I didn’t give a fuck how long it took or how much blood I had to spill, I would take out the entire syndicate that was coming for me and mine.
I would get and keep her safe.
“Primo,” Vissi said, snapping me out of my swirling thoughts, bringing me back to the moment.
“What?”
“The neighborhood is scared,” he said, shrugging.
The bullets had gone through a few windows. Luckily, the only casualties were a TV and a couch cushion. Both of which would be replaced as soon as the stores opened up again. Plus the owners got some extra cash for their worries.
“Yeah, I bet,” I agreed, sighing.
As a whole my neighborhood was good. Loyal. They knew I took care of them, so they, in turn, turned their heads and minded their business about my dealings. That said, I never had a goddamn shootout in the streets like that before. I understood them being scared. For themselves, for their kids.
My mind was on the same things.
“And if the neighborhood gets antsy enough,” Vissi reasoned, hating being the rational one, but I wasn’t operating at my peak right then, “they are gonna start talking to the law.”
“I know,” I agreed. “The main problem last night was the scouts were home with their families.” I’d been feeling altruistic. I figured that since I was taking Isabella home to see her family, I didn’t need as many guards on the street as usual. That was my fuckup. It wouldn’t happen again.
“And I think a lot of them know that. Since a lot of the scouts are from the neighborhood,” Vissi said, shrugging. “And they did all come running to help when they heard the shots. It’s just a mess. People are particularly upset because it’s Christmas.”
“We can use Christmas as an excuse to hand them all some cash,” I said, shrugging.
I didn’t live in the best area.
I’d chosen it on purpose.
First, because in bad areas, people tended to turn a blind eye to low-level criminal activity, so long as it didn’t impact them.
There were also a lot of young adults hungry to make a living and a name for themselves. Which was why I’d managed to have as many scouts as I did from the jump.
I also kept the predatory crime out of the area. The vicious drug dealers, the abusive pimps, the gangs that might suck up their kids and spit them out into the prison industrial complex in a few short years, serving life sentences because there was no way out once you got in.
On top of that, they appreciated anyone who came in and gave back to the community. The church almost single-handedly stayed open thanks to my donations. The food pantry was full from my men dropping off supplies. I did toy drives every Christmas and baskets every Easter. I even set up a program to help keep the local kids fed during the summers when school was out, and the parents didn’t have enough money to provide the meals the schools used to.
Was it asking too much to expect their silence for a wad of Christmas cash? Maybe. But if that cash came with a promise to handle the problem, and make sure it didn’t keep happening, I was pretty sure neighborhood morale would improve.
“It would mean you have to go to church today, boss,” Vissi said. “You sure you’re up for that?”
Honestly, I wasn’t.
I felt like shit.
But that church had been there for me in some of my lowest times growing up.
It would be good for me to go, to get an uplifting message.
On top of that, I never missed Christmas mass.
I was only disappointed that I couldn’t bring Isabella with me.
But she needed to be home, where I could at least guarantee that no one could get to her. At least not without there being a fuckuva lot of shooting that would draw my attention anyway.
“Alright. Get the cards and the cash. And some extra hands. We don’t have a lot of time.”
With that, we set to work stuffing envelopes.
“Nope, doesn’t look suspicious at all,” Vissi said, shaking his head as we each picked up the giant bags we’d had to stash all the cards in.
I was leaving Dawson and Dulles with Isabella, then several other guards around the building, as well as the scouts who’d volunteered to miss Christmas morning with their families to help me make sure that the whole neighborhood stayed safe.
She was safer than Vissi and I were going to be.
But that was okay.
I’d rather have the guards on her, not me.
At least I knew that if I got taken out, someone would get her home safe to her people, and they would be able to keep her safe.
So, Vissi and I sat through mass. I said a prayer for my brother. And then we stood at the doors, handing out the cash as everyone left.
No gunshots. No nothing.
Everything was fine.
Or so I thought.
Until I rode the elevator up to my floor, expecting to excuse my brothers, then take Isabella upstairs with me. To get in bed. To talk. Or just sleep.
I just needed a break.
To process.
To sleep.
To get back on my game.
“Isabella?” I called as I walked into the living room.
I didn’t immediately think anything of it. It was hard to hear if she was in the tub or the shower. She’d rushed downstairs to look for me first thing that morning, so she hadn’t had time then to get ready.
But then shit started not to line up.
Like Dawson and Dulles were nowhere to be found, either. And it wasn’t like there was a whole lot of space in the apartment for them to disappear into. I doubted they were both using the can at the same time.
What the fuck was going on?
“Isabella?” I called, something inside of me telling me to run.
So I did, tearing up the stairs to the second floor, bursting into the bedroom.
Finding nothing, I turned toward the bathroom, my stomach clenching hard as the hair on the back of my neck stood on end. I had no reason to think it yet, but a part of me knew something had gone down.
Taking a deep breath, I moved into the bathroom.
And there it was.
Proof of a struggle.
Isabella’s clothes from earlier had been put into the hamper, but the pair of pants and sweater she must have set out for herself for after the shower were spread across the middle of the floor. Her makeup case had spilled all over the counter.
And there was blood on the floor.
There was fucking blood on the floor.
I wasn’t even aware of the roar ripping through me at that moment, but it must have, because not a minute later, Vissi was running into the room, gun drawn.
“What happened?” Vissi asked.
“They’re gone. They’re all gone. And she was bleeding,” I said, waving toward the floor.
“How the fuck could someone get in or out without any of the other guards seeing?” Vissi asked.
I didn’t know either, but I tore down the stairs and down to the ground to ask just that.
“Who fucked up?” I yelled, slamming the guard there into the wall. “Did you run off to go get some cookies and milk or something? Who was not on their guard?” I screamed.
“Isabella is gone,” Vissi said, translating my anger. “And so are Dawson and Dulles.”
“Dawson and Dulles left not long after you went to mass,” the guard, said, brows pinched, looking confused.
“The fuck do you…” I started, then released him as shit started to come to me.