Chapter Twenty-One

Those We Know

Rafe

Three Months Later

Roman holds out the brand-new set of throwing knives I just gave him, the kind of enthusiastic glint in his eye that comes with a long-awaited wish. He's been throwing for hours under Sonja's tutelage, and something tells me this isn't his first time. Perhaps he picked up skills back at the Hernandez compound under Sebastian's watchful eye, though I doubt the abusive asshole ever let the kid so much as touch a plastic butter knife, lest it end up buried in his back. No, it's more likely that he met an old friend of mine at the Academy who gave him a few side lessons between classes.

Perhaps one day he will give me the joy of telling me about his experiences there. If he ever talks again. But perhaps that's not Roman's preferred method of communication.

The sideways grin on my wife's face when I presented her with a beaming Roman gives me just as much pleasure. All the money and power in the world is worthless if the same treasures can't make the people who matter happy.

The boy displayed the slightest apprehension when I drove him out to the warehouse Dom and his bodyguard outfitted for today's purpose, but since Willow sat in the passenger seat, any threat he sensed dissipated. Even though we'd fought, he recognized, or at least seemed to, how much we loved each other.

"They're yours." I smile without teeth as the boy appears to have an aversion to them.

Who knows what his uncle did to scar him, but as his verbal skills haven't improved with schooling, it's likely no one will ever know.

"I missed you." Willow fluffs the boy's hair fondly.

He rolls his eyes and jerks his head to the side. He might not talk but he can communicate his needs just fine.

"He was safe in a school I chose," I say carefully, glad I omitted the truth of Sonja's impromptu rescue action when her eyes narrow. She is pissed that I withheld this from her for so long and I am sure I will face her wrath once we are alone.

Not that I took him as a certain woman in blue leather sneaked her ass into my house and thieved what was mine. I still ached at the thought of him gone, but for the message she sent me four hours later with a picture of my old school with herself and a grinning Roman standing by the towering wrought-iron gates.

I pull my shit together and face my wife. "The same one I attended as a child. Rough, and strict, but good connections. To put him through I had to claim guardianship, even though he's of age now."

Willow's lips soften in the filtered light of the warehouse from the high windows above us, and her eyes shine for a different reason than her baby brother's. "Thank you."

I smile gently, holding out an arm and she comes to me, sliding into the vacant spot at my side as though she never left. "I wanted to have him back here as an early birthday present to you." I press my lips to her forehead, using my forefinger and thumb to lift her chin, and move my kisses slowly downward.

A loudly cleared throat stops my progress, and I sigh.

"Perhaps you could tell Roman of our plans for the day." A woman clad in a plethora of enviable, skintight blue leather and fiery-red hair steps out of the shadows.

If I hadn't had the building cleared before we arrived I might have been worried, but I called Sonja out of the compound to assist in today's activities. Holding back my reservations for the unpalatable woman who fought me at every turn when I proposed the idea initially, I pushed until I finally lost my patience and said exactly what I thought of her methods. Only then did she smile, pat me like I'd been a good dog, and went quietly on her way.

Until now.

"I know Roman's birthday isn't for another nine months," I started. I was still furious with myself that I missed the opportunity to celebrate with Willow last year and keen to rectify that this year. "But yours is coming up shortly and I didn't see a reason not to celebrate with a little family bonding of the knife-throwing variety."

Willow sent me a look askance, no doubt calculating the risk factor of today's venture, while Roman banged his booted foot on the floor in a show of approval. I'd take that simple joy and run with it.

Sonja cleared her throat.

I grinned. "And the lovely Lady Sonja will be teaching us all."

She nodded sourly at the false title I bestowed upon her that suited her oh-so-fucking well, and unrolled a strip of finely tooled leather that held dozens and dozens of finely honed and recently sharpened blades of all varieties.

I hadn't told her as much, but I'd been lucky to receive training in London with Konnor when I was a little younger than Roman was now. The skill saved my life several times in the early days, and when she offers me my pick of the weapons and points to a series of targets lining the far wall in various all-made-up in shocked, bang-bang sort of cartoonish human silhouettes, I keep my walk slow, perusing my options. It's all for show, because I've already made up my mind.

Perhaps it's time to up the ante on skill level from the baby practice knives we've been working with.

Picking out six identical blades, I walk the row as she talks, not waiting for her to clue me in on the demonstration. Her tone remains soft, with a slight eastern European inflection, perhaps Ukraine or Romanian. Weighing the knives gently in my palms I sink back into the mindset required, a calm space with a hollow breath.

Each blade leaves my hand as I meander across the row at the same distance Willow and Roman will be learning at, though I barely spare a glance at the targets. By the time Sonja gets to my part of the production, each of the blades I picked are embedded to the hilt in the center of each evenly spaced target.

Sonja faces the targets, her face expressionless as is her personal habit, though I swear an eye twitches.

Roman begins to applaud but before he makes it to the third clap, Sonja discards her pleasant persona, whirls on the table, picking out six smaller blades almost dart-sized bearing a slight curve, like a crescent moon, and throws them under arm like a deadly frisbee.

Each throw knocks my blades from the targets and leaves a broadly etched scar across the center, rendering them all useless.

I smile, joining in with Roman's applause, glad I picked the right teacher for the two most precious people in my world. I headed off to find the extra targets Dom prepared and stashed away as spares in case of just such an event. Though perhaps I need to have a talk with him about his obvious sense of humor. The spares looked more like they belonged in a Dick Tracey flick than an empty mafia warehouse.

Dom is absent, though I don't know if he is on baby duty or Thalia duty, or if those things are one and the same now.

When he turned up in my house covered in blood and bearing a remarkably spotless child for all the gore that decorated his body head to toe, Thalia had been inconsolable, alternating between clutching the child and railing at Dom with her small, clenched fists until she was exhausted. Then he took her upstairs for a little quiet time, and I imagined, for the same conversation I had with Diego regarding the beheading of Daemon Cross and what the fuck we were going to do with his remains. Diego was all for framing the bloodied mess, though I wasn't certain Thalia would appreciate the effort.

Which still left the matter of Dominic Barese wide open. While he completed the jobs I required, he had been notably absent for the past two weeks, and I knew our lives were at a parting point.

And for that, I had a plan. But first, Roman—and my wife—needed to know how to better defend themselves if my silent and deadly shadow was to be replaced in part by the stunning Lady Sonja.

That last memento slips unbidden from my lips and her next knife embeds itself in the target I am still fixing to the premade frame.

I send her a slow look over my shoulder, but as expected, she neither backs down nor smiles, or gives any other reaction. Instead, she strides across to my wife, fixes her stance in the briefest of gestures, and moves right along to hang with Roman.

Or maybe not hang with him, but she tutors the boy as agreed. Standing side by side, they are of a height and I note how similar in age my wife and Sonja are.

"If Roman has another growth spurt this summer, he's going to dwarf her," Willow murmurs, her gaze fixed in the same place as mine.

I turn away, knowing Roman is in the best hands we have and confident in Sonja's ability not only to protect our ward, but to lay down her life for him, if necessary.

You won't expect it when it happens.

I close my eyes and will Konnor's caustic, strained threat out of my head. Whatever burgeoning friendships Roman made at my old school I hope none of them end the way mine have.

"We'll be all right, Rafe." Willow, ever my mind reader, leans into my side. "Is this right?" She holds up the knives in the worst grip I've ever seen.

I take the comfort she offers, pressing my mouth over hers for a distracting moment, sliding my tongue seductively along hers, and break the kiss off before I take it too far. "Atrocious. Chef Luca would be appalled. Maybe I should have him punish you … again."

Willow squirms in the circle of my arms. "Maybe we should try for a lesson with him," she said breathlessly.

Lady Sonja makes a disparaging noise we both ignore, though Roman looks on curiously.

There's a talk we need to have, and soon. Though I'm not entirely sure I'm the right person to hold it.

I squeeze her hip tight. "What little monster have I made of you?"

Willow leans up to press her lips against my ear. "Your personal sort, Rafe."

My cock swells in my pants and I use the next hour to will my blood to flow in the right direction, though Willow seems intent on teasing the ever-loving shit out of me, rubbing her backside encased in silk pants into my groin each time I assist her.

"Do you flirt with Sonja like this too?" I grouse, getting her ready for her last throw of the day.

Willow turns her head and beams at me, all stunning and sweet and full off sass. "Yes, Rafe. And her dick is bigger than yours."

She hurls the knife without looking, taking a page out of my book, and decimates her detective noir looking target with a brutal efficiency I crave.

I growl obscenities under my breath, every word aimed at my wife, as Roman applauds again, throwing his remaining knives with decent strength though not with the flawless accuracy my wife possesses. Shaking out his wrists, he strides right into my space and opens one arm for a hug.

I hesitate, looking at Willow out of the corner of my eye. She nods slowly, a thoughtful look decorating her face as Roman engulfs me. The boy is stouter than I remember, but not just from decent food during the last months, and possibly for the first time in a handful of years as his uncle seemed to starve him, intent on keeping him weak.

Bulk presses into my shoulder as he embraces me, and I wonder at the choice of sending him to school, though the action was stolen from me by Sonja. I'm not certain if I want to thank her for taking on the arduous task or gut her. Either way, Roman's time apart has made a difference. His muscle mass has increased and he's well on his way to becoming a fine young man with the physique suited to our line of work, but incomplete students with any sort of disability, obvious or invisible, are often shunned in a world of born heroes and villains with the purse to suit their cruel needs and bribe away their biases and insults.

But the boy—I know I'll never think of him as more—is so naive in other ways. Perhaps I needed to have a birds-and-bees talk with him, or a glance sideways assures me that maybe Sonja will one day oblige and take on that mantle on my behalf.

Or I could pussy my way out of it and get Willow to do the thing in a more proper fashion. My mind made up, I turn to my wife, already congratulating myself on weaseling my way out of an uncomfortable situation as the first of many bullets pierce the windows above us, raining deadly shards and hell over the people I care about most.

Willow crouches over Roman, moving faster than I gave her credit for, and glares across the space at me. "I swear I'm never leaving the house again, Rafe!" she shouts, reaching back to grab at the half-empty knife roll.

Sonja tosses her a handful of the remaining blades in tense silence and disappears into the shadows as my wife splits the difference with her brother, speaking in an undertone I can't decipher. A flicker of movement to one far wall shows the leather-clad assassin scaling the cement exoskeleton of the warehouse like a wraith.

Equipped with no such magical powers, I grip my pistols, send up a prayer, and curse Dom for not being here when I need him most in the same breath, and rain hell on the fools who entered my territory.