7

Alessandro

By the following day, I was resigned. My ship was truly gone now, but my temper had lessened and calmed enough, so I didn't want to shoot everybody.

That didn’t mean I wasn't still going to flay that fucker when I caught him. It just meant that everybody else could breathe easier now.

The phone on my desk rang just as Frankie's signature firm knocks thudded against my door. It must have been my secretary, because Frankie had the power to be a ghost even though he was the biggest of us all. It was talent, something I sometimes envied.

Dom came five minutes after, rubbing at a lipstick stain on the corner of his mouth.

“Are we going to do something about Triev?” he asked, going straight for the fridge.

“Triev?” Frankie looked at me. “Get me a can too, Dom. What is this about the Triev?”

“Our darling Maxim sunk ADA,” I answered and stood up from behind my desk to sit with them on one of the couches.

Frankie watched me like I was joking until I settled on the velvet couch opposite him.

“Are you joking?”

Dom came, cradling three cans of beer in one arm and three glasses in the other arm. “Yeah, Frankie, because Alex knows how to tell a good joke.” He set down the cans and glasses and plopped beside me, putting his feet on the coffee table. “Everybody knows I'm the funny one in the family.”

Frankie swept Dom's leg off the table with a hand and glared at him. “That’s over thirty million dollars of our assets.”

I shook my head. “Forty million, to be exact.”

“Lost because of what? Retaliation?” He gave Dom a pointed look.

When people started things with us for no reason, it was usually because of Dom. He was the wild card that created many of our famous feuds. He looked at us both with a sheepish smile and shrugged.

“Don't look at me. I haven't run into any of them…yet.” He added the last part after a thought. “You both will be able to tell when I finally do.”

“So, what then? Who just starts shit of this magnitude?” Frankie asked with that firm calmness in his voice.

“Apparently, the Trievs do,” I said, reached for the beer, and opened it. It was halfway to my mouth when Domi cleared his throat and looked pointedly at the glasses he'd brought.

“Is there a reason we haven't shown them why that is a bad idea yet?”

Rolling my eyes, I put the beer down and gestured. He could pour it if he wanted it so much.

“There is,” I continued. “I haven’t decided what to do.”

Dom opened the beers and poured them into glasses. He was humming to himself in the short silence. “I don't see what's there to decide on, Ales. We have guns, they have blood, we can just bleed them dry.” He sank back and raised his glass. “Cheers, fratelli miei.”

“Something must be seriously wrong,” Frankie said, leaning forward to take his glass, “because I actually agree, it’s not a bad idea.”

“You cannot be serious.” Frankie was the least hot-tempered in the family, our mother included. When we wanted blood and saw only red, he was the one that you could count on to be more…rational.

He shrugged. “I am. They've cost us forty million and bonus points with some new city officials. A gunfight is very much due.”

That wasn't wholly unreasonable.

“But,” Frankie wasn't done. “You are right, just going in over this might be overkill. This isn't the dark ages, and we still aren't clear on who their allies are. So maybe something small. Lighting up a few of their properties.”

Dom cheered. “Blow it up!”

A more plausible, less drastic idea. “Bombs?”

“You know I have my supply. Any range, any type.” Dom smiled wolfishly.

“Now you have a list of options,” Frankie said, “pick.”

Bloodbath, arson, bombing, a whole list indeed.

The bloodbath was out of it. Frankie was right about the allies and all the things that could follow.

We were very cultured men, after all.

The phone rang again.

I ignored it. My secretary knew to bring anything urgent to my door.

“How about we all pay the Trievs a visit?” Dom suggested, watching us through his empty beer glass. “The Raven Boys, going to see the wolves.”

“Raven boys?” Frankie asked with a raised brow.

It was a scrappy nickname Dom had been singing for a few years now.

“Yeah, because we have ink-black hair like ravens do.”

Frankie gave me a look, and I shrugged. Far be it from me to point out any more of Dom’s scrappy ideas.

I was about to say something when the door interrupted us.

Millie came in, trying not to look in Dom’s direction. “Sir, a call came in from Mr. Ananas. He says there’s a problem at 13 Octove Avenue.”

“A problem?”

“The bank, the construction, the union, and the site’s new owner.”

All of us looked up at her. Millie swallowed and took a step back.

“New owner?” I asked because the shit show didn’t seem to know how to end.

Millie nodded. “Yes sir. He says you need to come because things are getting out of control.” And she hurried away.

We stood and started for the door in perfect silence, my mind running with thoughts.

Something about this was too familiar.

“I’ll grab more beer,” Dom said behind us.

It was almost a war zone when we got to the site, to the small tent that had been set up for administration while the construction was ongoing.

Imagine my lack of surprise when I recognized the woman in the middle of everything, with her hair up and the most disinterested expression you’d ever see.

I scoffed under my breath.