Page 63 of Savage Claim

She glared at me. “Hush.”

“Elio isn’t going to like it.”

Amalia nudged me. “Elio’s nanny goat days are over.” She smiled again, bright and sunny. “We’ll have a new little one for all of us to fret over soon.”

CHAPTER 40

Lorenzo

“They found Efram Volkov’s body.” Nikolai sounded tired, like he had gone days without any kind of meaningful rest.

“You knew he was dead, Nik.” That bomb set fire to most of the neighborhood, even the police had reckoned that Efram was already dead, given that no one was able to contact him.

“His skull was obliterated. Are you going to tell me that was from the fire?”

Fucking hell. I had called Nikolai to ask if he or anyone in the Syndicate contracted Alfie’s services. Miriam hadn’t contacted me again about the Feds’ investigation, but Alfie stayed on my mind. If my resident fire bug was making bombs for other people, I was going to have to do something about it. I hadn’t planned on getting a lecture.

“Do you want me to lie to you?” I asked, and Nikolai made that angry sound again. “Efram was never going to walk out of that building when I went in. You and I both knew that when you pointed me his way.”

“You could have just left him to burn,kozyol.”

“I did. I also filmed a little present for his brother the next time I see him.”

“The Syndicate is up in arms. They want me to take action against you.”

His urgency only made me laugh. While the Syndicate had a foothold in New York, the Cosa Nostra had an extremely long reach. Artem Volkov had succeeded as much as he did against me because he worked in the shadows for so long. Had he not tipped his hand, he might have caught me more off-guard.

“Don’t threaten me, Nik. You don’t want me as an enemy.”

Nikolai wasn’t a stupid man. He had a ruthless business acumen, and he was highly respected, even outside of the Syndicate. He’d also handed over a large cache of weapons to me, and he had no way of knowing what I had done with it.

“When Artem shows his face again, you better deal with him, Lorenzo,” he said.

“I’m not your servant boy,” I reminded him. “Watch how you speak to me, or Artem won’t be the only Russian bastard that I come after.” I cut off the phone call before he could respond.

“Do you threaten everyone that you speak on the phone with?” Isabella was sitting in a chair by the window with a book in her hands.

“Most of them.”

Isabella snorted and closed her book. “Is violence the only way you know how to deal with disputes?”

I snorted. “I haven’t heard you complaining,dolcezza.”

Isabella scoffed and pushed herself out of her chair. “I don’t think any of the Russians you were just threatening would enjoying a spanking.” She crossed the office and came around the side of my desk to put her arms around my shoulders. “I want to get married.”

I took her left hand and brought it up to my lips, making a point to kiss the band of her engagement ring. “We are.”

“I mean, I want to get married soon,” she said. “This weekend, if we can.”

My brows knitted together. “What’s the hurry?” It had taken so long to get her to agree to marry me to begin with; it was hard to imagine her rushing the process.

Isabella took my hand and put it on her belly. “I want us to be a family,” she said. “We can still do a big celebration later, if that’s what you want, but I want to be your wife before this one arrives.”

The baby kicked beneath my palm, and that pretty much decided things. “All right,” I told her. “This weekend. We can get married outside under the trees.”

Her smile was beatific. “Perfect.”

Isabella

---