Suddenly, I knew what Frankie and Robbie meant when they talked about compromises.
I reached up and wrapped my hands around his wrist, keeping his hands on my face. “I’ll make you a deal,” I said. “Give me one year. If nothing bad happens, give me one year and I will quit willingly.”
His eyes narrowed. “Why?”
“I hadn’t really given children a thought before because I was single, but if we’re going to get married, I want to start a family soon. So, give me a year to ease out of my caseload, and then we’ll get pregnant and I’ll stay home.”
Luca groaned, “Baby…”
“But,” I jumped in, “I want to create a community program or something that will partner with the schools in Morgan City where I can still check on my kids. We can…video chat or something, or once a month I’ll host a…I don’t know, but I still want to work with kids in some way.” I realized I was rambling, so I finished with, “I don’t have a plan yet.”
Luca pressed his lips to mine. “I love you, Remy.”
Yeah.
He did.
Chapter 25
Luca~
The barn looked pretty much the same as it had a week ago. The only difference was Sensio’s mutilated body lying in the middle of the floor.
Or what was left of it.
After Gio had blown his brains out, Sensio had been taken back to the funhouse where me, Ciro, Phoenix, Sal, and even Leo had toyed with him for days. In the meantime, Sal had cleaned up the mess that was Giovanni Benetti’s body, and we had left it to Leo to tell our mother her husband was dead. Leo had stayed with her through the night as she cried her sorrow, and the next morning Sal and I met with her to offer our condolences. She hadn’t been the best mother, but she was still our mother, and we went through the motions with her.
We buried Giovanni the next morning, closed casket, with the deliberate rumor that he died of a heart attack. The only people who knew the truth were the people at the barn, and none of them would speak a word of it.
They knew the repercussions.
No one wanted any one-on-one quality time with Ciro.
Remy had also gone to work that next morning-making me lose my fucking mind in the process-but Emilio had gone with her and Phoenix had assigned one of his guys as her other guard. She also promised to try to work from home as much as possible.
The word had gone out that I was now the head of the Benetti Family too. That had set the entire city a buzz, but nothing really changed. Everyone knew I’d been in charge long before now.
I also married Remy two days after we buried my father. It was a private ceremony with only Francesca, Phoenix, Robbie, Ciro, Sal, and Leo in attendance, along with the priest. We’d gotten married at midnight at St. Peter’s Cathedral, and her ring had a tracker on it just like Francesca’s and Robbie’s, but Remy knew it at the time.
The following days were spent cracking all of Giovanni’s passwords to his computers and phones, breaking into his safes, and combing the entire Benetti home. Francesca had moved forward with the security sweeps of everything, and Robbie handled all the real estate.
I also got a tattoo of Remy’s name covering the entire top of my left hand. Even if we did do wedding rings, a wedding ring just didn’t seem like it would enough.
And, now, we were all at the first official meeting as me being the head of the Benetti Family. I thought it would only make sense for me to start where Gio ended. I stood in the same spot Gio had stood in, with Phoenix and Ciro on one side of me, and Sal and Leo on the other side.
“It’s fairly simple, gentlemen,” I began. “Gio and some of his ways are gone. One, being that I will have two Consiglieres, not one: The Son and The Holy Ghost.” No one said a word. “Salvatore and Leonardo’s roles are the same, but Salvatore is now the Benetti Underboss and heir, next in line.” Every Capo in the room looked at Sal and inclined their head in a show of respect and acceptance.
I gestured towards the ground and what was left of Sensio. “That, gentlemen, is what is left of my guard, Sensio.” Murmurs and cough scattered around. “We found out he was Gio’s snitch,