The Mafia's Heirs

28. Something Doesn't Add Up

All her senses started to shut down and all she could feel was the hunger for air.

And as the darkness surrounded her, all she could think was,

'I don't care what happens to me but my children NEED to be safe, at all times.'

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"Are you frigging kidding me???" Adam looked at his best friend as if he was crazy. "One look at his face and anyone who knows you from childhood would say he's your son!"

Mateo sighed. "But I don't remember meeting her and the kids are around five. I think we should get a paternity test done before jumping to conclusions."

"Or we could ask the doc who the dad is." Alessia threw her knife at Adam's dartboard, hitting bull's eye.

Adam huffed and stood up from his bean bag, pulling the knife out and taking a dart in his other hand.

"This, right here Alex, is a dart, which goes-" He pressed it to the dartboard. "In the dartboard."

Alessia rolled her eyes and threw her other knife which cut through the dart and grazed his fingers.

"Owwww..." Adam shook his hand violently, glaring at her.

"What if she doesn't want to tell me. I mean, she didn't tell me these last five years. And she knows I am in the mafia."

"You told her?" Ricardo walked in, passing everyone sandwiches he brought from Subway.

"She figured it out." Mateo sighed.

"Wait what?" Alessia sat up. "How?"

"She ran around with gangs and all."

"So?" Adam looked disbelievingly. "You think that's good enough reason?"

"She's hiding something." Ricardo stated. "Maybe she could be with the Russians."

"That's not possible." He replied, glaring at his best fighter.

"Speak English please." Adam pointed at his best friend. "Plus, how can just anyone come to that conclusion? She could have guessed up to gangster level but Mafia?"

"That's what she thought at first. That I was some gangster. But when the kids got kidnapped and her gang friends figured out it was the Russian Mafia, she must have put two and two together. I mean, we found the kids and we weren't really subtle about the offensive front."

"Wait, how did those street thugs find out where the kids were held?" Alessia asked.

Now that she asked it, Mateo wondered, 'How did they know?'

"Something doesn't add up."

They all fell silent after that.

Was this another one of Mona's grand schemes?

What was happening?

They sat there in silence, trying to come up with a plausible theory.

Mateo's phone rang a few minutes later, Leonardo's face popping up on the screen.

"Cugino." Mateo addressed as he picked up.

"Thank me later but I may have bribed the lab technician in to getting the twins' blood samples from yesterday."

"I will be there in an hour."

"What's happening?" Adam asked.

"I will tell you when I get back."

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"The reports will come back by tomorrow." Wilson, the lab technician, said.

"Okay. Send it to this email." Mateo said, giving him his business card.

Leonardo had gone back to the room as soon as he had reached the hospital and he had stayed back at the lab to give his blood samples.

Mateo made his way to the VIP floor to pay Lorenzo and maybe River a visit.

As the elevator door opened, he saw them again.

The most beautiful children out there.

But they were crying.

Susan Johnson and River's best friend Sebastian were there. While Susan tried to comfort the kids, Sebastian stood straight and emotionless. Only if you looked closely into his features could you notice the sheer panic and fear in his eyes.

Mateo hurried over to them and knelt down in front of the kids.

"What's wrong?"

"Mommy's not okay!!" The little girl cried, throwing her arms around his neck.

His heart stopped for that one moment.

Her arms around him. His daughter.

He shook off those thoughts. It wasn't proved yet.

Mateo patted her head and stood back up.

"What happened?" He asked the woman who was observing him. She definitely knew who he was. More reason to believe it wasn't so hard for River to figure out.

"She had a panic attack and fell off the bed." She stated with a sigh. "It reopened the wound on her head and strained the ligament more."

'What? A panic attack? She was fine just yesterday.'

Sebastian stared at his godchildren's tear-stained faces and sighed. "Mom, go home with the children."

"But-"

"I don't wanna go!!" Kiara wailed, hugging her grandmother.

"Ki, let's go." Lucas hugged her. "Mommy will worry if we cry."

These little ones already had Mateo's heart.

Susan sighed and said, "I think I should stay. Take the kids to Mom."

"You sure?"

She nodded.

Sebastian turned to Mateo. "Thanks for everything, Mr. Adesso."

He nodded and watched him walk away with the twins, Kiara crying into his shoulder.

Susan Johnson sat down on one of the waiting chairs, face in her palms.

And he couldn't bring himself to leave her there so he sat down there as well, only noticing then the concerned looks the men guarding Michelia's room was giving him.

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