Page 66 of Devil's Deal

“If it had been anyone but the Buccellis who’d done this, they’d be dead.” His tone was so dark and ominous that I knew he meant it. The threat of violence should’ve bothered me, but instead, it reassured me that Romeo didn’t really consider this a viable threat to my person.

I sat next to him on the couch, scooting as close as possible. “I trust you to know what’s best.”

He kissed my forehead. “Thank you. I promise, if I thought you were in danger from Dante or this Family in any way, I’d have fixed it.”

“All right then, moving on. What happened with Tad and the Blondies?

“It’s all been handled. Rocco’s friend, Lulu, took the girls. Including the ones who want to try and go home or leave town. She’ll make sure they’re safe and all that. She seems like a pretty classy lady.”

I bit back my retort. There was nothing wrong with people choosing to be sex workers, so I didn’t know why I was having a hard time picturing whoever ran their business was a decent person. I needed to work on that.

Romeo laughed. “You don’t like Lulu, and you’ve never even met her.”

I sighed. “There may be times you have to give me some grace, Daddy. Your world is a little different than mine.”

“I know, boy. You’re fine. Was there anything else or can we decide what to have for dinner and relax now?”

Ready to show him the surprise I had for him, I jumped up, clapping my hands. Romeo shook his head, staring at me fondly. “What’s got you so excited now?”

I skipped over to my bureau and flung open the door on the right. “Voila.”

He stared into the empty space. “What am I looking at?”

“I went through my clothes and cleared this out for you for your stuff. You won’t have to live out of your duffel anymore. I plan on putting the big house up for sale, sooner rather than later, so I’ll have to move anything I want to keep to storage. There’s a storage company not too far from here, and I know you have all of your stuff in storage, too, so maybe we can go get it and move it here. And since you’ll be staying in one spot, you can even bring some of that home with you.”

It was a good thing I hadn’t expected him to be excited. The poor man looked completely shell-shocked.

“But we don’t have to do any of that right now,” I said closing the door. “However, I think we should set up dinner with your friend Omar. I’ve given it a lot of thought, and it’ll be nice for you to have friends.”

He gaped at me. “Did you forget they think my name is Bosley, and I’m a traveling businessman?”

I shrugged. “You don’t have to tell them what you do in order to give them your real name. If nothing else, you should let them know you’re staying in town so you never have any uncomfortable run-ins. What’s your other option? Keep texting and calling him like you’re across the country when you’re in the same town?”

I burst out laughing. I could tell by the expression on his face that he’d planned to do exactly that. Kneeling next to him on the couch, I grabbed his hands. “I know it feels overwhelming to merge Romeo and Bosley, but you have to do it. You made the name Bosley represent the man you think is better than who Romeo is. I thought Bosley was hot—with a stupid ass name—but I adore all the layers of Romeo.”

He blinked, sighed, took a drink of tea, then closed his eyes and let his head fall back to rest on the couch. “Can I think about it?”

Taking the tea out of his hands, I took a sip. “You can take as long as you want. I thought I might go with you, and we’d need to wait for my face to heal anyway.” I took another sip. “Ahh. That’s refreshing. Now, what should we order for dinner?”

Chapter

Eight

ROMEO

In so many ways,the last few weeks had been the best of my life. I never imagined that I’d have the opportunity to be with someone like Cory, to have my very own boy. He filled my days with light, infiltrating the dark places in my soul. He was magical, unexpected, and ending each day with him was totally worth the shit show that it was every minute of the day that I wasn’t with him.

Working with Rocco hadn’t been as bad as I anticipated it would be. He had an interesting perspective on life and a good sense of humor. Not that I ever let him see that I thought he was funny. In some ways, I thought that was part of his charm. He didn’t care that I ignored half of everything he said. We’d been doing our job, putting the Buccelli territory to rights, one street at a time.

Rocco preferred to go in swinging, which in many cases needed to be done. He was learning the art of subtlety, though. Learning to wait and read the room before he went off halfcocked. He was a work in progress, but whenever I grew frustrated with him, I remembered the little boy with big eyes who used to follow me around like a puppy. I didn’t know what the future held for me and the Family, but I was determined to leave the youngest brother better-trained than when I found him.

There were other frustrations beyond having to do the enforcer-type crap that I’d always sworn I’d stay away from. Cory’s PI was proving to be elusive. He hadn’t been in town at all since I asked Cory to set up a meeting between us. To hear this guy tell it, he was chasing leads for Emilio all over the country. I didn’t buy it. If he didn’t produce himself soon, I’d tell Cory to cut his funding. No doubt he’d show then.

Frederic had come through with the names I needed for the Pasini Family, and Tracker had been working on them ever since. I asked him to start with researching the Capo who’d had an affair with Frederic’s ex-wife. He’d seemed a likely suspect but had proven to be a dead end, as had all the other members of the organization so far. Maybe Frederic was wrong, and he’d been chasing his tail this whole time.

The information Tracker dug up left me in another awkward position. Sure, I’d agreed to be an associate for the Buccellis, but I’d hired him to help me find Emilio. To hear him tell it, while he hadn’t found Cory’s nephew, he was sitting on a gold mine of information that Nico—or more specifically Vin—would be interested in. Did I pay Tracker for those details or leave it alone? I didn’t owe the brothers any more than what I was doing, but…

That was another thought I shoved to the back of my mind. I wasn’t normally indecisive, and I was finding it unsettling.

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