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“Nope,” Victoria answered with a smile. “This is my night with my babies.”

“Your babies?” He teased. “Funny how I recall being there to contribute to making both of⁠—”

“Alright!” Ilaria shrieked, covering her ears. “That’s enough. I don’t need the thought of my parents doing the horizontal tango pinging around my brain.”

Aella shuddered. “I second that.”

Dropping his arms, Severo chuckled. “Well, you know⁠—”

His response was interrupted by a knock at the front door so loud it nearly made the walls shake. Fear shot through Aella as Severo’s face transformed into stone. What if someone found out about what happened the other night and was coming to arrest her for it?

Squaring his shoulders, Severo shot Victoria a look before saying, “Stay here until I give you three the all clear.”

“Daddy,” Ilaria crawled to the edge of the bed, but her mother grabbed her arm to halt her.

“Do as your father says.”

Minutes passed agonizingly slow as the three awaited his return. But, instead of Severo returning upstairs, he called up for the three of them to come down. Aella noticed her mother’s shoulders instantly sag in relief, but Aella was still tense. She could hear the calmness in her father’s voice, but there was also an edge that let her know something was still very wrong.

Together, the three traveled down the hall and descended the stairs, and a lump formed in Aella’s throat when she saw Detective Calder and her father at a stand-off.

“Honey,” Victoria said, her eyes bouncing between the two. “What’s going on?”

Sneering, Calder answered her instead, holding a folded sheet of paper into the air. “We have a warrant to search your home.”

“For what?”

“Financial records,” Severo said calmly, stalking toward his family and hovering over them protectively. “The Federal Government seems to think that there’s a possibility that I’m hiding some paperwork in our home.”

“I’m sure there’s nothing to worry about,” Calder said smugly. “If you don’t have anything to hide.”

“I’ve never had anything to hide,” Severo replied. “You know exactly who I am.”

Aella caught the veiled threat as she threaded her fingers with her sister’s, realizing that Calder had just incurred her father’s wrath in a way he may not survive.

Severo lowered his tone so that no one but his wife and children would hear his next few words. “No one speaks a word out loud after they leave. Not until after I have every inch of this house swept for bugs. Understand?”

All three women agreed without hesitation.

Cassius adjusted the sleeve of his coat as he moved down the narrow side road that curved along the creek. Gravel crunched beneath his shoes, the sound sharp against the stillness. He walked for nearly ten minutes before he caught movement out of his peripheral.

“Bruh, you are lucky I owe your pending father-in-law a favor. It’s cold as fuck out here.”

“My bad,” Cassius chuckled, apologizing. “Time got the best of me between the engagement party and a couple of other things.”

“You made sure you weren’t followed?”

“I’m a lot of things, but an amateur isn’t one of them. We’re good. I don’t plan to be here long anyway. I just need you to do me a favor. I’ll be indebted to you for a minute.”

“I have a feeling I know what it is, but I’ll ask anyway. What’s up?”

“I need you to tell your handler that you’ll accept the contract for Aella. I ended up putting a bullet in the last nigga who tried her, so I can’t question him how I want to. I need to know who’s behind it, and I’m willing to go through anything and anyone to figure it out.”

“I mean, taking the job isn’t a problem. But you won’t be able to flush out whoever is behind it off that alone. Payment is typically electronic.”

“That’s not a problem. I have a plug with the Feds who can trace it for me. I just need a starting point.”

Kenyon rubbed his hands together before blowing on them to warm them up. “The most potentially problematic part of it all is that I typically have to send proof of job completion. Meaning I’d actually have to kidnap your wife. I’d give her back afterward, of course,” he joked, making Cassius laugh. “I’m just putting it out there before you shoot me for doing the job you want.”