Mafia Fall-Out

Prologue

Luca

"Fuck!" I shrieked, watching as my golf ball sailed through the air, landing right in the center of a hot tub in the backyard of one of the houses on the course. The worst part was that this was about as close as I had been to the hole the entire day.

Angelo and Marco both burst out laughing, nearly doubling over.

"Well, ladies and gentlemen, I think we finally figured it out." Marco chuckled. "We've actually found something that Luca Catalano sucks at."

"Fuck you guys." I scowled, not in the mood for their banter. We'd been at this for hours and none of us were any good. Why anyone wanted to pay $180 to drive around hitting balls all day in the blazing sun was beyond me, but we had made a promise to the girls that we would look for more constructive hobbies in our retirement. Golf was only one of our many attempts, and so far, none of them were working out. Fishing had been fun, until we spent three days in a row on the riverbank without a bite. Reading was boring, hiking was exhausting, and our try at cooking had nearly cost me my house. For a few weeks, we even tried going to garage sales and repurposing things. It was amazing the amount of shit people had, but we did find some pretty cool stuff. Charlotte put the kabosh on that though when I came home with a life-size statue of Tupac.

We have certainly given this hobby thing the old college try, but we always came back to what we knew. Guns, gambling, and criminal activity.

It had been a little over a year since Carlo had taken on the role of Don, at least publicly. He was the face, and I was the brains behind the operation. I was still technically in charge of the family, but by promoting Carlo, I could take myself and my family out of harms way and give them somewhat of a normal upbringing. Mostly,  Angelo and Marco and I were putting our energy into our legitimate businesses like the imports and most recently, a winery on the outside of town. I fucking loved being home for dinner every night with Charlotte and the kids, but every once in awhile the itch came back. When I knew my men were heading out on a mission, the adrenaline started pulsing through my body just like it used to, and I hated not going with them. I had too much at stake now, though. Charlotte and the kids were my highest priority, and I wasn't going to put them in harms way any longer. I didn't need the notoriety, so I was happy to let Carlo take credit for what I was managing.

Charlotte was back at work now too, at least until the baby came. After the ordeal with Nico, she had started working with the state as an art therapist for victims of sex trafficking. She had taken it all really hard at first, but had figured out A constructive way of dealing with it. I was so fucking proud of her, and loved hearing the passion in her voice when she talked about it.

She was literally days away from giving birth to another little girl. I was thrilled, but a little nervous. The prospect of a baby girl was new to me. Layla was three when I met her, and I missed this stage entirely. Char swore it was no different, that babies were babies, but I was still anxious. If she was anything like her sister, I was in serious trouble.

Layla had already started developing the teenager attitude at the age of seven. She was a hellion right now and I was hoping she'd settle in when the baby came. She had a hard time sharing her mother with anyone, including me and her brothers, and I was a little worried that  another little girl would only add to the jealousy. She adored Marco's little girl, Vivi, but that was probably because she went home at the end of the day. We were all certainly in for some changes.

"Are we done with this yet?" I let out a sharp laugh as I fished my ball out of the hot tub.

"Yeah, I could use a beer." Angelo chuckled. "I don't even know where my ball ended up."