Page 56 of Privilege

His mind was a killer sometimes. Always reminding him of things he would rather leave to the wayside until he worked something out for himself.

That was a good point, though.

Lucia was there with him which meant, even if she was blowing someone else off, or her family wasn’t happy … she was right where she wanted to be. That thought just made his chest tight in ways he couldn’t explain.

“Well?” he pressed when he realized she hadn’t answered him. “Did you skip out on plans with someone else for this?”

Lucia shrugged. “Not really.”

Great.

“Not really isn’t a no, Lucia,” Renzo said, chuckling.

She gave him a look from the side, and just shook her head. “There wasn’t anything specific going on tonight with my family or friends, so no, I didn’t skip out on anybody. And even if I had, so what? Plans change all the time, right?”

It was that exact moment that her phone decided to start buzzing again in her hand. Renzo didn’t miss the way her gaze dropped to check the screen, or how she was quick to reject the call with a simple wipe of her finger along the red phone icon that came up. She wasn’t quite fast enough that he didn’t catch whose name was on the screen, though.

Daddy, it read.

Damn.

“Lucian is your father, right?” Renzo asked quietly.

Lucia’s head snapped back up fast. “What?”

“That’s your dad’s name. Lucian, right?”

“I was named after him, actually.”

Renzo nodded. “I figured that’s where the Lucia came from.”

“Do you know my dad?”

Who didn’t?

“I know of him,” Renzo offered.

Which wasn’t a lie. Any person who worked the streets under the Marcello organization, be it an errand runner, a drug dealer, a loan shark, or fucking muscle making sure everybody stayed in line and within their territory knew who the Marcellos were, and the people controlling the family.

It took Renzo a couple of years before he truly understood what the Marcellos were—not just powerful, rich people with a tendency for crime, but mafia. He heard the whispers, and as the saying went, there was always a grain of truth in every rumor. That alone was enough to tell him to be careful where the Marcellos were concerned.

Simple as that.

He did his job, and stayed off their radar at the same time. That allowed him to get on just fine, and kept them far away from his business. He dealt their drugs, managed his guys, never stole a dime, and always got paid on time. That was how he did business, and kept the people supplying him on their own side of the city.

Renzo wasn’t out here wanting more. This was good enough for him. He didn’t need any kind of trouble.

Lucia smiled slightly, and looked away at the same time. “I think knowing of my father, and really knowing the man might be two entirely different things.”

Renzo agreed.

Partially.

“I think,” he countered, “that the man I would get to know, if put in his path, is not the same man you know. To be fair.”

“That could be t—”

Lucia’s words were cut off by the buzzing of her phone. Again. This time, she wasn’t as quick to reject the call, and Renzo saw that, once again, her father’s contact lit up the screen.