17. Gia

I stareat Sal's brother in shock.

"Witness protection?" I hiss. I want to screech it louder than that, but I'm not sure who is in the little shop below. "Witness protection? Seriously?"

"Yeah." Dino glares at me. "Seriously."

Dino and I don't like each other.

It's pretty much just how it goes.

Since day one of meeting, we haven't gotten along.

And I see no reason to change that now.

There's so much to unpack with what he told us. My mind starts to go through it, and I still can't believe what he's saying.

He has kids.

Twins.

Their mom is some kind of princess, whose dad is in a gang that Dino is so afraid of, he won't even tell us who she is.

Marco offered to give testimony…

That makes me nervous.

In this situation, the cops have all the power. They can squeeze Marco if they feel like he's not giving them what they want.

"What the fuck is Marco supposed to testify on?"

Dino shrugs. "Don't know. But it has nothin' to do with us and what we've got going on, either on the De Luca or Rossi side."

"You can't know that."

Dino glares at me, ice in his stare. "You callin' me a liar?"

"I'm saying you don't know what Marco is going to say."

"I know my brother," he says fiercely.

"I thought I knew you," Sal says quietly.

That shuts Dino down pretty effectively.

I shut my eyes and hiss out a breath. "Okay. Let's say you're right, and Marco is only playing boy scout for a little while. He testifies. He pisses off every single person in our world. He can't just come back. He's going to have a target on his back. He's literally going to be the enemy number one for everyone. He can't just return to our world…"

"He's not planning on it," Dino says quietly.

I stare. "What?"

"Marco knows. He knows that he's going to be a target. He isn't coming back to the family."

Jesus H. Christ.

I look over at Sal. There's a muscle in his jaw that is twitching with emotion, and I know he's having some strong feelings about that.

Hell.

So am I.

If Elio just up and abandoned me without telling me what the fuck he was doing? If he didn't at least clue me in?

I'd be furious.

I don't know what it's like to have more than one sibling, so I can't speak to that dynamic. But I do know that with the one sibling I have, I'd lose my shit if he pulled a stunt like this.

I don't know Marco well. He was Elio's friend, and I didn't pay a ton of attention to him.

But right now?

I wish I could smack some sense into him.

"Sal," I say in a low voice. "What do we do now?"

"I don't know."

Both Dino and I stare at him. He looks calmly to both of us. "What?"

"You don't know?"

"No, Gia," Sal mutters. The frustration in his tone is evident. "I don't know."

I don't think I've ever heard Sal say that.

It's… alarming.

Instead of processing that, I round on Dino. "So what? You want us just to leave? To kindly fuck off so that Marco can continue to live in la-la land where he's protected from basically all harm?"

"Well. He's not protected from all harm…" Dino looks at Sal meaningfully.

Sal glances at me.

And I figure out what they're doing without speaking. "No. No, no. No secret brother brain communication. I'm not responsible for Marco, or anything that happens to him. Not when he chose to be a fucking narc," I hiss.

"Marco isn't at risk here. Or he wasn't until now."

"We're literally in Ireland, Dino! I know you're not the smart brother but surely you can put together Ireland and the Irish, the people who hate us? Like, I feel like I don't need to remind you are trying to take down everything we've built."

Dino narrows his eyes at me. "Interpol has him here for a reason."

"And the reason isn't to dangle him like a prize hog in front of the wolves?"

He snorts at me. "You showed up after being nearly assassinated by some kind of unknown…"

I throw my hands up. "Unknown? I think given the recent developments that you're telling us, it's pretty freakin' obvious who tried to assassinate us. How do we know it wasn't Interpol? That's clearly who we ran into in Prague, Sal."

"When were you in Prague?"

Sal ignores his brother. "Yeah. I agree with you, but they couldn't have known about the meeting with the Russians."

"Doesn't matter. Having Interpol's involvement is a whole different ball game," I snap.

It makes everything harder.

We're used to moving around in the shadows. We're definitely adept at doing exactly that. But having Interpol's lens on us?

That's a fucking terrible idea.

"Gia," Sal says softly.

I shake my head. "No. It doesn't matter, Sal. Marco screwed us. We have to acknowledge that. He totally, completely, and utterly screwed us over."

"No. It wasn't him. It was me," Dino says hollowly.

I point a finger at him. "Oh, you're definitely part of it. Do not mistake me, Bernadino De Luca. You're half of this fucking problem. Because you couldn't keep it in your pants…"

"I was a kid," he grunts at me.

"You have two brothers who managed to not knock anyone up!"

"And you have one who did!"

Dino and I are squared off and yelling at each other at this point. With a resigned sigh, Sal comes between us. He puts a hand gently on my shoulder, then pushes Dino back. "We don't know who could be listening," he murmurs.

"Yeah, like maybe the fucking police, or the Irish. As we are in Ireland," I snap.

I really can't resist it.

Dino bristles but Sal shoves him back. "Back off, Dino," he says in a dark voice.

"You're not the boss of me."

"I am," Sal says flatly. "As your brother, and your superior, I need you to back the fuck off."

That gets Dino's attention. Reluctantly, he takes a step back.

Sal looks at both of us. "Marco is solved, Gia. Like it or not, the reason we came here is clear."

I gape at him. "Clear? Clear as fucking mud, if that's what you mean by…"

"We know where he is. We know what happened to him. It's clear. Okay?"

No.

None of this is okay.

But I recognize the tone in Sal's voice. He's not telling me that I need to move on. He's pointing out that there's a fact here. No matter what, the purpose of our trip, the reason we came here, is over.

We know where Marco is.

We know what he's doing.

But… shit.

I can't do anything with this information.

"Caterina needs to know. Elio needs to know," I say to both of them.

Dino and Sal exchange a look. "Elio's going to like this even less than Gia did," Sal says softly.

"Yeah. I know," Dino responds.

"He's going to fire you."

"I know."

"He's going to try and make sure you never see Caterina or Luna ever again."

"He can fucking try," Dino growls. "Caterina is my sister same as yours. Luna is my niece, same as yours. He wants to be mad? Fine. I'm not going to stop Elio from being mad. But I am going to draw the line at being told that I can't see my own fucking sister, Sal."

Sal nods. "Same. Elio and Caterina are going to freak out. When's the trial?"

Dino shrugs. "Dunno. Didn't occur to me to ask, and I haven't talked to Marco since he decided to go into custody."

My eyes are going to pop out of my head. "You haven't…"

"No. Why would I? I'm not going to break his cover. He'd be a dead man if I did."

A bitter laugh escapes me. "He's a dead man no matter what so you might as well say goodbye to him! Shit!"

"We know what happened to Marco," Sal reiterates firmly. "What we don't know is who tried to kill us in Amsterdam. It could be Interpol."

"My money is on Interpol," I sigh. "Otherwise our faces would be all over the news…"

"They are, though," Dino says.

Shit.

He's right.

"You've been featured on the news ever since it happened. Two known mafia members, presumed dead after the explosion."

"Yeah, but if we're presumed dead…"

"They're trying to control the narrative," Sal says slowly. "They know that the underworld is going to more or less accept the story that they put out. We aren't going to have rivals look into this, because they're going to assume that if Interpol is putting out the report, it's real."

"Motherfuckers," I breathe.

Then, it occurs to me that we're still heavy into enemy territory here. If Marco is in witness protection here in Ireland…

"We need to leave," I whisper.

Sal nods. "We do."

Damn it. We just snuck into Ireland.

I don't want to think about sneaking out.

Ugh.

Sal looks over at me. "Why don't you shower, while Dino and I talk?"

"No. I don't need one."

"Gia," he says softly. "Please. Just give Dino and I a minute."

Well.

I guess I can't deny that either. I huff at Dino.

"Show me your bathroom. Cretin," I snap.

He does.

* * *

I shower.

Dino's been living in the tiniest living quarters possible. I have no idea how long he's been here, because the last I checked, he was running the docks for Elio.

He says Elio knows he's gone, but… how?

I'm suspicious.

And the room? Microscopic. The shower? Tiny. Neither of these guys is ever going to fully get clean scrubbing in this thing.

Especially Sal, with his broad shoulders. And his massive chest.

And his…

I shake myself. Now is not the time to be thinking about Sal's cock.

I swear, I'm getting weirdly addicted to him. If I can't make it through a full shower without fantasizing about his dick?

That's a problem.

We haven't even had like, real sex yet. I haven't felt what it's like to have him inside me. To ride him, to feel him shudder as he comes apart inside me.

Oh no. Now I'm straight up picturing him, and me.

And I'm getting wet.

I finish up, since the hot water is running out anyway, and I step out of the shower that looks like it might be made for ants. I don't really have anything new to wear, so I sit in my towel on Dino's bed.

I'm not waiting long before Sal comes inside. "Hey," he murmurs.

"Hi."

"Thank you."

"For what?"

"For giving us some time."

I hug my knees to my chest, hoping the towel covers up all the stuff I need to cover.

Or maybe not.

"You don't have to thank me for that. He's your brother."

"Don't, Gia."

I glance up at him. "Don't what?"

"Don't say it like that. You know that none of us are responsible for our siblings" actions."

I hug my knees closer.

"You know, back when Elio and I were trying to figure out what was up with the whole engagement that Marco agreed to, with Elio and Caterina, I said that I knew you would never have illegitimate children. I knew one of the De Luca's did. I caught someone buying some Easter gifts."

His eyebrows raise. "You didn't think it would be me?"

"No, Sal. Like I said. You'd do the hard thing and make it work with the mom."

"Dino wants to make it work."

I shake my head again. "You wouldn't try, Sal. That's the difference. You'd move heaven and earth to make it work."

"I can't move heaven and earth, Gia."

Looking up, I meet his gaze. "You always do, though."

Sal moves to sit on the bed with me. Slowly, he extends an arm around me, and pulls me close. "I would like to stop finding out I'm an uncle on accident."

That gets a laugh out of me. "At least it's better than finding out you're a dad on accident?"

"Yes. That would be bad too," he whispers.

The tone of his voice pulls a question out of me. "Do you want to be a dad, Sal?"

"Yes."

"Oh," I whisper.

He presses his lips to my temple. "Do you?"

This is a complicated question.

I've never really seen myself as a mom. Cool aunt? I can do that all day. But all the women I know who are great moms seem to have some kind of… softness that I lack.

At the same time though, I want it. Like, it's an experience that I do want to have in life.

I'm just terrified that I'd be bad at it.

"I don't think I'd be a very good mom."

"I think you're pretty fucking good at whatever you put your mind to, Gia Rossi. And there's no rules on what makes a good mom."

"I would say that a lot of therapy bills say otherwise."

He laughs and his hand skims up my leg. "As long as you love your kids, it doesn't matter. You love them. You do good things for them. That's all you need."

It doesn't seem like that's it.

His hand, however, is distracting me from all of this talk about kids. It's inching toward my butt, which, since my knees are still drawn up, means that his fingers are reaching toward my center.

When his hand meets the wetness that's been gathering there, he groans. "Gia," he whispers in my hair. "Are you sitting in my brother's bed, soaking wet?"

"I wasn't thinking about him," I murmur.

"And what were you thinking about?"

Well.

I turn my face so that our lips are meeting. I smile.

"Your thick cock."