Page 8 of Destruction

“Is my father’s Second,” I interrupt. “And he’s damned good at his job, but he’s not what I need.” There’s a desperation in my tone that I can’t quite control. “Tennant molded himself into being whatever my father needed him to be, and it worked for them, but the same can’t be said for Ten and me. I love him, but as was proven when I let you live, our views are too different. We can’t afford to be at each other’s throats right now.”

Jude turns to Carter. “Surely you’ll be willing to step up.”

Carter studies me for a long moment before replying. “I’ll support Roman as best as I can. He’s my son, and I will neverlet him falter, but…this isn’t what he needs from me. My place has always been by Cristian’s side. Even when I was on Roman’s guard, Cris was always my endgame.”

I give my father a weak smile. “Thank you. What I need from you is to keep the men in line, help Joel and Enzo navigate the scheduling and chaos. Tennant…” Blowing out a breath, I turn my attention back to Jude. “Another reason I can’t ask Ten is because without Dad, he’ll unravel. He cares about us, but Dad is his world. I have no doubt that he’ll help you step into your role, but we can’t rely on him to be impartial.”

Releasing my death grip on the desk, I cross the space between us and grip Jude’s hands in mine, looking up into pale green eyes that are full of trepidation. “I need you, Jude.”

“I’m a liability,” he replies. Letting go of one hand, he gestures to his ears. “I’m a weakness your enemies can exploit, Roman.”

“You’re stronger than you give yourself credit for. Not only that, but are you really telling me you’ll let someone bully you simply because you can’t hear?”

There’s a slight tightening around his eyes, but other than that, there’s no outward sign that my words hit their mark. “Your truce with the Martellis came before my time,” he says slowly. “Is now the best time to not only introduce me, but put me in such a position?”

“What are you protesting here?” I ask. “The role, or your capabilities?”

His hand in mine tightens and he narrows his eyes. “I want you to make the best choice, Roman. I’ll support you, but in order to do that, I need to make sure you’ve thought this through.”

“I have,” I insist. “I’m not asking as your lover, Jude, but as your Boss.”

He nods once. “Okay. I still think my deafness will be a disadvantage, but I’ll accept my place as your Second.”

“Thank you.” Raising up onto my toes, I press a quick kiss to his lips. Pulling back, I tell him, “We’ll figure it all out at a later date. As my Second, you’ll need your own interpreter, but for today, we’ll make it work.” I look at Carter. “Do you know if Dmitri is on shift? He can fill in until we figure something else out.”

“He’s not, but Soren is. Though I’d advise you to not bring him in unless it’s really necessary.”

“It is. Jude needs an interpreter, and I’d like to see them try to argue about an extra body. Knowing if they’re ableist pricks off the bat will seal the deal on if we let them in on our investigations or not. I would rather not cut them off, as they have skills we could use, but I won’t tolerate that kind of disrespect.”

Plus, I’ve always been shit at sim-com. Languages have never come as easily to me as they do Dad. My ASL is better than my SEE, but my brain doesn’t translate between English and Sign well enough to use them simultaneously. And Jude deserves better than that.

He’s carved out a place in our Family. Asking him to step up even further, to embed himself deeper into our world, is huge, so the least I can do is make it easier by allowing him access to his own language.

I understand Carter’s hesitation, though. Bringing Soren in means allowing Doc as well. He already knows, of course, as it’s his job to deal with Dad’s injured guards, but we’d all rather keep him as far away from the Martellis as possible for now. Things are stressful enough, we don’t need his special brand of fuckery, especially with how close he is to Dad.

This is a fucking nightmare.

Before anything else can be said, Tennant walks into the office. The look on his face is grim, and my heart plummets into my stomach. The last thing we need right now is more bad news.

“Before I give my report,” he says, sweeping his eyes around the room, “We should call in Hollis.”

“I need him focused on other tasks right now; we have a meeting with the Martelli Family in a few hours.”

His already ice blue eyes grow colder. “Why? What do they have to do with any of this? Unless we’re talking about a negotiation? In which case, I need time to prep a torture room.”

“No.” I move away from Jude to stand directly in front of Tennant. “I need you to rein in whatever’s going through your head right now. This is bigger than just us, Ten. They got Il Padrone as well. Which means whoever is behind all of this has a plan in place, and we need one, too.”

“I don’t agree to inviting them here, not when we’re in lockdown.”

“Well, we won’t exactly all fit in the basement office,” I snap back. “And I know you would have disagreed with meeting on their turf, which wasn't my preference either. Plus, Hollis needs his setup on hand. Lio asked a question, and Hollis is searching for answers.” I hope I can convey everything I want to in my gaze as Tennant stares me down. “I need you, Ten,” I say lowly. “As my partner, as Dad’s best friend, as the Amato Second in Command.”

If possible, I think his expression gets harder. The almost indecipherable turning down of his mouth, and the way his icy eyes seem to glow with restrained violence is noticeable only because I know his expressions so well. ButthisTennant is a stranger. There’s an air of danger surrounding him that I’m almost inclined to listen to.

I’ve seen Ten act in his capacity as Second many times over the years. I've seen what he does to people he uses in hisexperiments, and how brutally efficient he is at extracting the responses he wants from those who betray us. None of those times have even come close to making him lose the tight control he has. Something in his eyes though tells me that this won’t be like all the other times.

That whatever hold Tennant has on the bloodlust running through him, it’s about to break, and getting him on board with any plan needs to happennow.

“Fine,” he bites out. “There’s not much to say, anyway. The scene was clean, definitely an expert job. Cristian’s guards are dead.” I gasp, the pain of losing Gabriele rushing through me. “Doc tried his best once on scene, but…” He shakes his head. “Whoever’s behind this wasn’t taking any chances by leaving witnesses. Hopefully, Hollis can get something useful from the cameras in the area. I have men out there surveying a larger canvas area, but I don’t have faith that they’ll find anything.”

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