"That's helpful."

Shrugging, she said, "Our business crossed paths once or twice in Italy. I helped him out of a scrape once and he's been good to me ever since."

"If I ask what kind of scrape, would you tell me?"

Cat smirked. "You're awfully curious about me for being a man who thinks women are useless in your business."

"I never said that," Giovanni corrected sharply. "Women can be twice as dangerous as men because you never suspect them, and they're a hell of a lot more ruthless when it comes to getting what they want. Cosa Nostra doesn't believe in involving women. I don't mind working with a woman outside of that."

"You're working with me now."

"It's beneficial," he said like that explained it all.

"And I'm your brother's wife."

"That, too. Although, there's not much to see there, huh?"

Cat glanced away, refusing to dignify that with a response. Besides, she was trying to forget her weakness a month ago on her wedding night as it was. That was terribly fucking difficult to do when every inch of her remembered what Dante felt like touching her, tasting her, and fucking her like he had.

Difficult. Right.

Downright impossible was more like it.

"You didn't answer my question," Giovanni pointed out. "About your supplier."

"Someone I knew was planning to come in on him for his influence in the trade there. They thought he had too much control and wasn't offering out power to those who felt they deserved it for their influence. Since he was also hiding some of my extra activities as I had no other access to the product but him, I couldn't let that happen."

"Why would you need to hide anything?"

"I worked for someone else while doing my own business. It could have gotten me killed. You ask too many questions." There were parts of Cat's past that needed to stay there and that was one of them. "Do the bricks look clean, or what?"

"Clean enough. I'll break a few open and check the color for purity, but it looks like it's all here in this one. Do you want to stay for the rest?"

Cat checked her watch, sighing. "No, I have dinner in thirty with Dante."

"Mmm, the Calabrese sit-down. Try to be good, Cat."

She smiled slightly. Giovanni probably didn't even realize he was beginning to like her.

"Men are easy, Gio. It's the women I have trouble with."

"Like my mother."

"For one," she said under her breath.

"Invite Cecelia to dinner at your place," Giovanni said, pulling more bricks from the crate. "Let her cook it with you. You've only been in her domain, right? Welcome her into yours. Trust me, it'll work. Or help, at least."

"Thanks."

Giovanni chuckled. "She's still pretty prickly about the whole marriage thing even after a month of you two tying the knot, so maybe wait another month or so to let her cool down. She doesn't like it when her sons don't want her opinions or when she feels like we don't need her anymore."

"Italian mothers and their boys." Cat smiled. "I'll take it into consideration ... in a month, or so."

"Yeah, well, I know it's fucking hard on my brother to feel like his mother hates his wife, so ..."

Men sucked at emotions. Maybe that was why Cat got along better with men than females. She didn't push Giovanni to say more, knowing he probably didn't want to.

"Pass me down two of those bricks, would you?"

"Sure."

Giovanni tossed the heavy blocks of packaged coke into Cat's waiting hands. Without explaining her motives, she shoved them into her large purse. She preferred clutches, but since she had things to take care of tonight involving the blow import that came in the day before, she opted for the monstrous thing she toted around.

"Thanks. Don't play with the product too much, Gio."

"Have fun and smile," Giovanni called after Cat as she walked through the warehouse.

She flipped him the bird behind her back.

The bastard just laughed.

Goddamn Marcellos.

"That asshole," Dante growled, turning his cellphone off.

"What?" Lucian asked.

Dante's fists clenched at his sides, turning his back to Cat. "Take Jordyn and go home."

"No," Lucian replied. "That's not how this was arranged to go down."

As Cat didn't understand what changed over the course of a phone call to warrant Dante's unknown new plan and anger, she chose to stay quiet.

"Seriously, take her and go. Carl is bringing his mistress along, not his wife."

Lucian flinched. "You're kidding."

"I wish I was."

"What's the problem?" Jordyn asked, digging for the information Cat was curious about as well.

"It's disrespectful to bring a goomah to a meeting when the other side brings their wife. It's like saying mine or Lucian's wife is only worth to him what his mistress is." Dante cussed lowly, adding, "I can't believe he did that to me."

"Me, either."

"He never would have pulled shit like that on Antony," Dante hissed.

"So, make sure after tonight he knows not to pull it on you again," Cat said.

"What about Catrina?" Lucian asked.

Dante glanced at Cat over his shoulder. "What do you think, dolcezza?"

She appreciated the fact he even asked for her input on this.

"Carl's never met me and he didn't show at the wedding, right?"

"No."

"Is his awful son coming along?" Cat asked.

"Not that I know of," Dante answered. "Why?"

Cat slipped her wedding rings off and handed them to Dante. After getting a hair elastic from Jordyn, she piled the hair on the top of her head to give the effect of a messy updo styled bun.

"Does someone have gum?" Cat asked.

Lucian eyed her warily before pulling out a pack of peppermint flavored gum. She took it with a smile and popped two into her mouth, smacking loudly as she chewed.

"Wow," Dante mumbled, cringing.

"Whole new woman, babe."

Dante's gaze widened. Cat had lost her thick accent like nothing and with a bat of her lashes, a different hairstyle and an attitude change to make her seem airless, no one would know the difference.

Well, so long as they didn't know her.

"Does this work, hon?" Cat asked, smirking. "I can be just about whoever you need me to be."

Dante cleared his throat. "As long as you don't bring it home with you."

"I'll try to remember that."

"Sweet Christ," Lucian said faintly. "Who did you marry?"

"I'm still not sure, man."

Cat grabbed Dante's arm, tugging on his suit jacket. "Let's go have dinner."

"Dante, my boy," Carl greeted as Dante stood from their semi-private booth. "How've you been?"

"Can't complain," Dante replied with an easy smile.

Cat knew, behind that smile, her husband was pissed and planning, but she said nothing. She gave the woman wearing a tight red dress with a neckline that plunged too far down and a very short hem a once-over. Not forgetting her role, Cat offered the woman a brilliant smile, still smacking her gum.

Dante waved at the woman, but didn't offer his hand. Cat suspected if she were Carl's wife, he would have. "This is not Cynthia."

"No, this is Felicia."

"Again, not your wife."

Carl shifted on his feet. "Yes, well-"

"Well, what?" Dante demanded quietly.

"I wasn't sure I wanted to expose my wife to ..." The man trailed off, waving at Cat in the back of the booth.

"My wife, you mean?" Dante asked.

"In a way, yes. I've been told she's an interesting character, to be sure, but she isn't one I want my wife mingling with."

Dante flashed his teeth in a sneer. "Since my wife isn't here tonight, I don't think we have to worry about that, do we?"

Carl's gaze snapped back and forth between Cat and Dante rapidly. "But-"

Cat stuck out her hand, wiggling her fingers enticing. With not a hint of her Italian accent, she said, "Very nice to meet you. You can call me Tess."

Seemed like a good enough name in Cat's opinion.

Carl took her hand, squeezing it gently before he released it. "I thought for sure your wife would be coming, Dante."

"She's busy doing what it is that she does. Last minute flight out of the city to LA."

"And this fine woman is ...?"

"I told you, I'm Tess," Cat repeated, playing dumb, though she knew what the man was asking.

Carl laughed, giving Cat a wink. "No, sweetheart, I meant to Dante. What are you to him?"

"You know what she is," Dante said, smirking. "She agreed to come along with me tonight. Sit, Carl. And your lady friend, of course."

Once the two had taken their seats, a waiter came and did the booth's order. Cat continued keeping her role in check, giggling stupidly over the quiet conversation between the men and dancing her fingers suggestively over Dante's arm and shoulder.

Really, she might as well have been mimicking the woman's actions across from her. It seemed as though the character Cat chose to play wasn't all that far off from the real life thing.

Dante barely paid Cat any attention while she went on with her games, but she understood that, too. Women used by men for the purpose of sex and little else were meant to be candy for the eye and a hole to fill. She certainly wouldn't garner the attention or respect a proper wife would but the man always took care of his mistress. So was the way of goomahs. Just like how both Cat and the woman Carl had brought along completely ignored the men as they discussed their wives.

As Carl sipped from a rum and coke, he said to Dante, "I heard you and my Matty had a run in on your birthday."

"That was nearly two months ago," Dante replied, unbothered. "I've forgotten about it."

"Good, good."

Dante's gaze snapped up, meeting the man's. "What's that supposed to mean?"