Vito made us tacos, Caio lent a hand for that. Matteo tried to help, but they chased him away from the kitchen over and over. 

“You could have let me help.” Matteo complained. 

“No. I couldn’t have. I offered to make dinner for you and Ilya.” Vito said. 

“But you let Caio help you.” Matteo replied. 

“Matteo. Let it go, love.” Caio said, slipping his hand into Matteo’s. 

“There will be more times to help your dad.” I said, taking my gaze off Vito to look at Matteo. It was still so fascinating to me that Matteo was Vito’s child. Eating my last taco, I was stuffed. 

“Thank you, that was delicious.” I announced.

“I agree, it was,” Matteo said, stacking his plate on mine, and relaxing back into the chair. “Has Alessio called you yet about family dinner this weekend? He did say he would get around to it.” 

“When we saw Alessio earlier, he was a little busy.” I said, and Matteo’s eyes lit up. 

“So you saw Nikita too, then?” 

“Saw him, we met him and watched the shit show.” Vito clipped back. 

“Caio and I were going out shopping when we came across them arguing in the front hall, and Lev was laying into him in Russian. It was like watching Alessio and I. But oddly, I enjoyed watching Lev on all levels of madness. It was so well worth it to see him be the one getting into shit for once.” 

“Ilya too. He all but refused to leave until your brother told us to get lost.” Vito said, before I could. 

“It wasn’t like that.” I muttered. 

Matteo just laughed, not believing me. That was fine. He was just as invested in it for the same reasons I was. Vito stood up, his phone in his hand. 

“Excuse me, I have to take this.” 

He went down to the office and closed the door. 

“Ten bucks says that either Lev or your brother.” I said. 

“Most likely.” Matteo said. 

Caio just sighed, taking a drink of his coffee. 

“When I called Alessio a little while ago, before we came over, he was telling me this all started when he took a call on Lev’s phone. Nikita said he was Lev’s brother, and he wanted to speak to Lev. After he interrogated Alessio about who the hell was and why he was picking up Lev’s cellphone.” 

“What a way to find out your husband is keeping secrets about his past.” I muttered. 

“My thoughts exactly. Alessio has probably told everything to Lev. That’s just how close they are, or at least Alessio was to him.” Matteo said. 

“I see from Lev’s side of this, though, too.” Caio said, taking another drink. “Lev had a reason to hide his brother, or else he would have told Alessio.” 

“He said Nikita was responsible for the death of his parents, and his own parents.” I said, frowning. 

“That’s sad when you think about it.” Matteo said, frowning. 

Vito returned and looked beyond annoyed. “Your brother will be the death of me.” He bitched as he sat down.

“Eh? What do you mean?” Matteo asked.

“Lev and his brother seem to have worked things out for the moment, and Nikita will be staying in a guest wing, and your shit ass brother wants me and Ilya, Mostly Ilya, to be responsible for him, and keep him busy when I’m back to work. I told him I might let Ilya eat him. But on second thought, no,” Vito complained more. 

“How did I get roped into this?” I asked.

“Alessio thinks he could keep you company while I’m working.” Vito replied. 

“So, yet another babysitter.” I muttered. 

“Sort of, but here you’re, the babysitter.” Vito said, crossing his arms. 

“While I am responsible for a stranger, does Alessio want me to unintentionally cause his death?” 

“No. That is not what he’s asking Ilya.”

“Right. Don’t eat the stranger. Let me just file that away between mental and illness.”

Matteo snickered, and Caio looked at him. 

“It was funny.” Matteo said. 

“Good, it was supposed to be.” I replied. 

Matteo took a drink of his coffee and reached into his pocket, pulling out his phone as it started ringing. “What up’s Sio?”

Yelling on the other end got my attention. I tried to focus on the words he was saying, but his words were rushed. 

“I’m coming to help too, Alessio.” Matteo said, standing up. He pulled the phone from his ear. “Alessio got an alert that our mother was in a crash, and he couldn’t reach her on the phone. He only has a recent location.”

“We will help too.” Vito said, standing up.

“Meet out in the hall in ten minutes.” Caio said, as he took Matteo to the front door. I watched them leave and Vito grabbed me by the arm lightly, and pulled me to the bedroom. His bedroom. 

He dug through his closet and got me some clothing and spoke. “Keep your eyes peeled. We don’t know enough about this situation.”

I nodded, agreeing with him there. Quickly changing, Vito and I met Matteo and Caio in the hall and made our way down to Alessio’s office. You could hear him screaming and yelling out orders at others. Lev was trying to comfort him, but he wasn’t him. 

“Alessio, My love, please take a deep breath. Working yourself up like this won’t help,” Lev said, his voice soft and full of concern. They argued quietly for a moment before Alessio spotted us. He walked to his desk and brought me out my keys, and took the gun off Lev’s hip and passed it to me. 

“Why was she still in town, Alessio?” Matteo asked. 

“She was supposed to have dinner with Dad, Lukas, Lev and I, to discuss Gabe in proper terms now. Then she was going to head back to Italy. She was supposed to be in town for another few days. I got the alert just before I called you.” Alessio said. 

Alessio showed the last spot where her phone was still in service before it dropped off and the timestamp. It was about five minutes apart, the drop in service and the alert. Taking my phone out, I took a picture of the map and grabbed Vito. 

“Let’s be the first ones there. I have a bad feeling.” I muttered, yanking him with me. 

“I do too.” Vito said truthfully. 

“We are taking my car, and I’m driving.”

“Of course.” He replied. 

He took me to my car, and I unlocked the doors, hopping inside, and starting it. I buckled my belt and made sure the safety was on the gun before I slipped it down the side of the seat with reach. 

“We should have grabbed vests.” Vito hissed. 

“Just don’t get fucking shot.” I replied, pulling out of the parking lot. Matteo and Caio were just coming out of the house. “We don’t have time for vests.”

I passed Vito my phone and told him to give me directions. And he did, even as I did a hundred and forty down the road. Once we got into the area, you could see smoke from somewhere and I stopped the car. Shutting it off, Vito and I got out. 

Two sets of tire tracks of burnt rubber streaked the road. Once set went right down over the embankment, and that’s where the smoke was coming from. 

“Watch my ass. I’m going down there.” 

“What! Ilya wait! You—-”

“You have broken ribs, and we don’t have time to debate this.” I yelled. Tucking the gun in my waistband, I looked for a way down the side. If she was still alive, she likely didn’t have long to wait for help. 

“Be careful.”

“I’ll try.” I said, cracking a smile. 

Going down the side of the embankment, as fast as I could, safely, I made it to the bottom and followed the broken brush and trees, and the smoke. Following broken bits of metal and plastic, I found her car, and her. 

“Siena, Can you hear me?” I yelled as I got closer to the car. Something crunched the door in, but I could yank it open. Gunshot wounds littered her chest and blood was pouring out still. 

“Siena!” I yelled again, hesitating for a moment, but then touching her, trying to find all the wounds. Reaching inside, I unbuckled the seatbelt and yanked her out. She opened her eyes. She wasn’t looking at me though, she was looking past me. 

“Forgive me.” I muttered before I roughly yanked her clothing up and looked for wounds. She had six gunshot wounds to the upper half of her body. Pulling off my jacket, I pressed it to her wounds, and went to reach for my phone, but Vito had it. 

She looked at me and startled me when she spoke. “St..op.” She tried to push the jacket off her wounds. “Dy..ing…”

“Fuck!” I yelled. I wrestled with the idea of carrying her up the embankment. Settling on it being the right thing to do, I moved the jacket. She hissed, before passing out as I picked her up. I nearly dropped her twice before I got to the side of the hill and Caio was making his way down. He rushed down the side. 

“Vito, keep Matteo the fuck back. You hear me.” Caio yelled as he took her from me. “Find her things, leave nothing.” Caio said before he tossed a pack of matches at me. I stood there for a moment, watching him take her up the side of the hill. Walking back to the car, the smell of gas was heavy in the air, and I hurried through the vehicle looking for any personal effects, tucking her phone in my pocket, and her purse over my shoulder, and backing up. I struck a match and tossed it onto the vehicle. Watching the fire spread, I spotted something I recognized and got closer to the fire than I would have cared to. 

“Ilya, Get the fuck back!” Vito yelled. 

Grabbing the bullet casing, I shoved it into my pocket and shook off my hand. I met him halfway. 

“Matteo and Caio took her to Alessio. She will be dead before she gets there.” Vito said, his face emotionless but his eyes conveying how this affected him.

“Matteo…” I hissed, as Vito yanked me back towards the embankment and we started the climb up. 

“He is—I don’t know how he is. He was more worried about getting her there before she died, but Caio and I both know she won’t make it. Matteo is a child. He doesn’t know how bad those wounds actually are.”

Back on the road, I took my phone and took photos of the tire skid marks up close. The sounds of the car blowing up shook the trees. I fished the casing out and gave it to Vito. 

“Hang onto this.”

“Ilya, let me wipe—-”

“Just get in the car, Vito. I can get cleaned up at home.” I said, getting into my car. Vito got in, and I started the car, putting my seatbelt on, and looking at the smoke and fire once more. Before hitting the button for the trunk. I suddenly remembered I should switch my plate.

“What the hell are you doing? We need to get out of here.”

“Changing the plate, hold on.”

A few minutes later, I hopped back in the car, did up my belt and speed off. “Reach under your seat and swap the plate on the dash.”

He did as I asked and turned to look at me. “Where the hell did you learn that?”

“My father, in a past life.”