Page 40 of Shotgun Daddy
“Be careful,” Reece whispered, his throat tightening as the reality of his Fendi Daddy leaving sank in.
Faustino nodded, leaning down for one last kiss, his lips lingering before he pulled away.
Moments later, Faustino was gone.
The door clicked shut behind Faustino, the sound sharp in the quiet, and Reece was alone again, the bed vast and cold without his big, gruff Daddy’s weight.
Reece slid out of bed, the floor chilly as he padded to his bag, and pulled out Squirt and felt a safe, familiar feeling in his arms. The apartment felt too still, but Reece knew that what was about to happen out in the city was going to be loud, violent, and scary.
Reece crawled back under the covers and curled up with Squirt. His eyes traced the shadows on the ceiling, his imagination spinning… Faustino with Matteo and Michael, guns firing, fighting for their family, and… for him, Kyan, and Benjamin too.
He wanted Faustino to win, to come back safe, but the worry gnawed, a quiet ache he couldn’t shake off.
What if he didn’t?
What if this choice cost him everything?
Reece buried his face in Squirt, breathing him in, and let the fear swirl. He’d chosen this, and he had chosen Faustino, and now all he could do was wait, snuggled with his stuffie, and pray his Daddy would walk back through that door one more time…
Chapter 18
Faustino
“Now for business,” Faustino growled as he dropped a gear and thundered onward.
As Faustino peeled away from his apartment, the car’s engine snarled to life as he merged into the rain-drenched streets, the city’s neon lights bleeding across the windshield in jagged streaks of red, blue, and green.
The night loomed heavy, the storm a relentless assault, its roar pounding the roof and windows like a war drum echoing his racing pulse. Faustino was all set for the meet with Matteo, Michael, and of course the loyal generals and street soldiers – men who’d stood by them against the usurpers threatening to tear the whole Fendi family apart.
The weight of the situation pressed on Faustino, a brutal showdown ahead, and his hands gripped the steering wheel tight, knuckles paling as his mind churned.
Reece’s voice looped in his head, a fierce anchor pulling him through the dark. This fight wasn’t just for power. It was forhim, for the life they could build if he made it out alive.
“My boy…” Faustino muttered. “I have to do this for my boy.”
The road unfurled before Faustino, the rain sheeting down in torrents that blurred the edges of the world around him. In the safety of the car, the steady thrum of the engine and the rhythmic slash of the wipers carved out a space for Faustino’s thoughts to drift…
Justin had been Faustino’s first love, a wildfire of a boy… blonde hair that caught the sun, a laugh that could cut through any gloom, a spirit too bright for the shadows Faustino had dragged him into. They’d been young, reckless, tangled in a life he hadn’t yet learned to control. A rival crew’s hit gone wrong, meant for him, had caught him instead… a spray of bullets on a quiet street, his blood pooling red against the gray pavement, his eyes wide and still as Faustino screamed his name.
The guilt had hollowed Faustino out, a tragedy that shaped the man he’d become… ruthless, walled-off, always bracing for the next blow and searching for the next kill.
But tonight, as the rain lashed the car and the city blurred into a watercolor haze, Faustino felt the shift – a quiet, final release.
Justin was gone, he was a wound he couldn’t heal, a past he couldn’t rewrite. What happened to Justin was a tragedy, but it was truly time to let him rest. Reece was here, now. He was his present day Little to protect, his boy to shield from the chaos that had claimed Justin. And the only way for Faustino to do that was to be at his absolute sharpest, his most deadly – to cut through this war with precision and fury, to ensure no one could touch his darling boy. The thought steadied Faustino, a fire igniting beneath the trauma, and Faustino pressed the gas harder, the engine’s growl a promise to the night.
A red light flared ahead, stopping him at a deserted intersection, the rain hammered down so thick it turned the world to liquidshadow. Water streamed down the windshield as the wipers struggled to keep up.
Faustino’s phone buzzed sharply on the passenger seat, cutting through the storm’s bluster, and he grabbed it, the screen’s cold light illuminating his face.
“Coordinates,” Faustino said, his voice low. “Looks like this is happening right fucking now.”
Faustino’s jaw clenched, adrenaline surging like a live wire through his veins. He yanked the wheel hard, tires squealing as he pulled a U-turn, the car fishtailing on the wet ground before he floored it, powering through the night.
The wipers continued to fight a losing battle against the rain, the road a tunnel of blurry darkness, but Faustino didn’t ease up—every second was a countdown to the fight that would decide everything.
The old metalworks district hulked on the city’s fringe, a decaying relic of industry swallowed by rust and neglect. It was prime land for a Fendi redevelopment project, but in that moment building work and property empires were a million miles from Faustino’s mind.
Faustino rolled to a stop at the corner of the block, cutting the engine as the abandoned building loomed into view. The air was sharp with the scent of damp metal and oil, the rain a steady hiss against the cracked pavement, pooling in the ruts of a place and time long forgotten.
