Page 22 of The Arianna Arrangement

“Why do we need to remove the teeth?” If we were feeding him to pigs who could eat through bone, why take out the teeth?

Sandro handed me the pliers before speaking. “The pigs can’t digest them, so they’ll shit them out whole. You don’t want some guy's teeth appearing in a pig field. That would be enough for cops to assume he’s dead and start investigating. We’ll grind down the teeth to dust while you’re dismembering him, wrapping him up, and cleaning the room.”

Elio snarled. “Why do we have to do anything if cleanup and disposal is on him? Especially since he barely did anything in the interrogation?”

“Because the fact that he’s having to do any of this to begin with is asinine. There’s no reason he needs to initiate into the family other than my father thinks this is a great power play.”

With a roll of his eyes, Elio held out a cup for me to put the teeth into when I pulled them out. I hate admitting it, but by the time all of Leo’s teeth were removed, I was exhausted. Pulling teeth wasn’t easy.

Marco handed me a band saw to start dismembering the man in front of me. “Five cuts. Head, each arm, and each leg. That’ll give us six sections. When you’re done cutting, there’s painters plastic on the shelf. Wrap each section, then put them in garbage bags. You need to bleach each of the tools, the chair, the floor,” he looked around, “and wherever you’ve gotten splatter on the walls. I’d honestly just bleach the whole room to be safe. There’s a switch on the wall that turns on the ventilation system to help get out the fumes, but you should still wear one of the gas masks on the wall so you don’t inhale too much.”

With that, he gave me a pat on the back and headed out of the room with the others.

Chapter 9

Arianna

One thing I missed about Crestwood was informal dinners. At my father’s estate, dinner was always a family affair and we were expected to dress up for it. I mean, we didn’t have to wear formal wear or anything, but if I showed up in sweats and my hair in a messy bun, like I frequently did at the Givenchy’s, he would have lost his shit.

Zephyr and Ashley always had the family eat together, but sometimes they ate in the living room in front of the TV watching a movie together. Sometimes they ate out back on the patio. Never did they require anyone to dress up. Leyla showed up in boxers and a sports bra sometimes.

When Tuck and I had kids, I wanted us to follow that tradition instead of the one I’d been raised in. I didn’t want them to dread dinner for the formality of it, like I had.

Tonight, my father had been absent, but the expectations were the same. It had been a long few days of wedding planning with my mother, and Tucker had been a little more withdrawn. He didn’t tell me what he’d had to do, but I could tell it was something that bothered him to his core.

That’s why, I’d planned some time for us to relax and escape the mansion.

As we exited the dining room, I grabbed ahold of his hand, bringing him to a stop and he turned to look at me. “Can we hang out tonight?” He’d been spending a lot of time with Sandro and his friends, which I understood, but we hadn’t had much time lately, so I didn’t feel bad asking.

Wasn’t that something? I was never needy and hated women that felt the need to always have their man's attention, but I missed the man I was falling in love with, so sue me.

A smile crossed his face and he pulled me into his arms, placing a kiss on my temple. “Yeah. Got anything special in mind?”

“The estate has some good walking trails. I thought we could go for a walk as soon as we change out of these clothes.” No way was I going for a walk in a sun dress, nor was I doing what I’d planned as a surprise for him in this. I wanted leggings and a t-shirt.

His smile grew. “I love that idea. I’ll pick you up at your room as soon as I change.”

I rolled my eyes. “You don’t have to do that. I can meet you down here.”

“Yeah, you could. But we haven’t had the chance to go on any dates lately, so this will make it feel more like one.”

Tucker was a romantic, and I hated to admit how much I loved it. Don’t get me wrong, I was a badass bitch, but it was nice to have my man show me how much he cared. “If you insist.”

With a light kiss to my lips, he took off towards his wing and I headed to my room. I’d just gotten my hair up in the bun when there was a knock on my door. Slipping my feet into my sneakers, I headed out of the room.

Tucker looked hot in anything, but I had to admit, I loved when he wore casual clothes. There was something sexy about a guy in basketball shorts.

“Damn, Vita Mia.” His eyes trailed up and down my body. “You look hot like that.”

“You don’t look so bad yourself, Amore.”

We headed out arm in arm, heading for the trail that would lead us to the surprise I had set up for him. “I can’t believe in all this time I’ve spent here, I’ve never gone on any of these trails.”

“Sandro goes for runs on them, but other than that they don’t get much use. I used to come out here a lot to get away from the chaos of my family, but I haven’t really needed to in the last few years.”

We had shadows, Sean and Vinny not leaving us alone, but I wasn’t worried about it. I wasn’t doing anything sneaky, so having someone watching us, one that would report back to my father if asked, didn’t bother me.

“I almost forgot to tell you. My mom called earlier and said that the real estate agent agreed to meet us tomorrow to show us some homes. We need to leave here at five if we want to have plenty of time to look at houses and make any notes on renovations and get back here by dinner.”