7. Lucia

CHAPTER 7

Lucia

ONE MONTH LATER

I 've always believed in being grateful for the little things in life. And right now, my heart is completely full as I stare down at the baby in my arms. Alejandro Valerio Ramirez—named after both of his grandfathers.

"He is the most adorable thing ever. Aren't you, Ale?" I ask, rocking him in my arms while his mother watches from her seat on the couch.

I'm currently standing in the home I grew up in. I haven't been here in over a decade and yet the mansion is still unchanged and entirely familiar. I arrived in Chicago only just yesterday instead of the previously agreed time, which was two weeks ago. Like my sister predicted she gave birth a week earlier than expected, so she's currently three weeks postpartum and hating everything and everyone. Except her baby, of course. And occasionally her husband. I get a pass as well. Sometimes.

The baby blinks up at me, his clear blue eyes so much like his father's. He looks a lot like my sister, though. He has her nose and her mouth, but those eyes are so very clearly Nico.

"You know, when I first heard his name, I thought it was sweet that you wanted to recognize our father. Now, though, I'm thinking it's a possibility that the kid could be subjected to bullies later in life. Alejandro Valerio Ramirez is a pretty big mouthful. You could have given him a more generic name. Like Chad. Chads don't get bullied."

Aurora scoffs. "Like I'd ever name my baby Chad. Alejandro's a wonderful name."

"You say that now, but no one's going to be there with him years from now in the playground when the kids are making fun of him."

I don't really hate his name. I'm just looking for something to gripe about. Something my sister picks up on immediately.

"You're being ridiculous. Why would anyone make fun of a kid named Alejandro? Since when are you so cynical?" Aurora questions.

I sigh, holding the baby closer to my chest. "I'm just jet lagged, sorella ."

"The flight from New York to here was two hours," she drawls, calling me out on my bullshit. "Wanna tell me what's really going on?"

I avoid eye contact, unwilling to let her look into my head and pull out my secrets just yet. She pushed a baby out of her weeks ago; she deserves rest. And I have no plans to bother her with my problems.

"I'm fine," I assure her. "Quit bugging me."

Aurora raises both her hands in surrender. "You're pissier than me and I just gave birth."

I smile. "You're right. I'm sorry. What do you need me to do? As his aunt, I nominate myself as babysitter for life."

"Careful with the promises you make, Luce," a new voice joins in. I look up at the doorway to find my brother-in-law. "You just might end up regretting that."

"Never," I say assuredly.

Nicolas Ramirez chuckles as he walks into the room. He isn't just a brother-in-law to me, he's also the closest thing I have to a brother. He and my sister just got together over a year ago, after an embarrassing ten years of pining for one another. I love them both so much.

The baby starts to cry and I step forward to place him in his mother's arms, where he's immediately soothed. Aurora starts to breastfeed him, while I look up at Nico.

"You look tired, Nicky," I say affectionately.

And he really does. I understand they've just had a baby, but it's more than that for him. Nico's also the Don of the Italian outfit. The Cosa Nostra. A position that used to be belong to my father but passed to Nico upon his death. It must be hard, navigating being a Don while being a new father. Their relationship went through several hiccups, but at the end of the day, I'm glad they were able to find this. And each other.

He looks at my sister like she hung the moon. That kind of dedication and admiration is truly rare. I'm not saying I need something like that, but if I ever found a love half as great as theirs, I'd cherish it forever.

"Thanks," he mutters. "I can always count on you to be honest."

I grin at that. He starts telling me about the moment Alejandro was born and I listen attentively, suddenly glad to be back with family. I didn't feel so positively about things on my flight here, but now I understand that all things happen for a reason. And maybe, just maybe, this is where I'm meant to be.

"So how long are you going to be here for?" Nico questions, crossing his arms over his chest.

I arch an eyebrow. "Already chasing me off? I just got here, Nicky."

"No, but you and I both know your return is going to cause a few tremors within the outfit. I'm trying to make plans for that."

I sigh softly. Nico and his plans. "Actually, I haven't decided when I'm going to be leaving yet."

That has him raising his eyebrows in question.

"I had the same reaction," my sister speaks up. "Usually you can't get her away from that job of hers, and now she's talking about an extended visit. Something's up."

Damn it. Why did I have to be cursed with a family that knows me so well?

I'm saved from having to reply when someone walks into the room. My eyes connect with green ones that are like a shock to my system. The smile that spreads over my face is instinctive. He returns it, his expression shifting swiftly from annoyance to mild surprise.

"Hey, chipmunk," Adrian Rossi greets, stepping forward to hug me and ruffle my hair. "I see you finally made it."

"Dude, I told you to stop calling me that," I say, pushing him off and away from my hair.

The nickname might have been cute when we were kids but not anymore. Adrian's a dickhead, though, so I doubt I'll get him to stop anytime soon. When I look at sister and Nico, there are even more questions in their eyes and I suddenly realize they know nothing about this little situation.

My lips tilt into a smirk and I decide it's in my best interests to let Adrian explain himself.

Nico speaks up first. "Since when are you two so well acquainted?" he asks, gesturing between me and the six-foot-tall man.

Adrian offers him a short quick smile. "Before you get angry, I did warn you that I'd find it hard to stay away."

"He came to visit me in New York a couple months ago, crying about a dagger," I state.

"I was not crying," he grumbles, shooting me an annoyed look. "I very politely asked you to return it. It's a family heirloom."

A pretty important one. Adrian and I used to be close friends as kids. So close that when he was leaving the outfit he decided to give me something for safekeeping and also to remember him by. The dagger was a gift, because he knew how much I liked knives and pointy things.

For years, I kept the dagger safe. It was one of the links I had to the home I had to leave behind. When he suddenly showed up in New York a couple of months ago, I was pissed he thought he could just show up and ask for it back and I'd simply hand it over. I made him work for it over a couple of days, which is when we rekindled our friendship. We've been texting pretty regularly since.

By the time we explain all this to Nico, he's pretty pissed. But Adrian has the perfect distraction.

"Before you kill me, you might want to hear something. We've got a problem."

Nico takes in the expression on his face in quiet consideration. It's not often Adrian's ever that serious.

"Alright." He nods. "Let's go to my office."

He leans down to place a kiss on his wife's head before exiting the room.

"See you later, Lucia," Adrian says to me, following the Don.

I take a seat next to my sister, curiosity churning in my gut.

"What do you think that was about?" I ask Aurora.

My sister shrugs. "If it's anything of consequence, Nico will tell me eventually. Hey, I'm going to put him to bed. We can talk more after, okay?"

"Yeah, sure."

She leaves as well and I must have sat there for only a couple of seconds before my curiosity got the best of me. As a child, I was always pretty elite when it came to sneaking about the house. I'm able to find my way to Nico's office, a little surprised to see that the door was not only left open but Vladimir, Nico's guard, is also nowhere in sight.

Something's really wrong.

Adrian's voice drifts out as I stop to listen in on their conversation.

"My sources told me he killed off Aguilar a couple of days ago. Now that he's done with that, he seems to be gaining an interest in us," he's telling the Don.

I can't see their faces but it takes Nico a while before he speaks up.

"We're business partners, Adrian. You don't know if that actually means anything."

"I know the man's a goddamn psychopath. He spent the past month wiping out a drug ring for no reason, and now he's looking to do the same thing to us."

"Volkov may be powerful, but he's not stupid enough to try and take on the might of the Cosa Nostra."

"I hope you're right," Adrian mutters.

This is certainly an interesting conversation. Who is this Volkov? The power plays and dynamics in the outfit have always been interesting to me.

"What do you want me to do, Rossi?" Nico presses.

"He's coming for us, Nicolas. You know I'm never wrong. I don't know what the fuck he wants, but it would be in our best interests to be prepared."

"Alright, fine. I'll look into it. Okay?"

He must nod in agreement or something because I don't hear anything else. At least not until Adrian walks out and finds me leaning against the wall beside the door. I place a finger on my mouth to stop him from speaking out.

He smirks before wrapping an arm around my shoulders and quietly leading me away from the Don's office.

"I see you still like to sneak around."

"And you're still a jerk," I mutter.

He laughs. "Yeah, I definitely missed having you around. What did you hear?"

"Nothing. Except some mild paranoia on your part."

He rolls his eyes. "I'm not being paranoid, Lucia. Something's going on with the Bratva."

The Bratva is the Russian equivalent to the Cosa Nostra, except they're more cutthroat and secretive. I don't know much about them. I'm about to ask him to tell me more about his new obsession, but he moves on before I can.

"Weren't you supposed to be here two weeks ago? What's been going on? You went dark on me," he says.

"The whole lot of you are meddlers," I mutter under my breath.

Is it too much to ask for them to just let me keep one secret?

"What's going on?" Adrian asks again, his perceptive green eyes fixed on my face.

I sigh softly before deciding to come clean. "You're not going to believe this. But I may have quit my job a couple of weeks ago."

His jaw falls open. "No shit! You love that job. What the hell happened?"

There's a small ache in my chest as I explain the entire situation to him. By the time I'm done, Adrian is nearly shaking with rage. I have to wrestle his phone out of his hands when he insists on getting his private plane ready to fly over to New York.

"I'm going to kill that motherfucker," he promises, referring to Hans Murray, public enemy number one.

Over the past month, I've had to learn first-hand just how much power one wields when you're a white man with lots of money and connections behind you. The altercation in my office with that asshole spread like wild fire through the industry. Before I could blink, everyone knew me as the woman who had assaulted Hans. There was no use defending myself, and my company let me go a few days later.

I was angry, upset, a little depressed. It's why I didn't come here to Chicago sooner. I had to get my shit together. After losing my job, I realized there was really nothing left for me in New York. My family's here and it's time for me to be closer to them.

"No. You're not going to do anything to him," I grit out.

Adrian arches an eyebrow in question.

"Hans will get what's coming to him. You know I'm awful at letting things go, right? It might take a while, but I'll skin him alive eventually."

"Fucker," Adrian mutters under his breath, his green eyes still flashing.

I smile. "Aw, it's cute how annoyed you are for me. You must like me a lot, Rossi," I say teasingly.

He rolls his eyes. "You wish. You're a pain in my ass."

Despite his words, he does squeeze my shoulder in comfort, his eyes offering the sympathy he can't voice.

"I'm fine, Adrian. Really."

I've always had an uncanny ability to bounce back from shit, brushing it off my shoulders. I'm over the entire situation. Did it hurt a lot? Of course. But now all that matters is how I deal with it.

"So I'm guessing you'll be in town for a while?"

"Yeah. I'm considering moving back," I reply. "By the way, don't tell Nico and Aurora about this yet. Especially Nico. If he finds out, I won't be able to stop him from going after Hans. And I really don't want him to die. At least not yet."

He has to think he's won. Let him enjoy the next few months of his life. I'll come for him when he least expects it.

"You got it," Adrian assures me. "Come on, I'm hungry. Let's see if Mona can whip us up some breakfast."

I smile at the thought of the elderly woman who was the closest thing to a mother figure I had growing up.

"I missed being here," I say quietly, mostly to myself.

"Glad to have you back, princess."

There's a certain peace attached to being among people who I know would do anything to do protect me. But that kind of peace can be shattered in an instant.

A couple of days later, I'm having breakfast with my family when Vladimir suddenly rushes into the room, worry in his brown eyes. He only has to look at Nico for my brother-in-law to launch into action.

"Aurora, take your sister and head to your rooms," he orders in a crisp voice.

My sister doesn't even blink. She remains seated. "What's going on?"

Adrian's the next person to enter the room. His expression is completely blank and unreadable, which makes me a little nervous.

"They should probably stay," he tells Nico. "Volkov will be here in a couple of minutes."

Volkov? My heart races at the name and it suddenly hits me why it's so familiar. Because it belongs to a man I've tried hard not to think about the last couple of months.

But there's no way…

"Nico, what's going on?" Aurora asks insistently.

"We have a problem," the Don grits out. "At least according to Adrian's sources."

"My sources aren't wrong," the brown-haired man states.

I try to catch his eye but he doesn't so much as look in my direction. His entire demeanor is tense.

"It doesn't make any sense."

Adrian shrugs, "You're right, it doesn't. Which is why it's a good thing the man himself will be here in a couple of minutes." My mouth drops open when he pulls a gun out of his jacket. "Don't worry, Ramirez. I'll make it a clean shot."

My heart starts to race. I have no idea what the fuck is going on.

"You'll do no such thing. Put the gun away," Nico hisses.

Adrian ignores that, keeping it firmly in his hand. Aurora gets to her feet, walking over to her husband and forcing his gaze to land on her.

"Explain what's going on. Are we in danger?" she questions.

Nico blows out a breath. "No. At least not at the moment."

"So what's up with trigger-happy Bob over there?" I speak up, pointing at Adrian who still hasn't looked at me.

Come to think of it, Nico's avoiding my gaze as well. The Don runs a hand through his hair.

"I can't explain it, Aurora. Let's just go and see what he wants," he says to his wife.

"Who?" my sister asks.

"Ivan Volkov."

The name has my chest seizing and blood rushing to my head. I suck in a sharp breath, unwilling to believe it but knowing without a doubt that coincidences like that don't exist. Nico insists we all head into the living room to receive our guest.

When he finally arrives, my heart skips several beats at the sight of him. I haven't seen him in a month but he's entirely unchanged. Still that same man with the unflinching aura and piercing brown eyes. Eyes that zero in on me as soon as he appears.

I swallow softly, unsure what could possibly be going on.

But I do know one thing for sure. Things are about to change.