Page 32 of Matteo
“Almost as if they were related,” Nikola echoed my own thoughts.
“Sh-shooter?” Her gaze darted between the three of us, her eyes wide.
Fuck.
“I’m sorry,” I started slowly. “You look a lot like someone who killed a few people and attacked my sister at Yale.”
Her expression paled. “My brother goes to Yale.” Two heartbeats of silence. “Is he… Is he dead?”
“Give us just a moment,” I said, yanking Gabriel and Nikola to the back of the room.
“We should call Morrelli,” Gabriel hissed.
“Fuck that,” Nikola protested. “Nico will just take over and push us out of the game.”
“This isn’t a game.” My friend’s view of things could sometimes be skewed, but that’s why he had me. “He has shelters set up all over his territory. And we have nowhere to take these girls.”
“Let’s get their home addresses and?—”
“And the shooter’s sister?” Gabriel challenged.
“She might have someone else who can take her in,” Nikola protested.
Gabriel shook his head, and I could sense his patience running thin. “Not everyone has a big-ass family like yours, Nikolaev.”
“We could reach out to Áine King,” I cut in. “She has an organization that specializes in these kinds of rescues.”
“Good thinking, bro,” Nikola offered, then narrowed his eyes at our friend. “At leastsomeonehas brains.”
“Everyone but you,” Gabriel drawled.
“Fuck you, Colombiano. You’re so lucky you’re loosely related to my mother or I’d—” He dragged a thumb from one ear to the other across his neck.
“You could fucking try,Ruso. And I’m not loosely related. I’m her half brother. Your fucking uncle.”
“I object to calling you that.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “If you two are fucking done?—”
“We’re done,” Gabriel cut in when it seemed like Nikola was going to continue. “So we have a plan for these girls, but how do we figure out who was behind it in the first place? It seems unlikely that someone would be brave enough to go against your father and do this on his territory.”
“And yet… check out the evidence,” Nikola said.
“It kind of seems like these girls were taken as leverage, and if we take them back to their families, they could find themselves in the same situation,” I stated pensively, the puzzles in my head jamming together but refusing to make sense. “I wish I knew why they are targeting my family. All the members who did that shit are dead and gone.”
“And you’re sure that the shooter mentioned your family by name?” Gabriel questioned.
I nodded. “Ari said he specifically said Vitale.”
“Maybe your mom would know?” Nikola pondered. “She was a belle herself.”
“Under no circumstance will we be asking her about this shit,” I warned. Even though I was very young, I could still remember my mother’s night terrors that had plagued her for months after she and my aunt Ella disappeared for days. Her heart-wrenching screams woke up every soul in the house. Itwasn’t until I was much older that I learned they were kidnapped by her uncle Alphonso Romano’s son and his accomplice, Benito King, to be sold through the Belles and Mobsters Agreement.
“Let’s just give the girls a choice,” Gabriel stated. “If they feel safe with their families, we’ll send them home.”
“And if they don’t?” Nikola grumbled. “I’m not taking them in like strays.”
“We’ll give them a choice.” I shot him a look that I hoped he interpreted correctly—he was being insensitive, and the girls didn’t need his attitude tonight. Not after everything they’d been through. “If their families are part of the reason they found themselves in this mess, we’ll find them a safe place with Áine’s organization.”
