章 10: | Frustrations

𝐉𝐀𝐌𝐄𝐒

I stepped into my apartment to meet it as neat and perfect as I left it. It was so motherfucking clean that if you wanted, you could sleep inside my toilet. If you took into consideration what my apartment looked like, you'd say I was a neat freak. My sister would die a slow and painful death if she saw this place because she knows she'll never be able to keep up.

There were empty beer bottles neatly tucked in the corner of the living room. From where I stood, my kitchen looked as white as snow, all my utensils were shining as if a star had hit them or something. You couldn't find one microwavable plastic instant meal container anywhere in the kitchen sink, and empty cans of soda were nearly nonexistent around the house. Although I used them to quench my morning-after thirst, I made sure there were no traces of them on the counter.

The way I saw it, I was a detective, not a domesticated pansy. I had much better things to do with my time than clean, cook, and do laundry.

Talk about laundry... Everything was neatly ironed and piled in my wardrobe. The only dirty cloth I had was the one I was currently putting on.

I glanced around the living room and smiled. This was what living was all about. I was sure I'll little princess, Vanessa could never keep up with this. It was another reason I didn't bring women into the house. They tended to fall in love after being pounded into oblivion on clean sheets.

I was a minimalist. If I didn't have a use for shit, said shit didn't get into my apartment. There were the basics every human being needed. Microwave, coffee machine, fridge—and it was a fucking state-of-the-art fridge with an ice maker. Because there was nothing more annoying than when you wanted to pour that first drink of the day and realized you were out of motherfucking ice. Happened to me once, and I maxed my credit card the very next day buying that damn expensive fridge. I'd been a happy man ever since.

There was a La-Z-Boy in the living room because every man needed a La-Z-Boy. I was pretty sure it was written in the Bible somewhere. And then, of course, there was my fifty-two-inch Smart LED television set to complement my Xbox One perfectly, and the state-of-the-art surround sound for those nights I decided to piss off the neighbours.

Naturally, there was also a black leather couch where I just happened to fall asleep five nights of the week. The other two nights were usually spent in either my bed or a bed completely unfamiliar to me, next to a woman I'd familiarized myself with from the inside out or rather, my cock did. Bottom line, my bed was used for something completely different than sleeping, until I discovered how much it drove them crazy.

Then, of course, there was the cabinet - the cabinet where I kept all my investigation tidbits. The very first thing I did when I moved inbuilt the huge cabinet, which I bolted against the wall. Carpentry was one of my many hidden talents.

Behind those cabinet doors was all the information I'd managed to gather on the Bologna family. That cabinet was like my own personal Holy Grail.

I walked into the kitchen to get some coffee but then discovered I was out. Picking up my credit card, I made to step out of the apartment but then I almost squealed like a fucking girl when I opened the door and looked straight into Romans's ugly-ass face.

"What the fuck, Roman?"

He walked right by me and into my apartment. "Heard you got suspended."

"Why don't you come right on in?" I flung the door shut and set down the black bag.

"I told you to drop it. And you just couldn't listen, could you?"

I turned and swung my car keys around my finger. "I guess doing what I'm told isn't something I've mastered over the years."

Roman took a seat on the La-Z-Boy. Motherfucker. Did he not know a man's La-Z-Boy was right up there with his woman? You didn't touch it, you didn't even fucking look at it, let alone use it.

"Why are you in my apartment?"

He leaned back into the La-Z-Boy, patting the armrests before gliding his hand up the smooth leather. Oh, the fucking horror.

"You're chasing after the wrong family." He said it so calmly like he was discussing the weather.

I crossed my arms. "Not like I care, but what makes you think that?"

He snorted. "Fucking rookie," he muttered. "You need to make it less obvious that you haven't been around here long."

I scratched my jaw. "First, fuck you. And second, fuck you. Third, I've been here for four years."

"Four years," he scoffed. "No wonder you're so fucking clueless."

I narrowed my eyes. "Please tell me exactly why the fuck I'm listening to you insult me in my damn apartment?"

"Because if you'd been here long enough, you'd know the Bologna have been around for the last fifty years."

"God, are you that old?"

"No. I just remember my grandfather telling stories about them, about Rovenuf Bologna."

"Dan's father." I'd done my homework. I knew the history of these motherfuckers better than I knew fifth-grade math.

Roman nodded. "They called him the Professor, a very intelligent man, just like Dante. He was more popular than John Wayne in the seventies."

I plopped down on the couch. "Is this why you're here, to give me a fucking history lesson?"

"As I said, you're after the wrong goddamn family. It's during the last five years that shit started to go wrong on these streets, am I right?"

I shook my head. "Wrong. Children started to disappear around two years ago, smartass."

He shook his head with the most annoying smirk on his face. "Children started disappearing long before that. But no one took notice because only about two cases a year got reported. It was two years ago that it got so out of hand everyone started to notice."

I moved to the edge of my seat, suddenly very very interested. "What the fuck are you saying, Anderson?"

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章 11: | Discovery

𝐉𝐀𝐌𝐄𝐒

Roman stared at me for what felt like a million years. He looked apprehensive as if he was trying to gauge how the formation was going to affect me. After a few more seconds, I couldn't take it again. "Roman!" I grunted, sending him a scowl.

Roman rolled his eyes and nodded his head. "Okay, okay, chill. Now answer me this, when did the Morello's move into town, Gunner?"

"Five years ago," I replied. And then I clicked. I suddenly understood where he was going with this. "But it doesn't fit into the timeframe of all the child disappearances," I reasoned. If what Roman Anderson was trying to tell me was true, then he would have to make it all fit in my head. If not, It was going to be pretty difficult for me to believe him. It wasn't my fault. That was just how detectives were wired.

Roman lifted a brow, the corner of his mouth twitching. "If you're as smart as you think you are, you'll know it was about five years ago that drugs started to flow into these streets." He slanted his head. "Do you think that's a coincidence, Gunner?"

"This morning, I arrested a guy and found cocaine on him. He said he was dealing for the Bologna's."

"And you believed him?" Roman asked.

I shrugged. "Why shouldn't I?"

"Because there is no fucking way anyone with half a brain would give up the name of their dealer," he growled, snapping his fingers as if to wake me up or something. "Open your eyes, Gunner, you are supposed to be smarter than this."

"You don't know Rio, Roman. He's one stupid individual," I said, trying to defend my line of reasoning.

"I'm not kidding, Gunner. If he was dealing for a family like the Bologna, there's no way in hell he'd snitch on them. He'd be good as dead."

I leaned back on the couch. "So, you think he's lying?"

"Oh, I know he's lying."

"It's a setup, then?"

"Maybe. Probably." Roman stood up from the couch and moved to stand by the window. Looking out, he grunted, "If the Bologna are behind all the drugs and the child kidnappings, why did it only start to get out of hand two years ago? They've been around for fifty years so why start now?"

"Who knows? Maybe the fuckers got greedy."

He snorted again. God, I hated when he did that. It was only cool when I did it.

"Dante Bologna is guilty of a lot of things, Gunner. But kidnapping children isn't one of them, and neither is selling drugs."

He sounded so damn sure about this fact that it made me wonder exactly what had him so convinced of Bologna's innocence. Sure, it was a bit suspicious that Rio gave up the name so easily, but then again, Rio wasn't exactly what you'd call street smart.

I got up from the couch and stood next to him. "Do I want to know why you sound so fucking sure about all this?"

He placed his hand on my shoulder. "I've been around for a long time, rookie. Trust me when I say it's the Morello's you want."

I peered down at his hand on my shoulder before looking up at him. "This still doesn't mean we're partners."

"Of course, it doesn't." He removed his hand and walked to the front door. He paused as he reached for the doorknob. "Besides, your ass is suspended, remember?"

Ah, fuck. I forgot about that for a second, and it felt so good until this asshole ruined it.

And then it occurred to me. "If you know I'm suspended, why did you just tell me all this?"

He was already halfway out the door when he stopped and glanced my way. "I don't know what you're talking about. I just did my duty as your partner to check how you were doing after getting suspended." A wicked half grin curved up the corner of his mouth, and then he closed the door behind him.

This time it was my turn to snort. What an asshole—albeit an asshole who just scored some major points.

It pained me to admit it, but maybe he was right. Maybe I'd been concentrating too much on the wrong damn family. The heat had been on the Bologna's for so long, that the Morellos movements went almost completely unnoticed.

I needed to spend some time investigating the Morello's to see what I could come up with. I still wasn't convinced I was wrong about the Bologna's being behind this town turning into a criminal dumpster. But if—and that was a big fucking if—Roman was right, I needed to start paying closer attention to the other Italian family in town.

I grabbed my phone, scrolling to Vanessa's Instagram page before I sat on the couch, wondering why I felt the need to disinfect the La-Z-Boy before I made use of it again. Probably because of Roman's dirty ass.

There was still no status update on her page, and I was pretty sure since she now knew I was watching her profile, she wouldn't be updating it that often anymore. I was surprised she hadn't deleted and blocked my ass yet.

Staring at her profile picture, her smile almost reaching her chocolaty eyes, I couldn't help but think she didn't quite fit into the Bologna equation. Sure, she was feisty with a healthy dose of that sexy-as-hell Italian attitude, but part of a criminal family? I didn't think so.

It was easy to see her older brother Antonio was well on his way to following in their father's footsteps. Daniel had that whole Italian badass nailed to perfection. But her? I didn't know. One thing I did know was Vanessa Bologna was a puzzle I wanted to solve, and even if my spidey senses keep telling me to keep away, my dick didn't seem to listen.

I knew I needed to figure her out, so I was just going to press some buttons here and there, get the information I needed, and get the hell out of there with my cock very much unattended. Because if I wasn't careful Vanessa Bologna was going to be the end of me.

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