Ria
She opened her eyes. She had fallen asleep on the bed in Paddy’s basement room sometime during the night. When Piers came back to the house and came in search of her at some time during the night he shook her awake. Together, they had tried to make sense of what Paddy had been up to but had only succeeded in drawing a blank.
The twins had been too weary to continue to make some of the scribblings of Paddy’s bizarre notes, jotted down in his spidery scrawl. Yawning widely, they had left for their respective rooms upstairs, though her brother had helped her as they tried to grapple with what they had found.
They had sat for a while, talking about the wealth of information they had unearthed from Paddy’s tablet. It had not been difficult to unlock that, his personal one, a device he left locked in his basement locker, safe and sound, except from his family. The password had been that of their first pet dog…
It had been Cole’s name that Paddy had written on his notepad, the one he kept beside his laptop, on the large desk. It had been a job, trying to trawl through his notes, the pads littered on the table, the notes with his spidery scrawl which seemed to make no sense. The notes on his tablet.
But for the one name that stood out.
Cole.
What had their brother been doing? Having carefully camouflaged his search histories, there was no way of going back to find out what he had been looking for…but the twins had managed to discover that Paddy had been seriously unearthing all the dirt he could find on Cole, their so-called half-brother.
As she lay on her soft, mattress, watching the grey sky begin to lighten up, Ria thought, had Cole and his past been the reason for the so-called accident, that attempt on Paddy’s life?
*
Piers
He stood for a long while, puffing on a cigarette, the thoughts milling about in his mind as he stared out at the lawns below his balcony. Beston’s men were prowling around and now, they had also got a couple of dogs. The sight of the dark silhouettes prowling on the lawns below was strangely reassuring and familiar, having seen similar sights all his life from the time he could remember.
His troubled thoughts returned to the evening. Claude was being released from the hospital later that day and he wanted to be back there, to bring his brother home. As he pulled on the boxers he wore to bed, he ran a hand through his tousled blonde hair.
What was the reason for Pappa’s unrelenting animosity towards Claude? he wondered for the millionth time. It was not something that had occurred overnight. For as long as he could remember, the Don had seemed to have it in for his second-born son. Nothing the poor chap did seemed to be good enough; when the kids came home for their holidays for the Don during a brief spell when they had been sent to study at a posh residential school in Switzerland, it was always poor Claude with who Lucien Delano found fault.
He could recall Mumma’s white face as Lucien Delano thundered at his younger son, rebuking him in that deadly cold manner that would make anyone wet their pants. Claude had tried, very hard, to win his father’s approval. But the truth was, he was not great at academics. Gradually, he had become the Bad Boy, to grab his father’s attention, any which way.
Only, Pappa had simply ignored him then. Which was worse.
Mumma had been the one who had suffered the most because of this tug-of-war of emotions, he thought as he stretched out on the bed and yawned.
Just before he drifted off, his thoughts turned to Cole. His father’s ba*tard son. He scowled and drifted off into a deep sleep.
*
Lucien
He rose, reluctant to leave his wife’s warm body. She moaned slightly, clinging to him as he rose.
“Go back to sleep, woman,’ he ordered as she blinked sleepily and sat up, her large breasts thrust forward. Even as she reached for the soft blanket to cover her nakedness, he moved. Unable to help himself, he reached down and took a prominent teat in his mouth and suckled greedily. She whimpered softly, her hand in his hair, head thrown back in surrender, as she relished the tug of her lover’s mouth on her sensitive nub. His c*ck sprang to attention as he felt her whimper but he pushed her down, back onto the bed, firmly.
“I have work.’ he growled over his shoulder as he strode away, his c*ck standing at attention, unsatisfied…
Yes, he had work. He had to get Cole shipped out of the city at the earliest. He had discussed the matter with Schwartz, his closest friend and the only one he would trust, the previous night.
He knew where he wanted to send the boy to.
And he knew for a fact that Cole would resent it and put up a fight. Lucien easily dismissed the b*stard son he had sired. Something was not right about the fellow and he did not want the man near his other children; Cole was a bad influence and he had seen first-hand, the amount of ugliness, the depth of danger within him. No, Cole Delano would be best off in Australia, continents away and he had the contacts who were ready to have him.
*
Mid-morning in the Delano household was generally a time when the triplets were away at school, the elder siblings at University or in town at the boxing academy, and Paddy would be holed away in his lair, working feverishly on whatever he was working upon. Proserpina generally used to wander out of the kitchen to her study for a few hours to monitor the work being done at the Buddhist Centres of Learning in Japan and other places. As the de-facto Director of the Far Eastern operations of the Study Centres, she had a lot on her plate.
The work was going smoothly and she was pleased with her team. it was slow and steady but the interest being generated in Buddhist literature was amazing, as Alex Wu said enthusiastically, when he called her.
Then, of course, her beloved blog, which she had neglected to update for a few weeks now. But that was all on Proserpina’s mind as she went to her husband’s study, knowing that Lucien Delano was waiting for her. She had persuaded him, over a breakfast prepared by Camille and Beatrice, that she wanted to visit Paddy again.
Not surprisingly, her Mafia Don had agreed.
*
Breakfast had been a rather botched effort by the two ladies who tried to manage the cooking when Proserpina was incapacitated. Dom and Lou had protested loudly when they saw the food.
The breakfast sandwich which was served on a hard roll was an unmitigable disaster. The bacon was burnt to a crisp and that was an understatement, thought Proserpina when she walked into the kitchen, and the cheese was not melted the way her family preferred. Beatrice and Camille were in the middle of a loud, spirited argument about some inane topic and Proserpina sighed. Yes, her family, used as they were to her talented culinary outputs, was understandably disappointed and they made no bones about it.
Cereal and sausages saved the day.
But Lucien was too lost in thought to comment and Schwartz winked at Proserpina when the boys began to grumble. Maja and the children ate silently; Maddy thought it was quite good compared to her mother’s half-hearted attempts on the rare occasions that she ventured into the kitchen to try and cook. And Tara, who was observing everyone, thought that it was good to have a Mumma who cooked like a dream! Magnus was like a jumpy cat, avoiding looking in the direction of the men seated towards the head of the table. Ria and Piers looked tired when they entered, as always together and deep in some conversation.
Ria took one look at the breakfast and declared brightly,
‘I’m dieting.’
She walked to her father and kissed the top of his head. Schwartz, seated on his right, smiled affectionately. Everyone knew that the Don had a special place in his heart for his first born daughter.