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)
Catherine had.
So did Cross.
Nazio was just ... Naz.
Far too much like his father. Difficult to a particular point. Fiercely protective, and beautifully good in his heart.
“I will speak to Nazio,” Catherine told her daughter.
“Speak to me about what?”
Nazio leaned in the doorway looking like every inch a thirteen year old tsunami full of piss, vinegar, and hormones. The smug as shit smirk he wore—a mirror of his father in every single way—said he had probably been listening to their conversation in the hallway.
“Ugh.” Cece threw her hands high, gave her brother a glare, and then said to her mother, “Deal with him, Ma.”
Nazio smiled at his sister as she huffed, and stormed from the kitchen. Catherine gave her teenage son a look for instigating more trouble. Naz only shrugged in response.
“Really?” she asked.
“What?”
“Why do you antagonize her, Naz?”
“Because I can.”
Jesus.
Catherine pointed at the table. “Take a seat.”
Nazio strolled leisurely into the kitchen, and dropped his too-tall frame into a chair usually reserved for his father. Only thirteen, but puberty had kicked in hard for Naz over the last year. His voice had dropped a couple of octaves, the facial hair was coming in, and he was getting taller by the damn day.
Sometimes, she wished he would slow down a little bit. Just be her baby boy for a while longer.
It wasn’t possible.
Catherine headed around the island, and went to the table. She pulled her son’s beanie from his head, and dropped it to the table in front of him.
“You know the rules,” she said.
Naz smiled over at her. “No hats at the table.”
“Mmhmm. Now, why can’t you just let your sister and her boyfriend be, huh?”
He cocked a brow. “Frankie is a tool, Ma.”
“But you know Cece can handle herself.”
And she could.
She did.
Catherine and Cross made sure of that.
Naz shrugged. “Cece doesn’t even really like Frankie. He’s a distraction until Juan gets back into town. I’m not going to pretend to like the asshole until then. That’s all I’m saying, Ma.”
Catherine sighed. “You don’t know what she’s waiting on Juan, now.”
“Ma, everybody knows she’s crazy as fuck over him.”
“Stop swearing at the table.”
“Whatever—you can’t deny I’m right about Cece and Juan, though.”
There was something about Miguel’s nineteen year old son that Cece couldn’t escape from the time she was fifteen. Of course, being Catherine’s right hand man meant Miguel’s family often mingled with theirs. Juan and Catherine had grown from being children to young adults together, and now ... this.
“Naz, just ...”
“What?”
“Lay off a bit.”
Naz meh’d under his breath. “I’ll try.”
“Try what?”
Catherine found her husband leaning in the kitchen entryway. Leave it to Cross to smell food and come looking after all the trouble was finally taken care of. His way of dealing with Naz was to take the boy to a shooting range, or out to work on ... whatever. Cece, on the other hand, Cross simply let the girl do whatever she needed to do to get her spells out of her.
It was their life, though.
Their children were not like other children.
They had and lived a different life.
Catherine sighed as she stood from the table. “Your son poured a can of soda over Cece’s boyfriend’s head after school.”
“And then threw it at his face,” Naz added. “You can’t forget that part, Ma.”
Cross nodded—appreciatively.
Ass.
“Frankie?” Cross asked.
“Yep.” Naz stood from the table, asking, “Are we good, Ma?”
“As long as you remember what I said.”
“I will,” her son promised.
And likely not listen to it, either.
“Go find your sister, apologize the best you can so she will be a little bit pleasant when she comes back downstairs, and then tell her supper is ready,” Catherine ordered. “Do not antagonize that girl more than you already have, or so help you God, Nazio, you will not like what happens to you when you get back downstairs.”
Nazio gave his mother the two finger salute, not even the least bit concerned about her threat. “Got it.”
As her son passed Cross in the doorway, Nazio snatched a hundred dollar bill from his father’s raised hand. Cross’s smirk grew as Catherine gave him a look.
What the hell?
“Well done,” Cross murmured, never looking away from Catherine. “I appreciate it.”
“Thanks,” Naz said, laughing. “I would have done it for nothing, too.”
“I bet, son.”
“Cross!” Catherine snapped, finally understanding the exchange between father and son. “You did not pay him to do that to that boy!”
Her husband didn’t even have the fucking decency to look ashamed over what he had done, or that he got caught doing it, either.
“What? I hate that fucking Frankie prick, Catherine.”
“Seriously?”
“He’s a tool.”
And he wondered where Nazio got it from.
Really.
The Life
“Naz, come touch the water,” Cece called.
Little Nazio didn’t even bother to peer up from the sandcastle he was attempting to build. His focus had been zoned in on that task since they arrived. It was more like a mound of wet sand with his handprints all over it than an actual castle. The two year old didn’t really seem to mind all that much.