An Echo in the Mafia (Echo Reid, Reid Family Book #1)

Part 51

"Oh." Echo said, watching as Nadia pushed the door open and motioned for her to enter. 

"Good Afternoon, Ms. Reid, Ms. Donato." 

The greetings continued as they passed several different people moving throughout the house. 

"Who doesn't lock their front door?" Echo said, "How does Luke of all people not lock it?"

"There's a lot of people moving around right now with the wedding, but trust me... someone is always watching the door and everyone is accounted for." Nadia said, signalling for her to follow. 

"This..." Echo said as they made it to the room at the very end of the hall... 

"is the kitchen." Nadia completed the thought. Echo looked around- she'd only glanced at it before and from a distance, had never been inside. Now she walked around the counters, smiling and greeting an older lady who was busy at work. "Luke is very particular about his food."

"I should probably have told Luke this but I don't know how to cook... anything." Echo said.

"Lucky for you, Luke does keep a full time cook." Nadia said with a smile. 

"Not that I wouldn't mind learning." Echo said with a shrug. "I've never tried."

"You've never tried to cook? At all?" Nadia asked. 

"There was never any need. I doubt I could properly make coffee." Echo admitted. 

Nadia laughed. 

"I doubt Luke will care about who cooks," Nadia said, "what matters is that the cooking gets done."

Echo raised her brow. 

"So essentially, I need to make sure the house runs smoothly." Echo said with a nod. 

"Yep." Nadia said, "Starting with making sure the right things are getting cooked. This is your household now, you can let the same people keep making decisions or you can make them yourself."

"Nadia... you have wife dialed in perfectly." Echo said, "I would have never thought of half of these things."

Nadia shrugged. 

"I was raised to be a wife." Nadia said, looking around the kitchen, "but I always knew this wasn't my thing."

"I always thought the same thing... that I would never be married." Echo said, "I still can't believe it. I keep thinking I'm going to wake up from this dream"

"What's wrong?" Nadia asked. 

"Nothing, I just..." Echo began.

"What?" Nadia insisted. 

"Well... I haven't seen much of him lately." Echo said, "I haven't heard much from him either." 

"Don't worry too much about it." Nadia said with a nod, "It's part of it. Sometimes... he'll just be very busy."

"Yeah..." Echo muttered, "I suppose that's it."

---

"What do you mean nothing?!" Luke gritted through his tightly clenched teeth. It had been weeks and once again the search for the Russo brothers hadn't brought up any results. 

What was worse- he held in his hand more than half a dozen mysterious notes that had begun to arrive at him home. HIS HOME! How was it that no one had seen anything? He'd been over it hundreds of time with his staff, with his men and there was no one going in and out of the house without them being aware. Eventually, they'd been able to narrow it down to the mail, after all the notes did arrive in sealed envelopes that were settled nicely between the mail.