Perdita

48 | milkshake and fries

"It's for Salvo's birthday video." When we gave him a questioning look, he explained, "Since his birthday's coming up, I'm making a video edit of each of you pranked. Great, now the element of surprise is ruined."

"Apollo, never, never do that again. Do you understand?" Elijah looked angry based on his growing reddening face and pulled-down features.

"Why? It's no big deal." He huffed, dropping his chin to the table childishly.

"Did you forget who they are?" He hissed, bending over to smack Apollo's head. "They work for Ace and Alex - they're dangerous and you just shoved your little sister into a room with only Ace in it. What if they decide they want Ariana and Ace can't defeat all of them by himself. You're in trouble, mister."

Apollo took a sharp inhale of breath and horror washed over his feature. "Jesus! I didn't think of that. I'm sorry." He apologized sincerely.

"Don't apologize to me. To her."

"I'm sorry, Ari. I didn't mean to put you in that situation."

"It's okay," I said smugly. "I also didn't think it as that way. Don't matter either way because I got my revenge."

Apollo scowled and grumbled something to himself under his breath that I couldn't hear from the small distance.

"Ari," Elijah said sternly. "You're also in trouble too, bambina."

"What?" I blinked at him in surprise. "Why?"

Noah and Apollo laughed in disbelief - equally shocked.

"Ariana's in trouble." Noah tutted. "That's a first."

"Our family business is partly based on reputation. It's important that we maintain it and what you did is not only humiliating to Apollo but to our family name. Do you understand?" Elijah said gently. "I know you're new to this and that's why I'm going to let you go with only a warning this time. Next time something like this happens, you go to Luca, Ace, Alex, or me and we will take care of your brother's consequences, okay? You can't just go around and do something like this."

"Alex probably will help me." I huffed.

He ran a hand over his face and sighed heavily. "Right. Cross Alex off the line. He's biased. Next time, you go to one of three of us."

"Ace's desperate for her forgiveness right now." Noah chimed in. "He'll probably help her if she asked."

"Fine. Me or Luca."

"Luca cannot resist her charms. He'll do anything for her." Apollo said in a duh tone. My mouth grew into a huge grin.

Elijah waved his hands in the air and groaned. "Okay, okay! Go to me."

"Last time I checked, Ace is in charge." I snickered, Noah, joining me.

Elijah sighed in frustration and I began to feel bad for him. He opened his mouth but I beat him to it, "All right. We were just playing around. I'm sorry. I won't do it again, I promise."

He smiled softly at me and bent over the counter to squeeze my hand. "Thank you. I appreciate it." He got serious again. "Apollo, you know better so I expect all of your devices in my room by dinner time. And you're cleaning the eighth section of the main warehouse tomorrow. By yourself."

"What?! Eighth section?! But I don't want to clean the damn brains!" He wailed his complaints, throwing his head back to the ceiling, and let out a long, dramatic groan.

"Apollo!" They all gave me a quick panicked look. My brows rose. So their punishment was cleaning human organs? Interesting.

"I meant figuratively." Apollo chuckled nervously before turning to his older brother again. "Seriously, please. I don't like cleaning." He whined.