Total pages in book: 197
Estimated words: 199143 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 996(@200wpm)___ 797(@250wpm)___ 664(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 199143 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 996(@200wpm)___ 797(@250wpm)___ 664(@300wpm)
Seemed simple enough to Gio.
Besides ... Andino had enough people trying to keep him in line.
Like Dante.
“Well?” Dante demanded yet again.
Andino sighed.
He was quite a fucking sight—busted mouth, bloodied knuckles, and an eye already starting to blacken. Kim was going to flip out about her son’s swollen lip, for sure, and probably the cuts on his hands from where he’d broken a few teeth on the other guy. He’d taken a good beating, but Gio knew for a fact his son had given the other guy an even worse run for his money.
It wasn’t the fighting that was the problem—sort of. Made men weren’t supposed to fight with one another, but Andino wasn’t technically made. He had a few more years yet to go for that. Still, Dante held these principes of their family to the same fucking standards as any other made man in their family.
After all, Andino—like John—was a fifth generation made Marcello man. Where else was his kid going to go but straight into the life like the rest of them?
They didn’t fucking know anything different.
This was their whole world.
No, the fighting wasn’t the problem. It was who Andino decided to lay a beating on that was the issue at hand.
“He’s a twenty-eight year old enforcer of the family, Andi,” Dante said. “A good made man who handles his business, and is looking at a Capo position in a couple of years if he plays his cards right.”
“How’s that Capo thing going to work out when he’s drinking his meals from a straw for the rest of his life, huh?” Andino asked.
Gio literally had to press his lips together to keep himself from laughing. Because fuck yeah, that was a smart ass response, but it was a damn good one, too. Credit where it was due, and all that shit.
Andino wasn’t lying, either.
The enforcer would be lucky to wake up.
Dante’s jaw clenched, and he acted like Andino hadn’t spoken out of turn at all. “And that alone means you know better than to be fighting with him. What were you thinking?”
“That he shoulda shut his fuckin’ mouth,” Andino said quietly.
Dante arched a brow at that statement. “I beg your pardon?”
“I said what I said.”
Gio tipped his chin up, and nodded to himself. Andino also had balls which was more than he could say for a lot of people. Gio didn’t really take credit for that because a lot of the Marcello men were arrogant fuckers that could drive a saint crazy.
Dante leaned back on his desk, and rested his hands against the wood top. “I said, I beg your pardon, Andino. Try again.”
“And I said—he shoulda kept his fucking mouth shut. Popping off like that about John when his back is turned because he thinks he can get away with it. Nobody’s going to say shit about John whether he’s looking them in the face, or not. Not while I’m standing right there to listen to it, too. I warned him. If he could talk, you could ask him. I warned him, zio.”
Gio cleared his throat, and glanced away when Dante’s gaze slid in his direction. He was asked not to step in on this. Right now, that was taking a great deal of his patience, but fuck him if he wasn’t at least going to try.
But he couldn’t pretend like he didn’t know how goddamn protective Andino was over John. Especially now with John’s recent diagnosis. Andino was most sensitive to someone trying to hurt his cousin in some way. He’d always been like that even before they knew John was bipolar. He’d been inseparable from his cousin since the two were in diapers.
“What did he say, then?” Dante asked.
Andino’s jaw stiffened. “You don’t care. You care that I almost killed him.”
Dante nodded, and gave his nephew a look. “Yes, in your grandmother’s garden, Andino. You don’t see the problem there?”
“Next time I’ll lure them away from the house, then.”
Gio’s brother sighed so loudly that he couldn’t help but snort. He had to look away to avoid Dante’s glare that was surely coming his fucking way. Dante was predictable like that.
“I do care,” Dante murmured, “now tell me what he said.”
“Called him crazy. More than once, too.”
The shift in atmosphere was palpable. It took a beat in time, and then two before Dante said, “All right, go on, then. Go clean that fucking face of yours and your hands before your mother lays eyes on you, Andi. Get.”
Gio turned in just enough time to see his son’s back disappearing out the office doorway. He glanced his brother’s way to find Dante was staring at the floor, and a hell of a lot calmer than Gio expected him to be.
He almost looked ... contemplative.
Gio wasn’t sure he liked that.
“You’d have done it, too,” Gio was quick to say, “had that been me or Lucian someone was slandering, you would have—”