Submitting to My Best Friend's Dad by Scarlett Rossi
Chapter 309 -

*Giovani*

After sending Olivia back to her room, I decided to get a head start on my day. I pulled on a pair of dark jeans and a black shirt, clothes that would keep me from standing out, yet, ones that still made me look good.

I wasn't much of a fashion snob, but I had learned over the years that the best way to go unnoticed was to look just clean-cut enough that people thought I was trustworthy, but not so dressed up that they would remember me. I looked into the mirror to comb my hair. All my life I hadn't really given a shit about my looks. I had always thought of myself as a tool to be used, first as a body when I was young and needed to fight, then as a brain as I got older and was given more responsibilities.

But now that I had a beautiful girl like Olivia sneaking into my bed at night, I suddenly found myself taking note of a couple of lines around my eyes and the small gray patches that had worked their way into my stubble before shaving. I knew that what we had transcended looks, but I also knew that she was young and had a lot of life ahead of her.

I worked hard to maintain my body and stay as physically fit as possible, but what would happen when the gray fully took over my hair, or worse, those lines turned into wrinkles that made their way to places she'd only see in the bedroom? Would she regret choosing someone so much older?

A knock on my door broke me out of my thoughts.

"Who is it?" I yelled out, hoping that maybe Olivia had come back by before starting her day.

"It's me, I've got some news," Alessandro's smooth voice answered. I was disappointed but not surprised. I knew Olivia was determined to keep everyone from replaceing out about us. She wouldn't risk being seen coming to my room when everyone else was up.

I pulled open the door to replace Alessandro looking exhausted but proud. I hoped that meant he'd have good news for me. "Come in, then."

I shut the door behind him. Although we had carefully vetted every servant who worked in the house, I knew we could never trust them completely. We paid them well enough that I doubted money would get them to talk, but I had heard enough about Dmitri Zaytsev to know that he didn't use money to get what he wanted. I made a mental note to ask every parent who worked on the compound where their children went to school. It couldn't hurt to send a few guards to keep watch over them every so often.

"Alright, what have you got?" I asked Alessandro.

"We still don't know exactly where Dmitri stays permanently, but we managed to locate a Russian safe house. It looks like they have about six guys living there now. My team and I have kept eyes on it since last night. There hasn't been much movement yet, but I can work it out so that we have someone there around the clock." He was his usual cocky self, but he seemed to be focused on something other than his own gain for once.

"That's excellent. Does your team know what Dmitri looks like? If he ever shows up there, I want that bastard dead by any means necessary."

If Alessandro could play nice, so could I. Maybe it would be possible for us to put everything that had happened between us into the past. I was still pissed that the only reason he had even been looking into any of this was because of a shitty blackmail attempt, but if he could actually be good at the job, maybe it wouldn't be so bad.

"That's the problem. This place is right downtown. If we go in there, and shots are fired, the police will be called like that," he snapped his fingers to emphasize what he meant. "The only way we could ever infiltrate would be to do it at night when they're all asleep. It looked like the idiots only had one guard. We could easily take him out quietly and then get in. By the time they knew we were there, they'd all have bullets in their brains."

His inexperience made him unnecessarily cocky. I knew he hadn't even considered the fact that they could have guards in hidden locations, but I decided not to call him out right then. This was the most civil conversation we'd manage to have in days. I was determined to keep it that way.

"If their security is that lax, I doubt Dmitri would ever sleep there. But maybe he'll come by and we could put a trail on him."

I was frustrated. It felt like every time we made any progress toward getting payback for Dahlia, something held us up. And I had been so distracted by Alessandro's fucking antics that I hadn't been able to focus on what really mattered. "I'll make sure my men know what Dmitri looks like," Alessandro said through gritted teeth. "But I already came up with a plan. As much as I'd love to kill them all, dead Russians can't talk. I know you don't believe me, but I know what I'm doing, and I want to get those bastards as much as you do. Fuck them for ever trying to hurt one of our own. Nobody does that and gets away with it."

I nodded in response. I may have done a lot of illegal shit in my life, but I would never hurt an innocent person. The Russians had crossed a line the second they chose to get Dahlia involved, and I would personally make sure that every last one of them regretted it.

It made me sick to think of what could have happened if we hadn't managed to get her back. Even worse, they now knew exactly how far we were willing to go to rescue those we loved. What if they found out about me and Olivia? Bile rose in my throat as I imagined the horror of my sweet Olivia being dragged around with a gun pointed at her back. I promised myself that I would never let that happen. Olivia was right; nobody could know about us. If we managed to keep it a secret even from our own people, there was no way the Russians would ever be able to replace out.

"Okay, what's your plan?" I asked, refusing to let this devolve into an altercation, even though I could tell that was what he wanted.

"We'll keep watching them until we know their pattern of life-when they leave, when they come back, who comes and goes. You know the drill. Then when the time comes, we'll storm the building at night like I said. We won't kill them. We'll just incapacitate them and drag them all to our warehouse where we can interrogate them."

The bloodlust in his eyes was concerning, but I understood how he felt. I just hoped he wouldn't allow his need for revenge to make him sloppy. A good interrogation required more than just anger. He would also need to keep his wits about him.

"I'll oversee the interrogation," I said, knowing it wasn't what he wanted to hear.

"Fuck that! I'm the one doing all the work. You don't get to come in at the end and take over."

"I'll let you do the interrogating then, but I will be there," I said in a dangerous tone of voice.

He shut his mouth, his eyes swimming with fury.

I had been tolerant of his disrespect because I wanted to placate him and get him to think that I really did trust him, but enough was enough. It was one thing for him to get in my way inside the compound, it was another thing entirely for him to fuck up outside business. He was going to have to learn to compartmentalize if he was going to force his way in.

"Thank you for everything, Alessandro," I said sincerely, trying to smooth things over.

He was still an annoying prick, but this morning he had proven that he was more than just a guy who liked to run his mouth. I started to wonder if maybe it wouldn't be so bad to let him be the next in line. At least then I wouldn't have to worry about any future kids that Olivia and I might have getting caught up in the business.

I felt my heart pound a little faster at the idea of Olivia carrying my babies. As beautiful as she was now, I couldn't imagine how much more beautiful she might become as her belly rounded with my child. I shook my head to clear my thoughts. The last thing I wanted was for Alessandro to see me getting googly eyed over the idea of hypothetical children with a woman I had just started seeing.

I cleared my throat, then continued, "Seriously, I'm impressed with everything you've done. I really appreciate that even with all our differences, you've been able to put that shit aside and get some real work done. This is what it means to be a part of this. We might not get along or even like each other, but at the end of the day, we have to have each other's backs. That's the only way we'll ever manage to be successful."

He nodded, a strange look in his eyes. Perhaps he wasn't as willing to forgive and forget as I was, which was bullshit considering I had been on the receiving end of his little blackmail attempts. I had to remind myself that he was still young. I had been a hothead at that age too. Of course, I had never been stupid enough to try to blackmail my own goddamn cousin, but I also hadn't been the son of the Don like he had. Maybe knowing that his dad had once been in charge had given him an idiotic sense of bravery. It definitely had given him a sense of entitlement.

He was just lucky that my temper was nothing like it used to be. I had been pretty liberal with my pocket knife in the old days, and I suspected that he enjoyed having all ten fingers. Now I was mostly unbothered by his blustering as long as he kept Olivia out of it. I knew that a lot of his greed and shitty behavior came from a sense of insecurity. He wasn't sure if he'd be able to live up to James's legacy, and to be frank, neither was I. But I was willing to give him a chance, especially now that he had proven that he did have at least half a brain in his head.

"You're free to go. Your plan is fine, but make sure you scope out not just the house but the entire neighborhood. Just because you saw only one guard doesn't mean they don't have snipers posted up on some of the neighboring rooftops. As much as you annoy me, I'd hate to send you and your men out just for you all to get killed."

He started to turn, then his shoulders tensed up. I wondered if I had gone too far. We seemed to have reached some kind of truce, but maybe I had fucked it up by joking about his death. Sometimes I forgot that he hadn't grown up in this world the way I had. Joking about death was just a way to cope with the fact that a lot of us did die prematurely. In this line of work, we couldn't afford to be scared of ourselves or our buddies dying, because letting that fear creep in would cause mistakes to be made.

Although as I fell more and more in love with Olivia, I had noticed that fear creeping its way into my heart.

I leaned over and opened the door for Alessandro, but Instead of leaving like I had expected, he turned back to me and squared his shoulders. I rolled my eyes and prepared for another fight about how he should be in charge, but what he said next, I never would have expected.

"So... about you and Olivia."