Charli slowly looked at him and nodded.“I knew, I didn’t want to know but I did.”Then she raised a hand to her forehead and she began to rub the place between her eyes.“But this is bad and it's coming right to our front door.I don’t know what it will be exactly, but it will come.”
Ace glanced at his brothers then at the other people in the room and shook his head.Finally, he asked her, “Babe, what can we do?”
Charli raised her head and also looked around at everyone’s faces.“You don’t believe me.”
“It’s not that we don’t believe you but even you have to admit this is a stretch.”Ace shook his head.
“You think I don’t know that?”Charli snapped.“You think I want to be able to know when bad things are coming that I can’t control?I hate it.I have never told anyone about this because I don’t want anyone to look at me the way you guys are looking at me right now.I shouldn’t have shared it.I knew I shouldn't but I can’t hide it anymore either.I care about you all too much not to warn you that trouble is coming.You all need to know that much but I don’t have to stand here and look at your expressions of disbelief and doubts.”She stood from the couch with Ben in her arms and went down the hall.
They all heard the door shut.
Ace sighed heavily.He had been stunned by what she said and he also heard the pain in her voice but he had no idea how to comfort her either.
“What the hell are we supposed to do about this?”Joker asked his oldest brother.“I mean can someone really feel disasters coming?”
Ace ran his hands over his head and shrugged.“I don’t know, but that’s not what’s important here.”
“What is important here then?”King asked his brother.
Ace gazed at his family, his brothers and their wives.“We have to stand behind her or we might lose everything we built here.”He surged to his feet.“And I’m not gonna lose the peace and the sense of family we have.I’m not gonna wait unprepared for something she thinks is coming.So for a while we’re gonna be prepared for anything to happen.”
King and the others glanced at each other, then they all turned to look at Ace.One by one they all nodded.They might not know what’s coming if anything at all, but they would be ready for it.
A few hours later...
The house had gone quiet.Everyone was asleep.
Charli wasn’t sleeping as she became like a ghost that haunted the night.The same feeling she’d gotten at the cemetery this morning had come back to her, disturbing her rest.
Now she walked silently through the house, keeping guard over her family.In her hand, she carried her rifle, cocked and loaded as she kept watch over her family.She knew no one believed her premonition but she believed in it.She’d lived with her secret all her life.
She paused at one of the living room windows and searched the front yard.Then her body stiffened and she searched again.Whatever she feared was outside right this moment.She could feel someone staring back at her and the air around her seemed to go still, almost as if it was waiting too.
Charli turned on her heel and went to the back door.Peeking out, she halted but nothing out there alerted her, so she slowly reached for the door handle.She opened the door silently, then slipped outside, pulling the door closed behind her silently.
She used the cover of darkness to slip around the corner of the house and made her way around to the front.Staying in the shadows, she closed her eyes and cleared her mind, almost willing herself to feel where someone was standing.
Opening her eyes, she spotted some kind of movement in the darkness beyond.She raised her rifle in her hands and snapped on the sights.A red dot suddenly appeared and it landed against something solid.“I found you and I will kill you if you don’t tell me why you are here,” she called out softly, just loud enough for her voice to carry.
The shadow moved slightly and someone moved into the moonlight.“Please don’t shoot me, cousin,” a voice called out.“I came here to warn you, not to hurt you.”.
Pausing at the familiar voice, she called out, “Mario?Is that really you?”
“Si, cousin, it's really me and I come with news that you have to hear.”Mario took another step out into the moonlight.“My papa sent me to warn you about what’s coming.”
Charli came down the steps and lowered her rifle.Before she could say anything the shadows moved again and she raised her rifle back to a firing position.“Who’s there with you Mario?Did you bring someone else here?”
“I did but she isn’t dangerous.Please do not shoot her.She found me on the road and begged me to bring her here.She says her name is Angela and she used to live here.She was just looking for a way to come home.”
Charli could hear the truth in his voice.So she once again lowered her rifle and stepped into the light.“Is there anyone else with you?Any more surprises I need to be aware of?”She glared at her cousin.
“No bella, there is just us and you, of course,” Mario called back.“Are you going to trust me or shoot me before I can tell you the news I bring from Italy?”
Charli shook her head, “You’d better come inside before one of the brothers that live here takes a shot at you before I can tell them who you are.”
Mario paused and stared at her.“You have men living here with you?What does Ben have to say about that?”Mario exclaimed with a growl in his voice as his hands clenched into fists.
