Submitting to My Best Friend's Dad-Chapter 769 : When Night Falls

*Elio*

My blood boiled like a volcano just about to erupt. The only thing keeping my fist from going through the wall was the sight of baby Emilia still sleeping away on her mother’s chest and Cat’s stunned and worried eyes as she looked over at me.

She kept me sane even if I felt like I could explode into ash and fiery coal, coating everything in sight until Ignacio and his whole damn company were nothing but a memory covered by dust, forgotten in their stillness.

My hands clenched by my side, I glanced at Emilia sleeping away and my voice came out in a strained hiss as I said, “I have to go. I’ll be late.”

There was sadness and disappointment in her eyes and god, I hated disappointing her, but the understanding smile she gave me was the permission I needed.

I barely caught her saying, “Be safe,” before I was running down the hall.

I grabbed my keys and shoes, throwing on my gun and harness and my jacket over it before I left. It was raining, and I hated the rain as the puddles splashed against my expensive shoes, cold against my skin as I raced into the car.

“Fucking idiot, getting kidnapped right after we had our kid,” I murmured to myself, cursing Leo instead of expressing how utterly full of panic I was. Leo wasn’t just my right hand, he was my best friend.

I had to find him.

The drive was horrific, the rain pouring and my phone bursting with text after text. I didn’t have time to look at them all but Leo wasn’t their only hit. They had done damage that would be crippling for any illegal business.

If we weren’t the Valentinos.

I gripped the steering wheel tightly, my jaw clenched so tightly that I could feel my teeth grinding together. They just fucked with the wrong mafia family.

The warehouse was bustling, nearly everyone called to the area already, and still more cars following my own as I parked as close as I could. I got out, storming past the grunts and lower-ranked members as they parted like the Red Sea, scrambling out of the way.

Franky was inside, barking out orders and as soon as I saw him, I shouted, “What the fuck happened?”

Franky sighed, turning to me with a pissed-off look. “What does it look like? I’m trying to keep this fucking business afloat while you two fuck off to do who knows what.”

He sneered as I got right into his face, grabbing his collar much like I had Leo’s almost a year ago. I could see the dare in his eyes, and hidden behind it was a deep anger just like I was feeling right now.

I could see how much stress had been put on him, how much he was struggling to give under its weight. But I was so out of control that I was tempted to punch him anyway, even though I knew he was only baiting me to keep my rage away from all the other men in the room staring anxiously at us.

But before I could do something I regretted, my phone began to blare with the familiar ringtone I had set specifically to one asshole in particular. I stiffened, as did Franky as he recognized it as well.

“Get a trace going now!” Franky ordered loudly.

I dropped him, grabbing my phone and heading to the nearest bench. A laptop was opened up and I stared at the number with distaste, wishing I could have that bastard’s throat between my hands but I knew how to play this.

I let it ring until they plugged it into the laptop and then I answered. I knew their type. They always had to have the first and last words, so to keep this call going, I purposefully didn’t say a word.

Sure enough, after a few beats of silence, I heard him give a raspy cough then Ignacio said calmly, “I told you to leave.”

“I didn’t listen,” I said shortly.

“Ah, come now, there’s no hard feelings, right, Elio?” I could sense the smirk on his face, how much utter delight he took in this. He wasn’t just a bastard like me or Franky or Alessandro. He was a true psychopath. “It’s just business.”

“Is that what you’re calling it?” I scoffed, glancing over at the laptop who was quickly trying to track where the call was coming from.

I knew it might not be where they are keeping Leo but if it led us to Ignacio, I could beat the address out of him.

“Yeah, that’s what I’m calling it,” Ignacio said, completely calm and in control like this was a game of chess and he knew exactly which pawns were in his hands and what moves they were going to make. “Now, you’ve got a choice to make. You can either give up your best friend–”

I flinched as I heard a scream of pain, one I recognized as Leo from the other side of the phone, muffled like he’d been gagged and I struggled to remain calm, tightening my fists until my nails dug into my palms.

“Or,” Ignacio continued, “you can give up your business. You have twenty-four hours, Elio. Tick tock.”

The call ended just as Franky gave me the thumbs up. I slammed my phone onto the table, hovering behind our tech guy as he input the last bit of data.

“And here. This is where he was calling from,” our tech guy said confidently. He quickly sent out a mass text of the address.

I gave Franky a look, and he stared at me in silence for a moment. And despite the tension between us earlier and the near exchange of blows and harsh words, Franky gave me a nod and all was forgiven.

“We’re not giving anything up,” I declared loudly for all of my men to hear. “And that includes Leo. Get ready to leave!”

“Yes, sir!”

Loud cries came from the men around us, a renewed form of energy taking over as I confidently stood in front of them. I was still pissed and worried as hell about Leo but right now, the men needed their leader.

Franky immediately went to call all our men and I sent a team ahead of time to the location we tracked Ignacio to, just to watch to make sure nobody left or escaped. Luckily, their report indicated that Ignacio didn’t have a clue we knew where he was.

One of our tech guys hacked into the city plans and found the floor plan of the building, printing it out for us to have a physical copy as we planned the ambush. Another of our guys hacked into the security cameras across the street from the place, keeping watch to see who entered or exited.

Meanwhile, Franky and Leo’s guys showed up armed to the teeth, our best and most hardened men all focused on the same dedicated cause.

“Boss!” one of Leo’s guys, Dominic shouted out as he arrived with a truck full of weapons. He entered the warehouse with a grin, the scar that stretched across his right side cheek stretching out unpleasantly as he did. “We’re taking the C’s and B’s, right?”

I raised an eyebrow at him as he came in with a wooden box labeled in big yellow letters ‘Caution: Explosive.’ Dominic grinned widely at me, holding the explosives like it was something precious, and considering his track record, it was.

I glanced at Franky for his opinion and he quickly shook his head with wide eyes. I shrugged, turning back to Dominic with a grin.

“Only as much as you can carry on your person,” I told him, watching his face light up like a kid on Christmas morning. Before he could go crazy though, I added, “And make sure to use them sparingly. We don’t need any friendly fire injuries.”

“Yes, boss!” He nodded enthusiastically, skipping back to Leo’s men.

As I stared a the group of ex-military men, jacked as hell and scarred like they’d come out of a war group, I wondered what the fuck Leo was doing with his men.

“You’ll regret that,” Franky glared at me.

“We don’t know what kind of defenses they have inside the building. I doubt it’s the same as the floorplan,” I told him cautiously. “Besides, it might come in handy.”

“I thought the plan wasn’t to kill Ignacio?” Franky demanded, crossing his arms. “Cause C4 is going to do the job.”

“It isn’t,” I insisted. “We don’t need to kill him but if they have any escape routes, which they likely do, the explosives could come in handy to distract them. That way we can slip inside and capture Igancio. If they’d hold Leo elsewhere, we can trade Igancio for him or just torture the location out of him. Either way is fine with me.”

“Ignacio won’t talk,” Franky said with a shake of his head. “Even on death’s door. Our best bet is to trick his men into handing over Leo, without trading Ignacio hopefully.”

“That’s the best-case scenario, but I won’t risk Leo’s life if we can’t get both of them,” I said firmly, making sure to be clear about this. “Leo is the priority. Ignacio comes second.”

“Fine,” Franky said grumpily. “But that loser is going to pay if Ignacio gets away this time.”

“As long as you don’t cripple or kill him,” I shrugged. “He is still useful to me, and I am kinda attached to him at this point.”

I sent Franky a grin and he just rolled his eyes, but I could see that Franky cared about Leo. Probably not as much as I did, but after all we’d been through together, it was impossible not to care for the goofy and loyal guy.

Franky and I looked over the floor plans for the building they were hiding out in, watching the camera we hacked and noticing some distinct details. The original facade was much smaller than it currently was and the bricks were not the same.

“Told you the C4 would come in handy.” I smirked at Franky as we noticed how reinforced it was. “We take out the wall, blast their reinforcements, and it’ll let us get inside easily, losing as few men as possible. We split the men into teams, taking a few of Leo’s crazy bastards with us since they were ex-military and had experience in fire fights.”

Once we had planned as much as we could, Franky turned to me with a calm look. “So when do we hit them?”

I glanced at my phone, seeing it was now eight in the morning and we’d been going all night. I had a few texts from Cat, just asking if I was okay and if things were going well. She even sent me a photo of Emilia and her with a little caption that they were rooting for me.

“Get some sleep, men,” I declared for the rest of the men then turned to Franky with a determined look. “We attack tonight. Once night falls.”