Page 34 of The Mafia Bloodline
Sorcha laughed. “Oh, he’s learned that tone from Roman.”
“Scary,” I whispered, and Layla giggled beside me.
The lightness was fleeting, though. Beneath it, I felt it, the bond pulling faintly in my chest, like a tug on a thread that wouldn’t loosen. Volken was awake now. Or close to it, and he was restless.
I stared into my cup, pretending to sip, trying to ignore the quiet thrum of worry in my blood. He was hiding something. They all were, and if the whispers I’d overheard last night from the guards were true about Caesar being in the city again then I had a feeling whatever came next would tear the fragile peace to pieces.
Layla touched my arm gently, pulling me from my thoughts. “You’re part of this family now, Runa. No matter what happens out there, remember that.”
Her smile was warm, but her eyes… her eyes held the shadow of someone who’d already survived the kind of war I could only imagine.
I nodded, clutching her hand back. “I will.”
And in that moment, surrounded by women who had been through hell and still managed to laugh, I realized something:
Family wasn’t always blood. Sometimes, it was forged in fire.
We sat a little straighter, the moment settling into something practical. Layla’s smile went soft but fierce. “They’re knotted,” she said, tapping the side of her cup. “You can see it in Roman when he thinks no one’s looking. That kind of rage will eat him alive if he lets it.”
Sorcha folded her hands, eyes going distant for a beat. “They won’t stop until they make the bastards pay. That’s in their bones. But a night out, something loud, something stupid might break the edge. Give them a night where they remember how to breathe.”
I surprised myself by speaking before I could overthink it. “We need a plan and it can’t be just us begging them to leave the house. They listen to logic only so far, then they go stomp on things. But they’ll listen to a challenge, to a slight.” My voice warmed with the thought. “Make it competitive. Invite them to Havoc, tell them a rival club tried to poach one of our DJs, throw in a bet. After all Roman hates to lose, doesn’t he? They’ll go. They have to.”
Layla’s laugh bubbled out, delighted. “That’s perfect. Hit their pride and make it about territory, their ego. Viking will bite at that like it’s dessert.” She glanced at Sorcha, conspiratorial. “You and I can set it up. Something to make them forget the knives for one night.”
Gideon inclined his head once, voice low. “We’ll have two teams. One to escort everyone, one to sweep for trouble. Nothing happens without a signal. We can do all that but you ladies know that first you need their permission.”
I felt the knot in my chest loosen a fraction. The plan was ridiculous and childish, and exactly the medicine we all needed. We’d give them noise and music and a reason to laugh so hard that their jaws hurt. I roll my eyes at my own silly thoughts, maybe for one night the ghosts at the edges of their minds would have to sit down and watch.
“Fine,” I said, the decision solidifying like steel. “We get them out and we make it loud.”
Layla reached across and squeezed my hand. “Then let’s convince our monsters to come play.”
The women smiled, and for the first time in days the future felt a little less like a battlefield and more like something we might survive together.
Gideon’s expression didn’t change; he never smiled when danger was in the air. He set his cup down with a soft thud and leaned forward, fingers steepled. “Listen to me,” he said, his voice flat and careful. “Putting all of you in one place with the brothers, there will be loud music, strangers, booze, you know that is a pressure cooker. If one of them sees something that spikes their temper, they’ll go. Hard. And if they go, there’s no stopping the tide until it’s washed half the city away.”
The room went quieter. Even the children’s muffled laughter seemed to retreat a little into the background.
“I get it,” Layla said, meeting his eyes. “And we’ll control it. We’ll set boundaries.” She reached across and squeezed my hand again as if to anchor both of us. “Gideon, we appreciate you looking out. But this isn’t just for them. It’s for us too, we need to remind them what normal feels like, even if normal is a warped version of ours.”
Gideon’s jaw loosened a fraction, but his gaze stayed steady. “You know what I signed up for when I swore my blade. I’ll watch the perimeter. I’ll have men in the wings. But understand this, if something happens, I won’t be choosing sides. I’ll be choosing containment. Your lives matter.”
Sorcha’s face softened at that, and Layla gave him a grateful, quick nod.
I could see Gideon weighing us, our stubbornness, the hard edge that comes from living with knives at your ribs, and then, finally, he gave the smallest of inclines. “Fine. But I want a signal. One word. One move. And everyone moves. No hesitation.”
“Agreed,” Sorcha said immediately.
The practicalities snapped into place with the efficient calm of people used to planning violence: who watches the front, which exits stay clear, which staff are on clean-up, what to do if a demon shows up uninvited. Layla and Sorcha started sketching out the surprise elements, a DJ to bait Viking’s ego with a rival sound, an unexpected floral theme that would make Roman roll his eyes, just enough glitter to distract them from their knives.
Gideon stood, finally, and checked the time. “Do it quick,” he said. “Soon the men will be up.”
We worked fast. The men on the perimeter, the playlists chosen, the innocuous bets and slights earmarked that would be sure to lure Viking’s pride but not start a war. We assigned roles of who would sit near Roman to make sure he didn’t wander off into silence, who would stay close to Lucien, who would keep an eye on Draugr when his temper rose like a storm.
As plans folded into place, a thin thread of excitement wove through me, tangled up with the stone of worry lodged in my gut. This was reckless, yes…because we were women who had been through hell and had the audacity to want a night that didn’t feel like survival. But it was also necessary. If we could make them laugh until they forgot to breathe for a second, then maybe the knives would not be the first thing their hands reached for the next time the world shook.
I caught Layla’s eye and she grinned, wicked and tired at once. “We’ll pull it off,” she promised. “And if they explode, we’ll drag them out and glue them to chairs until they sober up.”
