“She has been under my protection.”
“She’s always needed protection, because her obsession has never been a healthy one.”
“Her obsession with my family.”
“Your family. Losing her heart. Same thing.”
“Her mamma,” I said. I understood what he meant. Ava did not want her heart. It hurt too much after her mamma had left.
He nodded. “It’s a complicated situation, for all of them. Ava buried the pain with focus, and the things she focused on only led her to dangerous situations.”
“You took care of the sisters.”
“Lucila. Yeah. Ava. To a certain degree. There’s a line with Ava. Cross it when she doesn’t want you to, she flies.” He took another drink of beer. “I’ve heard things, even if I’m not in New York anymore. You’ve been letting the world know who she belongs to now. I’m guessing because you know her history and all the dangerous men she’s dealt with in the past.”
I went even deeper than the paperwork Rocco had sent to me. I had my own men fly to New York and find out all there was to Ava Girardi. Once I realized how deep her work into that life, and my own, went, I branded her with my name.
“It is a warning. She belongs to me.”
“Good. Because there’s something going on in New York. Someone came into her office before she left for Venice. I don’t know how much you know about Vice City Press, but Edna’s family made it a fortress in New York. No one gets in unless they have clearance to. It was by sheer luck Ava got in when she was no more than a kid. Old man Giannini, who built it from the ground up, knew not everyone was going to love what Vice City stands for—especially since they report on business better left to the dark. Whoever got into her office was the same person who got her into the event in Venice.”
“Olivier Nemours,” I said. “He’s been a plague on my family.”
“I’ve never heard of him, but someone let him into Vice City.”
“Another worker,” I surmised.
“Must have been. But that place is a haven for the workers inside. I’m assuming you dug deep into Ava’s past, so you know she basically lives there. She used to eat, sleep, breathe work. That’s why she ran to Venice. She knows her safe place has been compromised. I found out Edna left Vice City to Ava once she dies. That’s not going to go over well with her family. Maybe it’s a disgruntled nephew who wants it for himself. She has one of those who works there.”
“I will take care of it. I will take care of her.”
“She’s not the type of woman who calls for help often. Two people. That’s it.”
“You.”
“I’m one of them. A man by the name of Kirill Balabanov is the other. She stopped calling him after he tried to take her to Russia. He was deported back for bad behavior. He still comes back, though, and if she feels desperate, she’ll call him. But she doesn’t have me to call if he tries to keep her again.”
“He wants to cage her in.”
“He knows her spirit is wild. He’s tried to lock her in before.”
My alarm chirped at me. It was time for Ava to eat.
Before I could leave to find her, Minnie came barreling into the kitchen, Ava and Lucila behind her.
“Time to do a pizza hop, Liloand Nazzareno!”
Ava and Lucila looked between Brio and me. Brio stood beside Lucila and set his arm around her neck, and she reached up and took his hand, entwining their fingers.
Ava narrowed her eyes at me as we all filed out and left. Ava and I walked side by side, and she kept glancing at me without saying anything.
I was quiet throughout what Minnie called the pizza hop. We tried different pizzas from different pizzerias in Naples. In one of the pizzerias, a man with the Fausti tattoo on his forearm was staring at Luci and Ava. I stared at him until he met my eyes. He took me in, and when he realized who I was, he nodded once out of respect and turned back to his order.
My face, which belonged to Marzio Fausti, was stronger than the tattoo on my back. I did not even have to show it to let our world know who I was in it. My position in the family was closer to the king than his.
My thoughts, however, were on Ava and her life in New York.
This Kirill Balabanov.
