Submitting to My Best Friend's Dad by Scarlett Rossi
Chapter 352 -

*Giovani*

I stared down at the paper on my desk until the numbers started to swim on the page. I was working on balancing our books for the past few months, and it was giving me a headache. I fucking hated paperwork. I loved being the Don, but I missed the days when all I had to do was grunt work. Transporting shit and keeping people safe was a lot easier than spending my time doing complex accounting and working on making sure all our businesses were running smoothly. All I really wanted to do was pour myself a stiff drink and wait until Olivia got home from the university, listen to her tell me all about her day, and then make love to her until she fell asleep in my arms. If I was being honest with myself, I hadn't gotten nearly as much work done since Olivia and I had moved in together. It was just impossible to pull myself out of bed in the morning when I was tangled up with her. And I never wanted to work late when I knew she would be waiting for

me.

I had never had someone that I enjoyed spending time with so much. I found myself keeping track throughout my day of every little thing that happened that I thought she would enjoy hearing about.

I knew that having her around was making me soft, but I didn't care. I just couldn't force myself to want to sit and do mundane work when I knew how much more fun it would be to hear her screaming my name while I pleasured her. I would never get tired of replaceing new ways to get her going. I had even started a little game with myself to try a new position every night until I found one that we couldn't do. She was so flexible that I had yet to replace a position that I couldn't get her into, and she was always willing to try out new ideas. I loved how much her shyness had faded away as we spent more and more time together.

A knock at the door interrupted my filthy thoughts, but I was grateful for the distraction. I hoped it was Olivia coming to get me for what had become our little afternoon tradition of chatting about our days over a cup of coffee. "Come in!" I yelled, shoving my papers back into their file folders and vowing to get back to them tomorrow. I absently wondered if I could somehow convince Gabriel to do some of it for me.

I was surprised when Dahlia peaked her head around my door. I normally only saw her at dinner and breakfast, where she was happy to entertain all of us with her stories of the university. Her time with the Russians had only made her more of a character than she had been before, and her big personality served her well at college.

"We need you downstairs right now," she said before turning on her heel and walking away without a single glance back at me.

I got up, not needing to be told twice to follow her. I knew she wouldn't interrupt my work if it wasn't serious, and her tone said that this was very serious. I hoped Olivia was okay. Come to think of it, why hadn't Olivia been the one to come and get me? As we were walking down the stairs, I heard the unmistakable sound of Olivia screaming.

"Gio!" She screamed as if her heart was being wrenched from her chest.

Ice-cold fear stopped me dead in my tracks. Something was horribly wrong, and I needed to be with Olivia right fucking now. I ran past Dahlia, not even bothering to make sure she was okay. All that mattered was Olivia. She was still screaming my name in a horrible, blood-curdling shriek when I got to the bottom of the stairs.

I followed Olivia's screams and sprinted to our room, where I found her in a mess on the floor. I ran to her, scooping her up in my arms.

"What's wrong? Are you hurt?" I panicked, studying her body for any injuries.

"No-I-Gio-thank god you're okay," she panted, clearly on the verge of a panic attack. "You didn't answer my text."

"Shhh, it's okay. Just breathe with me, okay?" I murmured, rubbing my hands up and down her back. Where was my phone, anyway?

She nodded and stared into my eyes, trying to breathe with me.

"In, out, in, out. Good, good girl. My precious carino, I'm so glad you're okay." I pulled her closer to me, feeling her breathing continue to even out. Her body relaxed against mine, and I allowed myself to enjoy her closeness. I loved her so much.

"Now, can you tell me what has you so worked up?" I asked her gently, not wanting to send her spiraling into another panic attack.

"I couldn't replace you, and you didn't answer your phone," she said in an accusatory tone.

"I'm sorry. I didn't know you were looking for me. I must have left my phone on silent by accident. I'm so sorry, sweetheart." I felt terrible that I had put her through so much anguish, no matter how brief.

I had to be better about making sure that she could always reach me. Of course, she would have trauma over not being able to get a hold of me. The last time I had been unreachable had been when I was in the hands of the Russians. I internally berated myself for being so stupid. Why in the world didn't I check my phone? I pulled it out of my pocket and raised my eyebrows when I saw that it hadn't been Olivia who had tried to call me, but instead, her bodyguard. I did have a text from her. Just my name.

"Why was your guard calling me?" I asked, concern flooding my heart. Had my sweet Olivia been in danger when I was unreachable? This was even worse than I thought. I silently vowed to always have my phone on the loudest possible setting.

"We need to go to the kitchen. Everyone's waiting for us there."

I forced myself to stifle my questions, although I had many. I was sure that Olivia would explain everything once we got to the kitchen. She led me down the hall, holding my hand tight in hers. I squeezed her hand reassuringly, reminding her that I was okay. I was so lucky to have someone who cared so deeply about my well-being.

I was surprised to replace both Olivia and Dahlia's regular bodyguards as well as the two extra guards that they didn't know about all in the kitchen waiting for us. Dahlia was there as well. I deduced that something must have happened at the university, but I had no idea what it could be.

"What's going on here?" I asked my men.

They all turned to Dahlia, who simply grabbed a piece of paper off of the counter and handed it to Olivia, who handed it wordlessly to me. I could feel everyone staring at me expectantly. It weighed on me sometimes, the need that everyone around me had for me to always take charge of every situation. I could tell that all six of the people in this room firmly believed that I would be able to solve whatever problem had arisen for them.

I looked down at the paper and read the words written.

TELL GIOVANI: WE'RE WATCHING YOU.

They sent a shiver down my spine. The implied threat to Olivia made me want to ball my hands into fists and rage against everyone who would dare hurt her, but I knew that was the last thing she needed. She needed calm Giovani, the side of me who could talk her down from a panic attack. Later, when we found who had left her this note, that was when I would let out vengeful Giovani, and I would make them regret every choice they had made.

"Where did you replace this?" I asked, forcing my rage to retreat so that I could think clearly.

"In my biology notebook. Someone must've put it there while I had it open in class when I wasn't looking."

She got the notebook out of her backpack and handed it to me. I flipped through it, not replaceing anything else unusual. I looked back at the note, regretting how many people had handled it. I wasn't sure it would be possible to lift prints from the paper, but I was definitely going to replace out. If there were any clues on this paper, my guy would replace them. I pulled a baggie from one of the drawers in the kitchen and dropped the piece of paper into it. "Do you think we could take this notebook for analysis?" I asked Olivia.

She nodded, her eyes huge with fear. "I can just ask my friend for the notes."

I found a large baggie to put the notebook in, feeling better now that we had concrete next steps to take. I turned back to Olivia and saw she had silent tears running down her cheeks.

Fuck, I was failing her left and right. First, I hadn't made sure she could reach me, then I'd focused too much on gathering clues and not enough on the fact that this had been a terrifying afternoon for her.

I waved my guards away and took two quick steps to pull Olivia into my arms. She needed my comfort a hell of a lot more than she needed me clinically gathering information as if this wasn't personal. I was replaceing it hard to balance my role of being a good Don with my role of loving and protecting her, but I was determined to get it right.

Dahlia patted Olivia on the shoulder and then left to give us some more privacy. She looked me meaningfully in the eye on her way out, as if trying to convey that I needed to do better with Olivia, I nodded to let her know I knew that she was right.

Olivia cried quietly as I held her. I knew she was embarrassed by her screaming earlier and now didn't want to make a scene, but I wanted her feel comfortable expressing her emotions with me.

"Hey, it's okay to be scared," I said, rubbing her back.

"I hate that I fall apart so easily," she whispered. "I want to be stronger."

Her words broke my heart, but I pulled away from her so I could look her in the eyes.

"Carino, you never have to force yourself to be strong with me."

She nodded and tried to smile, but fresh tears fell from her eyes and down her cheeks. I tried to wipe them away with my thumbs, but they fell too fast for me to sweep them all away. Instead, I settled for simply holding her cheeks in my hands and pressing my lips to her forehead.

She was scared, but she was safe, and I had to be okay with that for now.