We all stare at her, and his eyes get glassy. “You’ve fed my family and now you’re offering me a job?”
Jenny shrugs. “I mean, I did think I was paying tribute to a demon, but yeah. You’re an assassin who lives in a haunted house, you’re going to have, like, the best stories at our weekly staff meetings.”
Gio shakes his head and mumbles something in Italian I don’t understand. Donny’s already down the stairs and waiting in the vestibule. Jenny writes down her number on a piece of paper she found in the hallway and hands it over to her newest employee. But I think he might be better suited for my family business.
The past few minutes linger in my head. My girlfriend is completely unfazed by the violence, everything I’d work so hard to hide from the outside world. And instead, she embraced it with kindness and humor. Betrayal runs deep with the business, and the longer I’m in it, the less I like it. I want to be more like Jenny—hopeful for a future.
As Donny opens the front door, another body comes charging in. It takes me a second to recognize who it is. Cam is drenched in sweat, his gun drawn.
“Shit, Joey,” he gasps out, “are you okay? Dimitri called. Said the cabin was under attack. He gave me the code for your GPS tracker. I’ve got backup coming. What do you need?”
“GPS tracker?”
“Yeah. Dimitri said Alana lojacked the whole Four Families in case something like this ever happened.”
Alana. She was our constant protector. My throat tightens as I can’t hold back anymore.
“She’s gone.”
Cam holds the door open for us. “You think bullets are going to stop Alana? Nah, she sent a message to Dimitri a few minutes ago. Everyone needs to head to Mastodon to regroup.”
“Told ya!” our new friend calls out.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Joey
Cam drops us off at Mastodon Headquarters and says he’s going to meet up with the other Families to check on all the businesses. The Four Families have all their people watching buildings, protecting the assets, and generally on high alert. Uncle Gio is on the phone with the other uncles trying to get reinforcements to the safe house where the kids and aunts are. One of Mastodon’s employees leads us into a staff break room, with couches and comfortable chairs and a mini fridge in the corner.
Jenny and I snuggle on the couch. She was quiet the whole ride back. And pouty. “Are you okay? Besides the obvious trauma.”
She squishes her face and exhales. “I’m bummed that the ADHD guy died. I hope he gets to be a ghost or something.” She pauses. “Weird, I don’t think I would’ve said anything to you about that a few weeks ago. It’s like I’m not as concerned about what you’ll think of me anymore.”
“Probably because you know I like you.”
Her face sours. “No, that’s not it.”
Before I can ask any follow-up questions, the door opens and there’s a blur of motion and barking. Kingston does a lap of zoomies around the room, stops at Donny’s feet, growls, and jumps on my lap, shaking.
“Kingston!” He’s soft and fluffy in my arms as he licks my face. He pulls away and jumps onto Jenny’s lap, buries his face in the pillow next to her, and sticks his ass in the air for butt scratches. Then he jumps down, circles the room three times, and finally curls up on my lap.
Once the dog is settled, I see Dimitri standing in the doorway. “Little guy was scared. We found him under your bed.”
“We?”
Dimitri nods. “Yeah, I took Grae from the safe house before moving him here. We got notification from the cabin’s cameras that there was movement. We watched you get taken, but we were too far out to do anything, so we went back to get the dog.” Dimitri exhales and crosses his arms. “Grae was willing to run into the forest in a fucking tuxedo to find Kingston. I was the one who noticed the front door was still open and suggested we check the house first. Hell, Grae said he’d take the dog if anything happened to you.” He mumbles, “I don’t want to break his heart and tell him you're alive.”
Katya comes in next, her hair frazzled, no longer in the tight bun she normally wears when she’s on duty. She rests her head on Dimitri’s shoulder, and he quickly wraps his arms around her waist. I’ve never seen her so stressed before.
“You okay?” I ask.
Katya sighs. “It was a long night. After the Aurora Awards and Lance ran off, I took Grae, Lena, and Amanda to a safe house.” She motions in a big circle. “Which was compromised, so Alana set Dimitri and Uri to help move our clients. Each of us took one of the high priority clients here since this location is the most secure.” She looks around the room at us. “Amanda is locked away in the guest rooms in the basement.”
Donny lifts his head from his phone. “The basement? Isn’t that where you killed a bunch of people?”
“Technically, I only killed one person. But yeah.”
The color drains from Donny’s face. “You guys cleaned it, right?”
