Legend (Requiem MC #6)

Book 1 - Romeo – A Sneak Preview

Chapter One: The Standoff

Romeo

My brothers and I automatically followed our father’s action of producing our guns. We aimed our weapons at the Walker family as they all held weapons on our family. I stood rooted to the spot as I barely moved. I slowly and carefully turned my head to look over at Giovanni. His finance Glory held her gun aimed at me. I stared at her to note that she looked spooked.

Well, no wonder, I felt spooked.

When I heard Gio was coming home today, I never envisioned this. Maybe some pasta, wine and lots of laughs but never a standoff. This was insane. Our father started it of course…Didn't he always though? I looked sideways and caught Max, our butler standing outside the door. The man abhorred violence but he would throw his body in front of our father to save him if he had to. All about loyalty. Extreme, unaccounted for…loyalty.

I slowly shook my head at him, hoping he would stand still and do no rushing in to save us.

He seemed to get it, after all he had the highest IQ of anyone I knew.

After a tense couple of silent minutes, Gio finally spoke up, “All of you put your guns away.”

No one moved.

I decided that I wouldn’t be a part of this faceoff. I had missed my brother after ten long years and this was no kind of welcome home to him. I slowly lowered my weapon and then eased my arm back to replace my gun into my back pocket. I realized I had simply reacted to our father’s actions, despite the fact that these Walkers weren’t a danger to the Descalias. We all did that, followed his orders. It had been ingrained in us since we were toddlers. A longtime tradition. Follow Papà’s orders. Again, loyalty and agreement to fall into line, no matter the situation. I paused and glanced at Gio. Except for Giovanni, he had defied Stephano Descalia. He stood up to him at eighteen when told that he would have to marry a girl our father had chosen for him and that he would work in Skyscalia, our family’s corporation. Gio had been the only one in our family to openly defy him. Well, besides Maria, our aunt, but you couldn't really count that. Zia Maria was a phenom and even my father couldn’t control her. Her daughter Francesca, better known as Francie was exactly the same way. Someone who was unafraid of Stephano Descalia.

Since I put my gun away, Gio gave me a nod then he looked around at everyone in the room. “All of you. Stand down.”

Next to him, Glory lowered her rather large gun and tucked it back into her waistband. “Redemption, come on. Step back.”

The man she spoke to had his large gun trained on our father.

The woman who had come in with them – the one that looked a lot like Glory – spoke up as she also held a weapon out, “He needs to tell them to lower theirs.”

“Liv, please?” Glory called to her. “This does not have to happen.”

“Dad, lower that gun,” Gio tried again.

My father growled at him. “They came here as invited guests after we captured their most hated enemy and then they point weapons at us?” He looked enraged.

He often looked angry. In fact, I’d never known a man like him. Always full of fight and ready to go to war. I wouldn’t piss him off further by reminding him that he pulled his weapon on them first. No, right now, we all needed to stay calm. “Papà,” I spoke to him quietly. “We cannot have a war within the family.”

My father paused and swung his gaze over at me.

“Glory’s family will be our famiglia,” I reminded him. “Please don’t keep this going.” Yes, this had been my job more often than not. Keeping the peace. It had always been that way. Only I had been too young to stop Gio from leaving all those years ago. Had I known what was happening, I would have tried. But as far as I could tell, despite him being missing for ten years, it had been the best thing for Gio.

Shaking his head, my father finally lowered his weapon as he ordered Dante to do the same.

My brother Dante did lower his. It seemed odd to see Dante handling a weapon, though. He had mostly avoided those ever since the trial.

Redemption and the tall man beside him put their guns away as did the woman named Liv.

“Ok,” Gio spoke up. “Let’s all sit down and discuss this.”

Nodding, his woman Glory said, “We can’t be fighting. That is exactly what Deacon and his sister wants.”

Everyone looked over at her.

“Sister?” my father asked Glory.

Nodding, she explained, “Redemption said it was a woman who called him with the demand of an exchange. According to one of my sister in laws, who had also been kidnapped by Deacon, he has a sister.”

“A woman took this Jarret?” my father asked in some disbelief.

Glory shook her head and narrowed her eyes at him. “This Jarret is my daddy, Mr. Descalia. He is more than important to us.”

“And since you seem um, unaware of the fact,” Liv spoke up. “Deacon’s and V’s mother ran the most notorious crime organization in the US.”

“Oh, no worries about that,” my father responded. “She dealt with people so dark and so lowly that even the worst parts of the famiglia wouldn’t deign to do business with them. O was well known in our realm of the world. Much feared and disliked by many. So I am very aware, Senorita Olivia, of who the woman was. You are her namesake, no?”

When my father said her name…Olivia… I suddenly realized who was in this room with us.

Three days ago, our father told us that he had finally found Gio. It had been because of this man Deacon Walker, checking into Giovanni Descalia for some unknown purpose. So he had me and Dante scour the digital database, researching most of the Walkers. Talon Walker was military with a few awards for valor and honor. The man was a total enigma as he actually did underground flash fighting as was now popular and very illegal by the way. Then I realized that this woman, Liv, was Agent Olivia Walker, an actual CIA government agent. Well trained and she had several large busts under her belt. She had worked her way up in the government queue and that had not been easy for a woman to do.

That was also where we found Deacon Walker…in her past. He had actually gone to school with Olivia. The story was that he had befriended, then betrayed her and she never knew it for years. This Deacon character was more than just a bad apple. He was rotten to the core and from the information we dug up, he was and is mentally unstable.

“Well, I didn’t know this O,” Glory said as she stared at my father. “But Deacon has a habitual history of kidnapping people to make a trade with.” She shook her head as she added, “Like me.”

We all stared at Gio’s girl.

“You?” I asked her.

Nodding, she explained, “When the Louisiana Walkers caught O, Deacon had his men tranq me and I ended up as a pawn.”

“That’s what dragged us into this,” Glory’s brother Redemption explained. “They took our little sister out of the blue. Apparently, O had previously instructed her son, Deacon that if she was ever caught, he needed to take one of the Walkers to trade for her.”

“So, now they have taken Uncle Jarret,” Talon finished for him.

Redemption nodded. “They used tranq darts. They have done it before as my sister said. They somehow locate one of us and wait and then ambush our people. This V or whoever she is had a marksman aim at my dad. They took him down and snatched him, placing him into a van. They also injured several members of the Rebel Saints MC guarding him, so that they could not follow.”

Looking surprised by this part of the story, my father sat up straighter in his chair and asked, “Which Chapter of that MC?”

Everyone in the room again swung their curious gazes over at my father.

“How do you know of the Rebel Saints?” Talon asked him.

“You head the Ramton Chapter?” my father asked Talon.

Talon shook his head. “No, that would be my brother, Hawk.”

“Ok, then you must be aware of the Rebel Saints in this area,” my father said.

“Yes.” Talon nodded. “Many of them have been fighting O and Deacon alongside us.”

I knew why our dad asked this. His cousin had Rebel Saints providing security at his estate plantation, just ten miles from here. I knew some of those men very well as Dante and I had been over there three times this week alone. I was there to help with legal advice and lord knows that Alberto Mancini really needed that since his own attorney had disappeared. That was a whole other mess that our father had us involved in.

Glory looked upset now as she asked the number one question, “So what are we going to do?” She stared at her brother, Redemption as she asked this.

Looking concerned about her, Gio took her hand in his and patted it.

I watched this with total curiosity. I had never even seen Gio date when he had lived at home. How awesome was it to know he had found a girl while he had been living this whole other life? I believed I had found mine, but the girl didn’t seem to realize it yet.

“If you release him, we may never catch him again,” my father stated with gritted teeth.

“But we could lose Dad!” Glory exclaimed as she looked around at everyone there. “If they had taken one of you, would you refuse the exchange?”

Silence fell in the room.

I admired this Glory very much. She was a fighter and unafraid of anything, except she did look scared at this particular moment.

Her question seemed to rattle everyone.

“No, we wouldn’t,” I replied as I looked over at my father.

Looking displeased, he clasped his hands together. “I wanted this man dead. He tried to kill my son. I have never let people hurt my family. Capire? If you show weakness, you will perish. It is the legge della sopravvivenza… the law of survival and you all know this well, I assume?” He gazed at Talon, then at Redemption and even Liv. “You all have fighting backgrounds.” He zeroed in on Talon. “Especially you.”

Talon slowly shook his head as the room remained quiet. Then he stared right at my father and said, “We will make sure we can track him.”

“Using a device?” I asked.

Talon glanced at me. “Yeah.”

“They will know it as soon as they have him,” Dante said as he was an electronics expert.

Nodding, Talon replied, “Yes, we know but that might just give us enough time to have followed them far enough.”

“You hope,” my father stated.

Redemption looked from Talon to my father. “Do you have a better idea?”

My father chuckled, but it didn’t sound like he felt any amusement. “I live in a state of war, young man. How do you think I caught this cretin in mere days, when none of you could find him in all these months?”

Redemption and Talon shook their heads.

“Tell us your idea, Mr. Descalia,” Glory said. “We don’t have much time. The longer he is with this V woman, the more she can hurt him.”

“She would do that?” I asked her. “Like hurt him physically?”

Nodding, she replied, “Jewel said she hated all the Walkers. She blames the whole family for the death of her mother. She described this woman as vengeful and unbalanced.”

My father tisked as he almost smiled. “Sicuramente un problema. Two things that can make a woman very dangerous, indeed.”

“So what’s your plan, Papà?” I dared to ask him. He had his faults and he could be a total narcissistic ass, but when it came to war and battles, there was no one better.

NOT QUITE THE END…