Page 5 of Always: A Legacy Novel

“Yes, Cross,” Calisto muttered under his breath, “I do know that, son.”

“But you could be a little more interested in …” Wolf trailed off, and tipped his head in the direction of the dancing stripper. “I’m just putting that out there.”

“I see his phone history once a week,” Calisto groused. “It gets sent to me in a nice little email. Trust me, the kid is not gay. But that girl is not his preference, either. Too thin, too light, and way too blonde.”

Something that felt a lot like embarrassment filled Cross, but it was quickly replaced with another feeling that was foreign to him—anger. At least where his step-dad was concerned.

“How do you do that?” Cross asked.

Calisto looked down at him. “What?”

“Get stuff from my phone emailed to you.”

“I had my guy put an app on it after I bought it and—”

“You track my phone?”

“Cross.”

“You track my phone?” he demanded again.

Calisto pressed two fingers into his temple. “I have to monitor something when I can, don’t I? Have I ever brought it up to you? Have I ever spoke about the stuff you search or look up, or the people you text? No, because I don’t have to. Don’t give me a reason to, and I won’t.”

Cross stared at his step-father. “I want a new phone. Without a tracking app.”

“Buy one then.”

“But—”

“I bought this one. I do what I want with it. You buy one, do what you want, Cross.”

“Seems fair,” Wolf said more to himself than the table.

“And you,” Calisto said, turning back on his consigliere. “Stop bringing him into these goddamn strip joints. It’s not even about the girls. It’s the way the fools here act about the girls. Like pieces of ass, nothing more. Meat on display. It’s ridiculous, and I won’t have him getting those ideals in his head.”

“He’s going to see it one way or the other, man.”

“Not when I can help it, Wolf.”

“Whatever. Fine. You want a drink?”

Calisto waved as if to say, go for it. Wolf was gone from the table a second later, and then Calisto took the man’s vacant seat.

“You’re pissed at me now,” Calisto said.

It wasn’t even a question.

Cross shrugged as he pulled out a small vat of oil and a brush to clean the gun. “I follow the rules. Don’t see why you need to spy on me, Cal.”

Sometimes, he called his step-father his papa.

Sometimes, it was just Cal to Cross.

It all depended on his mood, and who was around to hear it. As he grew up, there were far too many men who liked to remind Cross that the man he loved as his father, wasn’t really his dad. They liked to point out as often as they could that Cross’s biological father was a bastard who had betrayed their thing—their Cosa Nostra—and left his young mother Emma with a baby and divorce papers before never being heard from again.

Like a coward.

They said those things like they were Cross’s stains to wear.