubbering at this point, nonsensical words dribbling from his mouth alongside the spit.
Ugh, fucking gross. I sigh, my tolerance for him nonexistent, my mind already wandering to my sister coming back to town. I wonder if Mary will join Madison too?
“P-please, Mr. Santorini, I have a family.”
His pleas don’t endear him to me, in fact, they just dump gasoline on the steadily burning flame of rage. “You have a family? I have a fucking family, Eric. And when you peddle your low-grade drugs in my fucking city, you endanger them.” I’m near shouting by the end of my little outburst. I rake my hands through my hair, tugging on the ends as I release a breath.
It’s fine. I’m fine.
Eric won’t be but he sealed his fate the moment he flipped for the fucking MC.
6
MADDIE
I flip the last page of my book and sigh. I always love a happy ending, and this girl got that in the literal sense. Romance novels have been my escape for years—the angstier and spicier, the better. But ever since my cousin ended up with three boyfriends, I started picking up more reverse harem romances.
And now that I have my very own collection of men? It’s my new favorite trope.
We’re in this sort of limbo ever since the marriage bomb over pasta a few nights ago. I feel restless, anxious about too many moving parts. But I know it’s the right thing to do—for more than one reason.
Nerves about Las Vegas permeate everything I’ve done the last couple days, including even dampening my enjoyment of the book I just finished. Ever since I talked to Romeo, actually. He assured me that they’d come up with a conceivable plan to make sure Vito doesn’t catch wind of it. The last thing I want to do is see him.
