Page 3 of Thin Lines (Donati Bloodlines 2)

Calisto shrugged. “Nothing serious.”

“Territory disputes?”

“Basically.”

Gio hummed under his breath. “Be careful with them.The O’Neils can be vicious.”

Calisto didn’t respond, because he didn’t have to.He’d been keeping an eye on the small Irish family trying to bleed their wayinto New York territory from their roots in New Jersey. The best thing to dowas avoid any street wars, but sometimes that shit just couldn’t be helped.

“Next week, you said?” Gio asked.

Calisto nodded. “Yeah. I need something to do onThursday nights.”

Gio laughed. “Doesn’t Affonso have some kind of familydinner thing then?”

“Sì. Which is exactly why I need something elseto do on Thursday nights.”

“You could always sit down at the Marcello table. Wewouldn’t turn you away from a meal, Donati.”

Calisto knew that was true. Giovanni Marcello camefrom the long-reigning Marcello crime family. Cosa Nostra was in that man’sblood just as much, if not more, than Calisto’s.

“You might not turn me away, but I can’t go wining anddining with the rival family,” Calisto said, only half kidding.

“Just fighting with them on Thursdays, huh?”

“What are you talking about? I am nowhere near afellow family tonight. I am over on Bleecker Street doing business.”

Gio cocked a brow. “Seriously?”

“What Affonso doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

Calisto swallowed the lump forming in his throat. Hecouldn’t possibly explain to Gio how true those words really were.

“How’s the new family member?” Gio asked.

Calisto stepped out of the cage, keeping his backturned to the man. It was difficult for Calisto to hide the varying degrees of emotionsthat ran through him every time he was forced to talk about his uncle’s bridelike she was just any other woman he knew.

She wasn’t any other woman.

Not to Calisto.

Emma Sorrento—now Donati—could never be “just someone”to him.

Calisto had taken Emma from her life in Las Vegas,uprooted her without a single care, and deposited her to his uncle like a giftwrapped in a pretty bow. Somewhere in between all of that nonsense, Calisto hadmanaged to find himself in Emma’s bed, and she had somehow weeded her way intohis mind.

He couldn’t get her out.

“She’s … doing well,” Calisto settled on saying.

As far as he knew.

“Good.” Gio broke away from Calisto, walking towardthe weights. Calisto went for the showers and changing rooms. Behind him, theyounger man called, “Next week, stop protecting your face so much.”

Calisto flipped his friend off.

Unfortunately, his mind was now in a different place.A place where he tried not to go, and hadn’t gone since the wedding four monthsago. He’d watched the tuffs of February snow fall to the ground as Affonsoshuffled his new bride into a waiting black car after the reception ended.

For a week, Calisto barred himself from everyone andeverything he possibly could. He tried not to think about the week-longhoneymoon that Emma was forced to endure, or what was happening. He drank hismind stupid to the point where coherent thoughts were impossible and emotionsdidn’t exist.